 So welcome to this seminar of the Center for World Christianity. Yes, so as it's my great pleasure to be welcoming Dr. Siverin Dununa, who has a number of official functions, one of them including being affiliated to Bath University. Then perhaps most importantly, you're also, she's also a director of international development of the Laudato Si research institute, which is of course a very well known institution. And those of you who have been in touch with the Institute in Oxford, then you can ask more questions after the session. I myself, I'm also familiar with Laudato Si, but I would encourage you to ask questions after the presentation itself. There are a number of publications which all relate to, which mostly relate to the field of economic development, social economic development and the environment, environmental sustainability and spirituality, all taken together. And I think this is where our speaker today has made a name for herself and for the Institute. So without wanting to say too much, I would like to pass the word to Dr. Dununa and also invite her to maybe say a few words in the beginning and let's start with the presentation. So thank you very much and all eyes on our speaker. Thank you very much, Lars. And so I come mainly from development studies, so I did economics is my first degree and they moved towards ethics with the words of Amartya Sen and my presentation today is very much situated within the field of development studies, but trying to bring insights from spirituality or from religious traditions into into development. So let me share my screen. So, whatever like to talk about today is an initiative that the Catholic Church started or about two years ago, called the Amazon Synod based on the document called Laudato Si, which Pope Francis issued what in 2015, which is a letter that is written to every person on the planet to have a global conversation on the meaning of progress and how do you understand progress that for 200 years, we have had a certain vision of progress that has led us to catastrophe. And so how can we redefine what it means to to develop in a common home. My argument will be was supposed to start from the religion and development literature, which is the most familiar with and which has to become a kind of field of study in itself, over the last 10 years. And within that field of religion and development, there's been so far very little discussion on how reflections on development from within the standpoints of religions can illuminate reflections on development. It's still kind of, I would say, a secular religious divide if we see any, if you believe in that distinction between the secular and the non secular. But what I'm saying is that there's still very little dialogue on how the reflections on progress conducting from within the theological frameworks have informed secular discourses on development. And then the argument is that, well, development studies is is a normative field. The very definition of development studies is about this multidisciplinary study about how can we improve people's lives. So it is really linked to emancipation, which is in some ways very much akin to religious traditions. It's also about normative for how we should live our lives and how to attain that normative ideal and emancipation of liberation freeing oneself from, from more sorts of attachments or addictions or whatever we call them in different religious traditions. And so my question is, was to these reflections on the meaning of development from within religious religious traditions to contribute something to development studies. And I'll take the example of the Catholic Church and the kind of its conceptualization of development and whether it can offer anything for for development studies. So I'll base this presentation is just five, five parts. So first just introduction about the illusive concept of religion. I don't know whether something I need to go quickly through that. As we, you know, as we all know, the definition of religion is a very, very contested subject. And then I'll go into development studies and it's normative foundations. Then I'll say a few words about the Catholic Church and its understanding of development. And then I'll go into the Amazon Synod and look at implications for development studies or and the research in on religion and development. So, despite I would say 20 years of research now on religion and development, there's still very little, I would say on on on engagement with the thinking on development from within religions. And it begs the question, what do we understand by religions. And here I've decided to take a contextual approach, not trying to define what religion not trying to to offer something that is universal or general. But look at one specific manifestation of religion, and which is in the Catholic social tradition. The other traditional tradition is, is a body of thought that the Catholic Church has started about 150 years ago, 40 years ago on analyzing the social economic realities from the perspective of faith. The first document was in 1891, which was called Rerum Navarro, which was a kind of engagement with the Industrial Revolution. So how could the church respond to them, the industrialization to them, the exploitation of workers in factories, and what would the gospel say to these situations. So that's kind of started this kind of systematic reflections on socio economic realities from the perspective of the Catholic faith. And these documents have been addressed to people of all faith and non since the 1960s. And the latest document is load that to see in 2015, which is addressed as I said before to, to every person on the planet. I mentioned it in the in its early, early days, it was much, much, much more, much better received among secular circles and the Catholic circles you had Naomi Klein, for example, who was very much promoting the document. While if you went to the average Catholic church in the UK, the parish priest would never have read it. And it was interesting how the first engage the first people who kind of really took it on board where the Naomi Klein at George Montbure, the kind of, you know, on these these kind of environmental activists. And