Seven innovative projects are awarded funding by the Ecological Citizen(s) Network+ to explore “Ecological Citizenship” under the theme of Materials and Resources.
The Royal College of Art (RCA), in collaboration with the SEI York centre at the University of York, and Wrexham University, has announced the recipients of the first funding round in the Ecological Citizen(s) Network+ research project.
Ecological Citizens: Tools, Technologies and Means to Enable Sustainable Citizens brings together a multidisciplinary team of experts in design, science and technology to tackle the ecological and climate crisis by using the digital economy to catalyze sustainable change beyond individual actions. Its mission is to foster and proactively encourage (through technologically appropriate interventions) Ecological Citizenship for positive climate action.
The project was awarded £3.3 million in 2023 by UKRI’S Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) to establish the Ecological Citizen(s) Network+, over 4 years. The grant awarded by EPSRC includes three rounds of funding which will support innovative projects, initiatives and pilots devising new-found ways to encourage and explore Ecological Citizenship and its potential in moving us towards preferable futures. In this first round, under the theme Materials and Resources, following an extensive review process the projects awarded funding are:
I see the Ecological Citizen(s) Network+ as an essential endeavour for the RCA and its partners in this research project. Working with community networks, knowledge exchange, small and medium enterprises and other civil society stakeholders means that any changes we make to prioritise ecological citizenship will be truly sustainable. These seven projects demonstrate exactly that in their ambition and their sharp focus.
Professor Christoph Lindner, President & Vice-Chancellor, Royal College of Art
Ecological Citizen(s) Network+ is led by Dr Rob Phillips (Senior Tutor in MA Design Products / MDes Design Futures, School of Design, RCA) with Professor Sharon Baurley (Director of the RCA’s Materials Science Research Centre) and Tom Simmons (Head of Programme, MA Digital Direction, School of Communication, RCA), in partnership with Dr Sarah West, Centre Director of SEI York at the University of York and Professor Alec Shepley of the Faculty of Arts, Computing and Engineering at Wrexham University, as well as a range of non-academic partners from industry, charities, culture and civil society.
Ecological Citizen(s) Network+ follows a number of initiatives at the RCA that have employed design innovation, technology and collaboration to promote awareness of, and increase access to, sustainable processes and products. These initiatives include; The My Naturewatch project, in collaboration with Northumbria Interaction Research Studio, the BBC and The Wildlife Trusts’ #30dayswild programme; the Terra Carta Design Lab – which invites students and alumni to design solutions addressing the climate crisis – as well as work carried out by the College’s Textiles Circularity Centre.
Conceptually, the notion of ‘Ecological Citizenship’ was published in a seminal position paper at the prestigious Cumulus Detroit conference in November 2022. This design-led work believes:
EC is defined as “activities that go beyond your own agenda, benefiting the wider ecologies, systems or communities surrounding you."
Phillips et al. 2022
As an ever growing research network, Ecological Citizen(s) mobilizes diverse groups of people to make impactful change through accessible technology and community-focused approaches – including citizen science, activism, collective learning, advocacy, design strategies, creative arts, manufacturing, environmental science and engineering practices. As a pro-active collaborative community, the network has the potential to cover a wide range of pressing topics from biomaterials and wildlife corridors to local manufacturing and repair, and will draw on expertise from across the RCA, as well as other academic, business and civil society partners.
Project / SEI's Ecological Citizens project cultivates trans-disciplinary collaboration and research to enable a digital sustainable society for positive climate action.
Ecological Citizen(s) Network+ is a NetworkPlus project funded by EPSRC grant EP/W020610/1 that is focused on digital interventions that would create ‘the conditions to make change’ towards a sustainable post-industrial society.
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