The Provincial Council of Gipuzkoa has launched the Deliberative Citizen Assembly that will focus on agricultural activity and climate change promoted by Telesforo Monzón Laboratory on State building (TMeLab) and Arantzazulab.

As residents of Gipuzkoa, 32 randomly selected citizens will share their points of view and experiences and reflect. They will have to answer the question “How can we guarantee agricultural activity in Gipuzkoa to face the climate emergency?”. Experts and agents of the sector will be heard and will be reflected and debated within them through sessions spread over 4 weekends. The results derived from their deliberations will be a series of recommendations that will be presented to the Provincial Council of Gipuzkoa.

In the opinion of Unai Pascual, a TMeLab collaborator, “these recommendations will help guide actions in terms of agricultural policy in the coming years, highlighting that the future agricultural sector will have to face the climate emergency that we already have there in order to guarantee its future”.

Why is it important to share the rural sector and the climate emergency situation?

There are endless reasons, but Unai Pascual highlighted three in his presentation:

1. The local agricultural sector is strategic for all countries. The agricultural sector is important for the production of food that all countries need and is also a manager of other benefits generated by the rural environment, such as water, biodiversity, etc. Climate change, as in any other corner of the world, including in Gipuzkoa, will enhance the management of the agricultural sector.

2. As has been said before, the climate change that already exists and is accelerating will greatly condition the evolution of the rural world in the future. Therefore, in order to guarantee the future of the agricultural sector, the sector itself must adapt to climate change. This requires the use of new resources (E.g. human capital, technology) and we are aware that resources are scarce and must be appropriately allocated.

3. Greenhouse gas emissions in rural areas, such as CO2 or methane, can be absorbed in the case of suitable agricultural activities.

The Telesforo Monzón laboratory on State building (TMeLab), being one of the promoters of this Citizen Assembly, will help to disseminate the recommendations that will be generated in the assembly in Gipuzkoan society and transfer them to the Gipuzkoa Provincial Council.

This Citizen Assembly is the culmination of the project presented almost a year ago by the Telesforo Monzón laboratory (TMeLab) and the Arantzazulab laboratory within Etorkizuna Eraikiz. This project has been developed with the collaboration of local and international advisers, experts in deliberative democracy (OECD, Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development and the Deliberative Association).

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The objective of these conferences has been to promote a reflection on the existing data to date. To do this, on the one hand, we wanted to explain the existing data up to now and carry out a more exhaustive analysis of them, to analyze and discuss what the pro-sovereignty movement should do to be more effective with or based on these data. To do this, we have used the four surveys carried out so far by Naziometroa, as well as those carried out by others. Likewise, Robin McAlpin, from the Scottish Common Weal Foundation, has carried out a detailed analysis of the data on Scottish independence and the Professor Núria Franco-Guillén has brought us the Catalan’s reality reading the same topic. Finally, in a round table we have been able to listen to the reflections of Floren Aoiz, Onintza Odriozola, Xabier Barandiaran, Estitxu Garai and Txomin Poveda.

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40 years have passed since the approval of the Basque Language Law of 1982 in the Basque Autonomous Community and some 35 since the Basque Language Law of the Navarre Community. From then until today, various processes have been generated (robotization, the Internet of Things, artificial intelligence…) that have substantially changed the world, and consequently, the Basque Country.

All these changes are influencing our value systems, and more so in minority nations like ours. Given this, from the linguistic point of view, it is essential to act in response to the aforementioned new needs. In other words, we have realized the need to start thinking about a language policy adapted to this new context.

The objective of the conference was to share the expressed concern ttogether with the Jakin Fundazioa and the UEU and offer a place to think and undertake around this problem.

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In June, together with the Berghof Foundation, we held a closed seminar in Arantzazu on the importance of security and personal guarantees for negotiators, advisers and defenders of peace processes.

The report containing the summary of the seminar can be read HERE in English.

Participation in the Etorkizuna Eraikiz Congress

The so-called Wave of Deliberation comes to face the current complex challenges and to consolidate democracy. At Plaza #EECongress22 present by the coordinator of Proyectos Domínguez the path we are following with @arantzazulab in Gipuzkoa.

“Scotland: Now yes? Lecture “Opportunities and barriers of the second referendum” by Xavier Solano i Bello

Together with the Master on the Sovereignty iof the Peoples of Europe (SEH) and Gure Esku Dago, we organized the conference by Xavier Solano i Bello at the Bilbao Stock Exchange on November 17.

The New Zealand case for measuring well-being at the SEH International Conference

The TMeLab Project Coordinator, Malen Domínguez, presented at the III. International Conference on Nationalism organized by the Master on Sovereignty of the Peoples of Europe (SEH) the policy carried out in New Zealand to define and measure well-being.

We attended the Euskaltzaindia ́s workshop on the Basque language

At the Luis Villasante Basque Center in Donostia (Caserío Tolare) we attended the space for reflection organized by the Jagon section of Euskaltzaindia. The Project Coordinator, Malen Domínguez, worked

during the day on revitalization tasks.