the Catholic tradition is is kind of a reflection of this dynamic interaction between the life of faith communities with grassroots academics and church leadership. So even if it's the pope that that kind of science is these documents. It's not the pope who writes them. So to say, they can have emerged from from from the life on the ground. And if you know if you go back to the first document in 1891. Well, it was first the, the, the engagement of faith communities, especially in Germany and Belgium and France with the Industrial Revolution. So you had a few Jesuits in Germany, who kind of started to think about how to respond to these situations of exploitation. And then you had the social workers movements and, and, and then, and then this was reflected upon. And the same with with the environmental movement and load that to see you have first I think a lot of first of engagement at the local level, especially in Latin America. And how then that that social mobilization is then translated at the level later on. And so let's just miss a few words about development studies and it's normative foundations. I don't know if many, if some of you are in development studies. I think we should have done some introduction beforehand. So, at the very notion of development is this idea, you know, it's, it's, it's moving from one situation to a better one. And ever since the start of development studies in the 1960s, there has been heavy distressions on on what does it mean to to towards a better situation, what constitutes progress. From the, the roster of the stages of economic growth to human rights to women's women's rights to the MDGs and SDGs today. But it is the consensus today is that the development and here I take the definition of the development studies association is that development is about combating the global challenges of poverty, injustice and environmental degradation. And from the literature on on on what development studies is now what is key is that development has a mission. It has a mission to analyze to transform and to interrogate processes of social change. In some ways, development studies occupies a very specific position in the academic field. It's not only about doing research on something it's not only about understanding the social reality. It's also about trying to to to transform it. So it is to analyze in order to transform that reality. And so this is why you know development studies borrows from all these different disciplines of sociology and non-native, politics, psychology, law, engineering and geography in order to to transform a certain reality and make it better. So, so I think there's a consensus that that development studies is about not only analyzing the problems of poverty and injustice, but also trying to combat them trying to address them and and and be achieving social change through research and involvement with policy and practice. And development studies is is is a multiplicity of many disciplines, as we know. And history comes in. So far, philosophy and theology are not very much engaged with yet. And that be done of my argument that we need to engage more with the disciplines of discipline of theology in in development studies. Because it has some insights to say about, you know, about this mission of improving people's lives or the mission of combating poverty and environmental degradation. And so far, the normative discussions and development studies about what what is what is it to improve people's lives, what does it mean to live a better life. The discussion has done mainly from political and moral philosophy, not mainly from MRTSN and the Human Development Report. But it hasn't, but it hasn't been kind of mainstream, or it has done from feminist, political theory, of course, feminist philosophy, or Marxism, critical theory. But if you step aside from Marxism and MRTSN and feminist feminist theory, there is actually very little discussion about the normative basis of development of what we are, what we understand as a better state. So recently in the last five years, especially, there's been this big movement in development to decolonize. I think it's just becoming better and better. So, as we all know, development studies is born from the colonial project. The Institute of Development Studies in the IDS in Sussex was initially a place to train colonial administrators. The Institute of Social Studies in the Hague was a place to train the Indonesian colonial, post-colonial administrators. So there wouldn't be development studies today if there hadn't been colonization. And now we're really stepping back from it, with the Rosimus Fall, the Black Lives Matter movement. And this movement to think about our own possession of power and where is our knowledge coming from. And there's also been a much greater engagement in recent years with Indigenous cosmology. It's linked to the social movement of Indigenous people. But also this movement to decolonize really, to senior chair, what can we learn from other ways of knowledge, other ways of knowing the world. And if we take Indigenous cosmologies, well, unavoidably, we are into the territory of mixing the spiritual and the material, because for Indigenous people, everything is connected. The forest is imbued with spirits. And so, you know, we need to engage with these plus more visions of what it is to be human and what it is to relate with nature. Yeah, I just want to say a few words about the Human Development Report 2020, which came out in December last year, and which is basically the stresses Indigenous cosmologies and the stresses also Islam and Christianity. Saying that, you know, that through Indigenousismo visions, everything is interconnected. And we are striving to harmony, to oneness of creation. And the report is actually trying to derive even these implications of interconnectedness and harmony and this strike for oneness and for thinking about development. And especially with thinking what it is to be human, because even if we take the human development approach, what does it mean to become more fully human. So then really the Catholic Church and its own conceptualization of what it is to be human. The first reflection on development was in the 1960s, so