No one can do everything.
But everyone can do something.
The crises of our times - climate change, biodiversity loss, pandemics, racial injustice, economic inequality - are converging and affecting the most vulnerable communities the hardest. These crises are symptoms of unsustainable, unjust systems and paradigms that dominate our politics, economies, and societies, including colonialism, capitalism, imperialism, patriarchy, and white supremacy.
But - there are reasons for hope to overcome these dominant power structures and co-create a sustainable future for flourishing life on Earth. Solutions exist that can address our overlapping crises and their root causes, together. Diverse actions already underway. And additional, more holistic, and bolder actions are still needed. Visioning and stewarding these solutions is the calling of our generation, and can start with bridging traditional boundaries between disciplines and institutions.
Ensuring a livable future for all life on Earth now and for the long term requires nothing short of transformative change.
I’m sharing here a few examples of efforts I’ve engaged in to bridge boundaries, build coalitions, and advocate toward fostering change - usually incremental, but attempting progress toward broader transformation. Amplifying these types of solutions, engaging more diverse coalitions, and embracing new approaches will be essential to addressing our collective crises to create a flourishing future for all life on Earth.
Featured solution stories
Mainstreaming science into policy
At Conservation International, I led efforts to integrate research recommendations from my master’s, dissertation, and other research into a Resolution of the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN): Global Response to Protected Area Protected Area Downgrading, Downsizing, and Degazettement (PADDD). The Resolution passed at the World Conservation Congress in 2021 and lays the foundation for concerted collaborative action to address and prevent environmentally-damaging rollbacks to protected areas.
This research also informed the Convention on Biological Diversity Post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework. PADDD is now included as a Complementary Indicator in the Monitoring Framework. Governments will now be encouraged to report this information on a regular basis, toward increased transparency, accountability, and improved conservation governance.
Science for advocacy toward policy change
At Oceana, I contributed to scientific research on seafood fraud and mislabeling, including by leading a literature review and creating an interactive advocacy map (which has been updated since its initial launch in 2013). Our efforts led to a Presidential Memorandum from the Obama administration on Illegal, Unreported, and Unregulated (IUU) fishing and seafood fraud that set in motion federal efforts to improve labeling of seafood imports. Initially, the scope of regulations was limited to high risk seafood, with traceability from only boat to US port. In 2022, the Food and Drug Administration issued a Final Rule to require traceability of high-risk foods including most seafood from the point of landing to the final point of sale - (“boat or farm to plate”). This effort demonstrates the power of sustained and science-based advocacy to make a real difference.
Grand-Staircase Escalante National Monument. Photo via Unsplash
Informing political discourse
Research that I led (published in Science) confirmed that President Trump’s Executive Order to reduce Bears Ears and Grand-Staircase Escalante National Monument constituted the “largest rollback of protected areas in US history.” This factoid was picked up in headlines and informed political discourse from the monument’s downsizing in 2017 to their restoration in 2021.
The New York Times first reported the factoid, which was picked up by dozens of other media outlets
Elizabeth Warren included this point in her Public Lands Plan for the 2020 Presidential Campaign
Council on Environmental Quality Chair Brenda Mallory highlighted this factoid during the event to legally restore the Bears Ears, Grand-Staircase Escalante, and Northeast Canyons and Seamounts National Monuments (pictured, along with Gina McCarthy, Secretary Deb Halland, and President Biden; credit: Susan Walsh, the Associated Press)
Coalition building for pandemic prevention
I co-led a Task Force with the International Union for the Conservation of Nature’s World Commission on Protected Areas, focused on COVID-19. With a diverse group of expert from around the world, we developed research and recommendations and amplified the connections between the destruction of nature, zoonotic disease spillover, and pandemics. Through a special issue of PARKS, guidelines, technical notes, and communications efforts, we advocated for protected areas as nature-based solutions that can support pandemic prevention. Our research and advocacy received widespread media coverage including via the BBC, Reuters, and the Washington Post, and IUCN included our key messages in their broader advocacy efforts toward “building back better” from the pandemic.
Image adapted from NaturePositive.org
Science and art
Research that I led (published in Science) was cited in the media by artist Yumi Janairo Roth during the exhibition of her exhibit “Property Rights” - a series of “screen-printed aluminum signs installed throughout the Roosevelt National Forest.” Roth describes the inspiration behind the art: “I’ve thought often about how complicated the image of the American West is. Public land is both a touchstone for the construction of that image as well as fuse for its destabilization. … Property Rights is my exploration of how that image of public land and the American West is built, maintained, accessed, controlled, and delineated.”
“Property Rights” by Yumi Janairo Roth
Safeguarding science and informed decision making with policy
As a AAAS Science and Technology Policy Fellow, I contributed to efforts to update, socialize, and implement USAID’s Scientific Integrity Policy, which aims to protect science from political interference. Because informed decision making is critical to ensuring more effective, equitable, and enduring policies and outcomes, the integrity (or “wholeness”) of the science that informs policy is paramount. To contribute to this effort, I participated in the National Science and Technology Council Subcommittee on Scientific Integrity, (pictured, at the Eisenhower Executive Office Building) including collaborations with other AAAS fellows, past and present.
Envisioning a Nature Positive Future for the Ocean
Governments and the private sector are increasingly recognizing the importance of healthy nature (living and non-living things, including biodiversity, our climate, and people) for our physical and financial security, health (including mental, physical, and spiritual) as well as the intrinsic and relational values of nature. We need healthy nature for a thriving future. The movement toward a “Nature Positive” goal is growing with the adoption of the post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework goal to “halt and reverse biodiversity loss” by 2030. Now, it is imperative that scientists and society define what the concept nature positive means and how to operationalize it. How can different institutions contribute to a nature positive future credibly and avoid greenwashing? To that end, I am focusing efforts in my role with WWF on envisioning, recommending, and demonstrating what a nature positive future looks like for the sectors and actors that affect the ocean, co-creating science and engaging through innovative partnerships. This approach aims to maximize the potential for the transformative changes that we need to reach a nature positive future in an equitable, durable, and effective manner. Read more here.