Thriving: The Breakthrough Movement

23. Pessimism is a Luxury We Can No Longer Afford, with Kumi Naidoo

Season 1 Episode 23

My guest this week is Kumi Naidoo, Founding Chair at Africans Rising and former Secretary General at Amnesty International and Executive Director at Greenpeace. In this episode, he talks about why:

  • Thriving requires a can-do attitude and intergenerational mentality that accepts that social and environmental justice is a struggle of a lifetime
  • Framing climate change as an environmental issue was a strategic and tactical blunder of major proportions
  • Environmental decline is not from lack of solutions, but rather lack of political will, appropriate economics and inclusive communication
  • We need to get better at speaking to the heart, not only the head, including by turbo charging “artivism” and a culture of emergence
  • The changes necessary will only happen when we scale societal movements that pressure business and politics to move further, faster

Key links
Kumi Naidoo (LinkedIn)
Africans Rising (website)
The Starfish and the Spider (book)
Thriving (book)
Africa Proud (poem)
Wayne Visser (website)
Wayne Visser (LinkedIn)