again into the wave of decolonization. So the 1960s, also the birth of the emergence of these new independent countries and how to respond to this new situation of the post-colonial world. And this is the first UN development decade and that's when I think that the world development was coined into our international vocabulary. And that document in 1967 that was signed by by Pope Paul VI talked about integral human development. The first development that the UN was talking about was not just about economic growth, and it had also to be about the development of the person and the whole person, so putting people first. So one could say that more than 20 years before the human development report, you had already a conceptualization of development as putting people first. That would then be taken on board by the UN 20 years later. And then about the spatial dimension of life that we should not neglect this dimension of spatial growth, which it talks about as being open to the values of friendship of prayer and contemplation. And then that would prefigure the voices of the poor document of the World Bank in 2000 that talked about contemplation and prayer as being very important dimensions in poor people's lives. And then kind of come back to that, that development is not just about material growth, but also about inner growth, about spiritual growth, and increase in the quality of friendships, quality of relationships. And 2015 is the second major reflection on development within the Catholic Church with Lodato Si. And this time, a radically different context from the one of 67, which is climate change and biodiversity loss, which in the 1960s was not really much on the agenda. We only had Rachel Carson on the, I think the Salon Spring was published in 1962. So we were in the very, very early days of the environmental awakening. And Pope Francis develops then that that thinking on internal human development. It extends this virtual dimension to relationship with the natural world. And it talks about the manifestation of the divine in anyone who gives herself out of love to help others and to protect nature. And it's not the naumic lines of this world that the greater Thunberg would be seen as the manifestation of the divine. As any person who gives herself to protect nature is an expression of this, this kind of divine presence in the world. And it talks about development, not so much in terms of internal human development, but in terms of internal ecology. And these two concepts are now used interchangeably. I would not say that the Catholic Church has not read of the language of development. It's still very much there. There's a big history for the promotion of internal human development. But in a given its, its loadedness and its history, there is a move away from talking about development, talking about integral ecology, especially when you think about Latin America, and in the alternatives to development and the rejection of development because so many, so much destruction has occurred in the name of development in Latin America. The Amazon, the Amazon forest has been destroyed in the name of development. There is none of this replacement with, with the language of integral ecology that the striving or goal is not internal human development or goal is integral ecology understood as harmony, because everything is interconnected. And then what we are looking for is this harmony between these different dimensions of life. And what I would like to see emphasizes and it's something that we find very strongly in the human development report that we need to consider what it is to be human. And what it is to be human is being part of the wider web of life. What it is to be human is not, it's not about being in control of nature, dominating nature, being human is being part of something that is of common home, you know, the wider web of life we are part of the animal kingdom. We are, we are sharing the ecosystem with the lions with the, with the hedgehogs, and, and we are all interconnected. And what I'd love that to see emphasizes and which which the human development report also emphasizes is this idea of inner growth that development is not something that is to be done out there in the global south. Development is something that we also do in the global north, but also within ourselves this idea of personal transformation. And that connects with the digitalization movement and looking at our own place in our relations of power. How do I deal with power in my own relations? Am I aware of my white bias? Am I aware of my Eurocentrism? Am I aware of my own patriarchal bias? And so, and what do I need to do to transform myself? And that's something that we see more and more in development studies, this relationship between development as a global structural project, but also something that is much more personal. And how the two are connected, how the personal change is connected to structural change. So change has to be integral. And the message from Laudato Si and from the digitalization movement is that it's above all us humans who have to change. And the colonial movement would say, you know, it's Western academia that has to change. It's us academics that have to change the way we do our research, the way we collaborate with global researchers, with researchers in the global south. And so we need a profound transformation of everything in our lifestyles, in our models of production, in established structures of power, and also in ourselves. And in order to start implementing that structural transformation, well the place to start is the Catholic Church itself. So the Catholic Church as well needs to be transformed according to its own vision. And this is why the Pope convened the Amazon Synod in 2019 to start this process of transformation of the church but also of structures of production and consumption. So the Amazon Synod was the first assembly of the Catholic Church to discuss a situation in a territory. It wasn't dealing with a topic as previous assemblies before it was discussing a territory. Parallels with development studies that we are no longer looking at countries, we are looking at biomes, because ecosystems are beyond nation states, we need to