Brian Davey trained as an economist but, aside from a brief spell working in eastern Germany showing how to do community development work, has spent most of his life working in the community and voluntary sector in Nottingham particularly in health promotion, mental health and environmental fields. He helped form Ecoworks a community garden and environmental project for people with mental health problems. He is a member of Feasta Climate Working Group and co-ordinates the Cap and Share Campaign.
Justin Kenrick is a social anthropologist and activist who lives in Portobello, Edinburgh, where he helped co-found PEDAL – Portobello Transition Town in 2005. He lectured in social anthropology at the University of Glasgow from 2001 to 2009, when he left to work for the Forest Peoples Programme supporting Central African forest peoples to protect their rights to their forests. He has been heavily involved in campaigning against nuclear weapons, in campaigns against the logging of Canada’s old growth forests, and currently works with a loose network of resilience-building communities across Scotland.
Laurence Matthews is a mathematician who has worked as a university lecturer and in the transport industry, where he carried out consultancy work on five continents. For several years he has lectured and campaigned on the psychology of climate change, and has given evidence to the Environment Select Committee of the UK House of Commons. He is Chair of Cap and Share UK, an NGO promoting Cap and Share, which is described in Chapter 3.
Nick Bardsley lectures in climate change economics at the School of Agriculture Policy and Development at the University of Reading. He is interested in ecological and behavioural economics, particularly deepening understanding of energy “rebound effects” and evidence that contradicts received theories of economic behavior.
John Jopling. For 30 years John practiced as a barrister in London advising clients about the law of trusts. Increasing awareness of the deep-seated flaws in mainstream economic and political systems led to using his professional expertise to help establish a number of new institutions, including FIELD, the Foundation for International Environmental Law and Development, and Feasta. Publications include two Feasta Reviews, edited jointly with Richard Douthwaite, and the Schumacher Briefing Gaian Democracies, written jointly with Roy Madron. John lived in the Ecovillage in Cloughjordan, County Tipperary, Ireland, until his death in November 2019.
James Bruges, with David Friese-Greene, is working with Social Change and Development, an NGO in Tamil Nadu, on the Soil Fertility Project. This combines biochar with sludge from anaerobic digestion as an organic alternative to synthetic fertilisers for the 5,000 farmers connected with SCAD. He is author of The Big Earth Book and The Biochar Debate.
Caroline Whyte grew up in Belfast and Dublin. Her involvement with Feasta began while she was living in the western United States. She collaborated with Richard Douthwaite on an online update of his book Short Circuit: Strengthening Local Economies in an Unstable World in 2002-3 and went on to study ecological economics at Mälardalen University in Sweden in 2005-6, writing a masters thesis on the relationship between central banking and sustainability. She lives in central France, from where she edits the Feasta blog.
Richard Douthwaite was an economist, journalist and author specialising in energy, climate and sustainability issues. He was a co-founder of Feasta, served on its executive and co-ordinated the Feasta Climate Working Party. His books included The Growth Illusion (1992), Short Circuit (1996) and The Ecology of Money (1999). He also edited and contributed to Before the Wells Run Dry (2003) and Fleeing Vesuvius (2010). Until his death in November 2011, he lived in Westport Co Mayo.
David Knight has been a research scientist and teacher in Life and Medical Sciences since 1970 with a particular interest in carbon-neutral biomaterials. His parallel interest in Ecology, Energy Policy and Economics started in 1973 when he and Prof. Paul Smoker at Lancaster University started “Half Life” to oppose civil and military nuclear power in NW England. He is currently an advisor on the science of energy and climate change to both Feasta and Winchester Action on Climate Change. At Richard Douthwaite’s request David assisted with natural science, references and some editorial work when Richard was too ill to complete his chapter.