look at things in an integral way. And so instead of looking at a topic, let's say migration, or let's look at what's happening in a specific ecosystem by your own territory. And it's the first Synod, the first assembly that didn't include only ordained men, but also indigenous people. And more than 100 delegates from indigenous organizations came to Rome, and here's some pictures to participate in the discussion so that they would be driving the agenda. And before the meeting, there has been a massive consultation that is signed with 87,000 people over two years about how they saw development and the role of the church in the Amazon region. And so to see the process, so you had a working document to discuss, that was in this just in the assembly, and then the final document. And then the pope's own reflections on the meeting. And there's one to highlight in three areas that from that meeting from the Amazon Synod that we could take for development studies. One is the area of interconnectedness of full life systems. And the search for harmony as a normative criteria with which to assess progress. And then we see that already in the human development report 2020 by borrowing from indigenous to small visions. The report is moving and the human development is towards this harmony with between old spheres. And here I quote from the instrumentum laboris, which is the working document, you know, and from indigenous people and the good life should not be seen in terms of accumulation of material goods but as harmony with oneself with nature with other human beings and with the supreme being. There is intercommunication between the whole cosmos, where they are not excluded and excluded, so that we can all form a project of life in plenitude. And here, another passage, we are part of nature because we are water, air, earth and life of the environment created by God. And this quote actually is is also not replicated, but you find a similar quote from a First Nations community from the United States in the human development report that we are water we are air that we cannot be separated that and that humans we share, we share with why the ecosystems. And then the second area that I would argue development studies could borrow is this idea of stretches of sin or with total structures which undermine all lives in common and the recognition of a participation in these structures. We find parallels with the decolonization movement and structures of power and our own participation in patriarchy in colonial relations of power. And here the Amazon Synod is just the modification of forest and water and the domination of financial interests. Here I quote from the final document, they identified the structures of the privatization of natural goods of water, legal logging, concessions and illegal logging, media projects. And this is behind all this, this are dominant economic and political interest with the complexity of some government officials and some indigenous authorities. So here, the document is inviting all of us to think about all participation in the structures, especially through our investment. In the church, we are, they are thinking about where the money is invested, how to disinvest from fossil fuels. I was just reading the Guardian this morning, a report about the University of Oxford that had received 11 million pounds of donations from fossil fuel industries over the last 10 years. So, sort of looking at, know what is the University's own position with regard to the structures of power and structures of which undermine all lives in common. And then I put from the first letter, but the throwaway culture as another structure that is undermining our life in common. And there's none that that that makes us want one more resources. And then the third area that I would argue developments that is to borrow from this idea of self responsibility at the collective and individual level. And starting with the church itself. And, and looking at the church's own collaboration and naturalization enterprise. This exclusion of women is corruption. And you, which is only starting that process of recognizing its own collaboration in destroying indigenous culture in excluding women in in sympathizing with dictatorships and so on. And it's a very slow process. The idea is actually very central to Pope Francis papacy is the idea of bringing the peripheries to the center. Not that the peripheries can become the center, but that the peripheries can transform the center. And this is the dynamic of the synod is to bring the wisdom from indigenous communities from those who've been suffering at the margins. And bring the knowledge into the center. So it can be seen the same dynamic as this digitalization movement. To get away from this euro centrism and take from the wisdom, the ways of knowledge of people who are suffering at the margins of the peripheries and bring that to the center, so that they can transform the center. This kind of approaches is now being replicated beyond the Amazon. And we actually here at the data to see research institute we started an initiative of networking churches in the Congo basin in the Philippines in India in Oceania, and in North America with with Canada the first nations. And in Europe, and bringing these different networks together to think about this in territorial conversion and bring the wisdom of the people of Papua New Guinea, the wisdom of the people of the Amazon into into Europe into into North America and how the churches and in Europe could be transformed and and recognize their own participation in the stretches of power and the stretches of destruction of environmental destruction. But this is not to say that this is this process of integral integral cultural conversion is not resisted. Pope Francis has a lot of opposition in Rome, and especially in the United States, and power and politics is at the heart of the graphic church like any other organization. And it is a difficult process. But nonetheless, you know, the process has been set in movement and and I've been to seem to see how in the next 10 years, this process develops. Just to wrap up about the implications for development studies. And there is a, there's a very good book on development studies and its future that's been published in 2019. And that was the outcome of some meetings of the European Association of Development Institutes. And now what it's argued is that now development studies needs a new vision and in that new vision, it much reflect that new vision must reflect not only the interdisciplinarity. And now we are we see in development studies and bridging more and more with the sciences with engineers with with physics with geology with hydrology. But we also as a need to to reflect that development studies needs to reflect these multiple forms of knowledge. And we started the process with, and respecting the forms of knowledge from indigenous personal visions. And I wonder whether the next step now will be to respect the forms of knowledge from within religious traditions. And that could be kind of a new area for development studies. And there is no reason why, you know, this process or this, this word I've started to do within the Catholic Church can be done at with other other other other religious tradition actually I'm starting a project with Islam of translating the Quran to see in the Quran. So someone will be working at taking the Quran and looking at, you know, all the, the, the, the the Quranic on the pen names of the argument about that to see. And see this we're thinking of what it is to be human and doing beyond the human nature, material spiritual dichotomies and I think we are, you are still very much in that dichotomy. Even in the religion and development research, you know the sacred and the secular, we still talk in terms of these dichotomies you know, but how to go beyond them how to go beyond the material spiritual the sacred the secular and the human and the nature. And I think that would be the challenge for development to go beyond these dichotomies. And then explore how then these religious traditions that go beyond these dichotomies can better fulfill the commitment of development studies. I'll leave it, I'll leave it there. Thank you. No stop sharing. Yes, let's do it like this. You just forgot one quite important detail, namely the book that you're going to be publishing in June. I shared the publication details in the in the chat function, if you can see but maybe you can just say two or three words about the main focus of your book. So the, so the book is, it's not going forward in dialogue between one tradition of thought with the human development framework with Amartya Sen and then the other tradition within the Catholic tradition and and how they can inform each other on three areas one on the meaning of development, the second areas on the anthropology of what it is to be human. And then the third is about social transformation. And so, in these three areas, I look at how the religious tradition can inform human development, but also how human development and the human development reports. And then Amartya Sen, the capability approach can inform the religious tradition, especially on women, and on power and politics. That's the nutshell of the book. Thank you very much. I mean, I had a lot of questions actually that if if I can just jump the queue and and just ask you about the last point that you made the pen out here in your in your summary already. I was going to ask you about the implications for areas where other religions are more important and then, of course, Islam is tremendously important in Southeast Asia, for example, is from the Laudato Si point of view. Is there a certain conference that is possible that you see, you said that you're looking at the Quran at the moment in order to see what their parallels, but in from a development point of view, do you think that Christianity in the tradition that in the newly shaped tradition that you outlined earlier on and Islam have the same perspective on, you know, creation, role of God, the role of the human in this environment. Well, I think this is to be explored on on the surface. They have the same perspective from the discussions I have had on the subject already. A couple of months after Laudato Si came out, there was an Islamic declaration on climate change that follows exactly the same stretches of Laudato Si and it's much shorter. And that was this was probably Istanbul declaration on climate change. And it was pushed by Islamic relief and and a few, few other Islamic organizations. There hasn't been much widespread taught into some Muslim scholars have never had never heard of it. In terms of the teachings, I wouldn't say there is much difference and and the Pope has has made this kind of agreement with the run move T of Al-Azhar declaration of opportunity and cooperation. And this is actually something that I'm going to look at much more in the future. I'm just starting a project also with Masouda Bano on on care for the earth and care for the poor looking at the Muslim and the Catholic traditions in comparative perspective. But what is I think that the major difference is the organizational difference and the trajectory of the countries. Within Christianity or within the Catholic Church we have a structure of knowledge in some ways. But in the traffic is very centralized. And we have the authority of the Pope and this role of magisterium. There is reflection on development has been going on for a long time within the world concept of churches. And I'm not dealing with them but I know they exist and the World Council of Church document doesn't have the same, the same status as a document from the Pope when the Catholic Church. And within Islam, we have the same issue is that you don't have central authoritative teaching figure. Yes, you have the Imam. But the Imam of Indonesia, for example, of a mosque in Jakarta doesn't have authority over a mosque in London. And it's something that needs to be addressed and I think there is a movement in renewing Islamic scholarship on these debates and have so much more harmony and collaborations. But I think organizationally it's difficult for the Muslim tradition, the Islamic tradition to have such a common document. And yes, we do a lot of networking which we hope to do with this project on the Quran, try to get Indonesian leaders get people from the Islamic centers of learning on board. Thank you very much. There's much more to be said than I was thinking of Africa. But I wonder who amongst you would like to ask questions first. Nicholas, I see a hand growing up there. Please go ahead. Thank you very much for your presentation. And I wonder if I can start by commenting on international law. You are probably familiar with the Convention on biological diversity from 1993. And also for the Council of Europe's burn convention on the conservation of European wildlife and natural habitats, which was the earlier one in 1979. And international documents have preambles. And in the preamble of both of these, there are reasons given for the conservation of biodiversity. And apart from the usual ones given of what it's useful to people. There's a very interesting phrase, both of them use the phrase attributed to biodiversity of it possessing intrinsic value. And that is absolutely nothing to do with its usefulness to human beings. That it seems to me bridges the three main monotheistic religions really rather nicely. And I would tie it in with what I would respect for the suggest as the correct interpretation of Genesis chapter one. Humanity is given its role, its raison d'etre, its job. And that is not to exploit, because that's not what I understand the Hebrew to say. It says govern. And government of the natural world is thus given to human beings as their primary fundamental raison d'etre. And government is carried out not for the benefit of the government of those governing, but for the benefit of those who are governed. In other words, we realize our true identity our true reality by caring for that which we have been given responsibility for which we've been given. And that it seems transforms the entire approach that we should have. The fundamental development is not the key is caring for and looking and preserving and looking after and conserving the whole of the integrated interconnected reality that is biodiversity. And that it seems ties in with what I understand to be the Orthodox traditions view of the liturgy, which incorporates the concept of representing back to God through the sacrifice and inverted commas of the whole creation. And by pouring through the liturgy, the creation back to God we are fulfilling our human duty to return it to that status that God originally created. And I wonder whether to what extent you have had contact with the ecumenical patriarchs, a religion science and the environment symposia. We've been organizing since the 1990s, and one of which was on the Amazon and I think 2006. These of course dealt with inviting not just scientists not just politicians, but also theologians from the, and I put them in this chronological order Jewish Christian and Islamic backgrounds. There has been a substantial exchange of views on ecological matters, which has been overseen by the ecumenical patriarch going back for nearly 25 years. I wonder to what extent you found those. I think it's really a helpful source of help was also help, I suppose. It's very good that the papacy has effectively come come on board, and I, and I'm delighted with its efforts on the environmental front. But I don't think it was quite the first. No, I don't know very much. No, no, initially, in Pope Francis and let the sea starts the document by knowledge and the going back to it, but that you are. Now I am, I am familiar with the the Orthodox, the work in the Orthodox Church on these issues and I've read a board by a Christo, Christo Bades on the John Christian bodies on liturgy and Yeah, I am aware of this dialogue and my colleague, Celia Dindrimund, I know has attended one or two of these meetings. There's definitely much more work to be done in terms of learning from each other. Yeah, I don't know the extent to which Amazon Sennaud was looking at the Orthodox Church, I think it was looking much more from the indigenous perspective. But there's definitely more work to be done on this exchange and I know that in the Protestant world they had this Vipital conference and Vipital declaration a year or two ago. So these are sort of attempts to have some some common documents or common statements. Yeah, yeah, but the biodiversity, the Dazdutra report that came out in February this year on the economic sub-biodiversity has a chapter on the sacredness of nature. And back to the intrinsic value of nature. Thank you. Thank you so much Nicholas. It's very worthwhile comment because of course more important than any law or any political considerations are those that go to the very heart of the discourse which is the, you know, the position of creation and what is what we do with it as believing beings. Jörg, your hand went up. Yeah, I just wanted to pick it up there. Hello, sir. Good to see you. You said, and I was kind of intrigued by this he said that development studies might have a lot to learn from religious language and taking on religious concepts such as sin. To one extent, to some extent, I agree with you but I'm also struggling with that notion because what is it to gain for people who are not religious or who are from a different religious background to learn that language. So I can see the usefulness of developing a number of synergies between let's say an ideological critique of the assumption that everything needs to grow that the economy needs to grow or we're going downhill and you know bill call notions by greed. So, you know, beyond, however, just bringing people together and discovering those synergies and then saying, how can we join up those movements in a common fight against climate change. I don't know what there is to gain of development studies itself as sort of a discipline that doesn't, that isn't rooted in a particular religious tradition, what they would have to gain from the religious tradition so I don't know what literacy I see synergies I see, but it is sort of incorporating a particular religious language within a discipline that's not theological. I don't know what it's what you what you were thinking of there so I wanted to push you on that a little bit. If I may ask a second question is that allowed. The other question I have, you know that I had this small pilot project on sustainable development goals and we just, you know, then found on the grassroots so little engagement and that's of course a frustration that many of us share. Perhaps more if you're more of an observer like myself that there is all these top level organizations and declarations and gatherings that when you then look at the ground level they don't really seem to connect all that well. So how does how does this filter down how can this really translate into grassroots movements, especially in the issues of climate change which in the areas that are most affected by climate change often translates into basic needs. So you work with organizations around hunger drought, those kinds of things. And of course not climate change advocacy because the most urgent thing is to get people water and fed so so there's also that kind of disconnected you see that that fight then is something that stays more outside in the West or is this something that we can bring into more of a grassroots approach let's say into communities in Africa and other places. Good questions. I would say that I would be more in the religious, the synergies born and adopting the language so what. It's not about non development studies borrowing suddenly the language of structures of sin. But it's about taking the idea that there are structures which are undermining life in common. It's not about structures of vices like no greed or and or like this idea of conversion. Well it's not an idea that travels outside religious circles, but it doesn't mean that transformation cannot travel or in the growth in the transformation. Yeah, I think it's a good point that that that what we should emphasize is how the ideas that are born from within religious traditions can travel outside. This idea of synergy or translation, but not necessarily these religious concepts of sin or conversion. But, but yeah. Still the same, the same ideas. And love, for example, that the only the thought of a set of Kenosis, you know, self emptying for the state of the other, but this is something that that would travel outside the religious language of of the environmental defenders for example on the ones who are risking their lives giving their lives for the sake of protecting the forest. So I think this is where I was coming from with this idea of synergy and more than than adopting the language. And on the on the grassroots. I think it probably depends on the context for the inlet in America, the grassroots is so affected by destructive development with the mining aspirations and that that these documents do do filtrate at the local level because they can have a resource of mobilization against the extractive against governments or and I don't know in Africa, it may be maybe a different different context. And it probably also depends on on the stretch of the of your organization in some way in the the role of missionaries the role of of the hierarchy in the Catholic Church and how you know the bishop, the bishop then influenced the priest or mission or in the missionary orders, you know, if the Jesuits decide that the orientation is careful coming home, then every Jesuit in the world within the most remote, you know, place of Kenya and will have that as this as the focus. Yeah. It would be interesting to look at the context and and for my limited knowledge of Africa and and for my interaction with the the Congo, the, the, the, the red, the Ecclesian network for the Congo basin. It's very materiality for them the forestation and maybe again Ethiopia is another context I don't know. No, I mean it depends very much on the context of where you are but in terms of the stakeholders that we interviewed the climate change oriented goals, you know, clean water air ranked relatively low on the sort of and those were largely white organizations so yes locally when there's land grabbing going on when there's drought these things may pop up, but it's hard to translate that into sustained grassroots efforts and efforts in many areas. And of course it doesn't make a difference whether there's a Catholic priest who has this in their hand already if it doesn't resonate with what local farmers are experiencing or seeking and it doesn't make a difference either so. Yeah, but thank you that that's that's very helpful on the thing about synergies and I wrote an article where we kind of spell this out with La Claus philosophy or sort of broadening political groups and kind of generating sort of a grassroots movement that has politics as forging synergies under labels that everybody can agree to those and social policy and society came out last month so I can send you the reference if you're interested. Yes, please. Yeah. Thank you. Yeah, this is what these seminars are for they are places where we can exchange ideas and where we can suggest them, you know, you research to each other, and then old research older what Nicholas earlier said yes this does go back to the 1970s This is a very discussion which has some cross fertilized different academic disciplines but then also the faith communities, the discourse in in general you know if you picked up a newspaper in the 1970s. The topics would be completely different. To make nobody would have mentioned her as that's, she would have been a little girl somewhere. Now, of course, this is something that has changed us the way that we think and it is only logical that you know this has a direct impact on the religious structures that we belong to. Now Francis, your hand has been up for some time. Yes, please go ahead. And I probably behind the times now I was I was going to pick up on that interplay between religion and the language of religion and language of human development and get they can teach each other. And my own work which was in the Andes of Ecuador was precisely trying to look at that and looking at integral development as understood by the Catholic social teaching and I do say teaching rather than tradition here. And how that not only that was implemented, but how the impact on it on the integral development of marginalized children, they happen to be indigenous children, how that could be measured in terms of all the aspects obviously of their development sorry I'm losing my sentence here. I was looking at Jesuit education in a rural area, and what I did was to adapt sense capability approach to measure the impact of the Jesuit schools that work with those children. And there being studies carried out on the impact of various institutions on children. For me I wanted to adapt that to take into account spirituality to take into account solidarity collective values which, as we know are or are supposed to be very important in Indian cultures. And I found the two work very well, and you can use the capability approach to measure such things not spirituality, but the children's perception of how the school helps them develop their spirituality the parents perception, which is not always the same of how the school impacts on that. And so there is an interplay there between something like the capability approach. It's actually I think because it is not complete theory of justice, we can take it and adapt it to what we want, and I would love at some stage to have a longer conversation with Dr. Have you written it somewhere. That was my PhD thesis, which was completed last year. Oh, so it's very recent. Okay. So I spent two years in the Ecuadorian and is. And when I read about perfect harmony of communities and people in nature, human nature is the same everywhere. The work of the Jesuits. The Jesuits, but their work on on integral development is very interesting, but it's, it's not easy, and it's not always successful, but I do feel that by using something like the capability approach to be adapted. And one can get helpful pointers as to further develop the education that is my data. So where can I find your PhD is it on some database. I send it to you I put I embargoed it for a year so it's not yet it's University of London but I can, I would be happy to send it to you. Three pages, called as done a lot in the bibliography. Did you do what with LA know something or I worked. I started at Heathrow College and then they closed it and I went on with the school of advanced study. Advanced study is college at the University of London is the University of London Senate House behind me. Anyway, Francis fascinating very very interesting. Do we have more questions. Any of the others because I know that people are dropping off because they have to go back to their jobs and Yes. Last round. No. Yes. So, am I allowed one last question just a short one. It's, and when you that takes us back to the very beginning where where the topic of development studies is introduced and I I mean shows my age I mean I actually remember how the term was discussed in the very beginning you know why, why is it not decolonize decolonization studies rather than anything else. And, but, but it's this image where taken in 1961 I think where this man is holding up the the the sign celebrating the end of the colonial era, and I just wonder whether we are underestimating the the impression that we have in. Well, we refer to it as the global south that environmental protection is a first world concern. And I'm saying this because my, my interest is in China, and I followed the changing discourse that you've had in China from the Well, when I first could read Chinese was 1980 so if you if you picked up, not just party papers but any any kind of Chinese medium that the emphasis was clearly on economic development so how can we get our factories to to belch out even fumes in order to make us all richer. And this is something which is has changed in in China and in some other countries which have managed to develop, but I wonder whether we're collectively guilty of the sin of underestimating the the the reservations that poor people have in the world who think that we're somehow depriving them of economic progress. I know that I know of all the discussions I know what of course the context is but in our publications we this tends to be a blind spot, and I'm myself guilty of this. I'm quite clear. I just wonder whether you have any thoughts about this. What's the first world problem. Well certainly they're more responsibility in it, or ancestors they're more responsibility in it. Yeah, when it's done. I don't know if there is a response to that. If you think of the fact that the majority of the Christians in the world are now at home in the, you know, in the global south. You know, you have a pope who now says, from Rome, from his, you know, a condition to sweet, you know, we should be kind to nature. Then they, they, they look at their plot, and they think, well, we should exploit the earth. So, how do you do you think this is a potential problem. But if we take the perspective of those who are exploded and marginalized, if you look at Indonesia, and if you take the perspective of the poor, the ones who are suffering from the palm oil plant, the old pine plantations, their response will be very different from the business elite. And, and so it's about trying to see the situation from the perspective of those, those who are marginalized and those who suffer and from their perspective. Addressing climate change and environmental concern is, is a problem of everybody. And not just the global north, not, but the Indonesian elites, the Congolese politicians. And, and, and yet the European investors who invest in, in, in, in these companies or not do. So, yeah, I would say that that would be the perspective of it's not taking the environmental search but taking the perspective of dues who live under margin and so if we see the world from their perspective. And it's the idea of solidarity. Then, yeah, then it's the responsibility of every single person. Thank you. That's a very comprehensive answer. Any questions. Thank you profusely. And it was a great pleasure to have you here back again, since before COVID in any case, so we, I hope that we can all meet again at so as in person, or in other places even but if it's always wonderful to wonderful to see academic work in progress. And this is of course, both spiritual and academic work but it will be published so by an academic university press is a roughly. So, your book so I'm looking forward to reading that too. Thank you and I'll be in touch with your then Francis to send me your, your work. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you. Bye bye. Bye bye. Thank you. Bye bye.