National Bioneers Program

FRIDAY | OCTOBER 19 | 2007

Opening remarks from Kenny Ausubel and Nina Simons, founder and co-producers of Bioneers, and Welcome to Beaming Bioneers Satellite Conferences.

FRIDAY PLENARIES 9:00 am – 1:00 pm

JAY HARMAN Designing the Next Golden Age: A Progress Report
Award-winning inventor, entrepreneur and CEO of PAX Scientific offers examples of highly efficient technologies inspired by natural systems that can help us create prosperity without degrading the biosphere.

JUDY BACA The Interactive Digital Mural: A Tool for Social Reconciliation from the Local to the Global
World-renowned Los Angeles muralist and community arts leader unleashes the power of public art to help transform societies.

JUDY WICKS Local Living Economies: Green, Fair and Fun
Fabled entrepreneur and activist tells her story of moving beyond responsible business practices to working cooperatively with other entrepreneurs and citizens to build whole economies based on love of nature and community.

JOHN ABRAMS Thinking Like Cathedral Builders
Business needs bold new stories. Author, designer/builder and community activist explains how equal doses of freedom, hope, outrageous behavior and long-term thinking can open the way to a durable and successful future.

VAN JONES Toward a Green Growth Alliance: Birthing a New Politics
It is the chief moral obligation of our time to build a green economy strong enough to lift people out of poverty. Activist and founder of the Ella Baker Center for Human Rights urges us to carry our spiritual, cultural and economic movements into the electoral arena to transform politics and forge a green "New Deal" coalition so that kids who are now prison fodder will help create a zero-pollution economy, harvest the sun and heal the land instead.

FRIDAY AFTERNOON SESSIONS 2:45 pm – 4:15 pm

From Ecovillages to Ecocities
Growing numbers of people are seeking both sustainable life-ways and community, a trend that's transforming urban and village design. With: Liz Walker, co-founder and executive director of the famous EcoVillage at Ithaca, NY, and author of EcoVillage at Ithaca: Pioneering a Sustainable Culture; and Ecocity leader Richard Register, president of Ecocity Builders and author of the classic Ecocities: Rebuilding Cities in Balance with Nature, moderated by Charles Shaw, editor-in-chief of Conscious Choice magazine. (A1)

Building Local Living Economies and Successful Social Ventures
How are local and socially minded businesses organizing themselves to promote the common good? Hosted by Don Shaffer of the Business Alliance for Local Living Economies (BALLE); with social entrepreneur and BALLE co-founder Judy Wicks of Philadelphia's White Dog Café; Just Desserts founder Elliot Hoffman of New Voice of Business; and Native American Ashoka fellow and Alaskan social entrepreneur Dune Lankard. (A2)

Race, Class and Power: Structural Analysis and Fairness – Part 1
A Special Presentation of the Tides Foundation. A small vanguard of accomplished activists/thought leaders is building a body of work that makes transparent those structures that inhibit our ability to be a healthy, diverse society with high standards of accountability. Structural race analysis provides a framework for thinking about how racism is perpetuated in our society and how, by changing and rebuilding these structures, we can create greater opportunities and fairness for all. Join leading thinkers in a two-part workshop that will include both analysis and an exploration of opportunities we all have to act in a more conscious and just way. With: Maya Wiley, Center for Social Inclusion; Colette Pichon Battle, Moving Forward Gulf Coast Inc.; Gihan Perera, Miami Workers Center; Van Jones, Ella Baker Center for Human Rights and Manuel Pastor, Center for Justice, Tolerance & Community, UC Santa Cruz. Note: This is a double session. (A3)

Becoming Guardians for Future Generations
How can we apply the wisdom of the Iroquois "seventh generation" principle to contemporary public policy and politics, and radically re-imagine our laws, communities and personal actions? With: Tom Goldtooth, executive director of Indigenous Environmental Network; Precautionary Principle leader Carolyn Raffensperger of the Science and Environmental Health Network; renowned philosopher/activist Joanna Macy; and psychotherapist Edward Tick. Moderated by Patrick Reinsborough of smartMeme. (A4)

Cultivating the Land and the Narrative
A close relationship with the land informs a way of thinking and inspires creative expression. Organic farmer and writer Andy Griffin shares stories of his connections with the land, food and people. (A5)

Hotfrog Presents: Writing the Revolution
A new, web-based interactive magazine, hotfrog.org, presents gifted writers chronicling today's unprecedented global "movement of movements" from the ground up. Hosted by Hotfrog founder and Orion cofounder Laurie Lane-Zucker; with Rebecca Solnit, author of Storming the Gates of Paradise: Landscapes for Politics; award-winning journalist and former publisher and editor of Mother Jones, Mark Dowie; and Eddie Yuen, author and media studies professor at New College. (A6)

Clean Tech Comes of Age
Suddenly clean tech has gone from fringe to binge, but will we achieve the massive shift to renewable energy in time? Hosted by Tom Van Dyck, senior vice president for wealth management at Royal Bank of Canada; with Mark Donohue, the venture capitalist founder of Expansion Capital Partners; Jack Hidary, an entrepreneur in the finance and technology sectors, and co-founder of SmartTransportation, a nationwide organization encouraging clean technology in the transportation and housing sectors. (A7)

Building and Bridging Movements
Learn how young people have come together to build coalitions, engage communities, provide training strategies for change and influence legislation to ultimately transform our society. With Billy Parish, coordinator of Energy Action; Taj James, executive director of the Movement Strategy Center; ibrahim abdul-matin, technology organizer for the Movement Strategy Center; and Adrienne Maree Brown, executive director of The Ruckus Society. (Y1)

No Nukes or Green Nukes? The Debate over Global Warming and Nuclear Power
Does the onset of catastrophic global warming justify the wider application of nuclear energy? Are the certain risks worth the potential benefits? What kind of society might result from a proliferation of nuclear plants? An energetic debate with: Stewart Brand, founder of Whole Earth Catalog and co-founder of Global Business Network; Peter Warshall, biologist and anthropologist; and another TBA. (A8) Herb Walk Get outdoors with Kami McBride, a teacher of herbal medicine since 1988, including at the UC Nursing School and Stanford Hospital. Kami teaches herbology as a relationship with the Earth and a way of life. (A9)

Grandmothers Council
THE INTERNATIONAL COUNCIL OF 13 INDIGENOUS GRANDMOTHERS was formed around a common vision to unite the Earth's First Peoples in a global alliance dedicated to peace, the healing of the Earth and the preservation of indigenous ways. At the 2006 conference, Bioneers participated in an historic satellite "spacebridge" dialogue with the Grandmothers as they gathered in Dharamsala, India. This year, the grandmothers join us in Marin for daily council sessions, panel presentations and a screening of the film that was made during the spacebridge last year. The councils will be held around the themes: Healing Our Relations, Healing Ourselves and Healing Our Planet. Each council will be an opportunity for participants to offer their dreams, visions and prayers, and express their concerns and questions. See the brochure schedule for details. (A10)

FRIDAY AFTERNOON SESSIONS 4:30 pm – 6:00 pm

Gimme Shelter: Green Building in an Age of Mega-Cities and Meta-Collapse
How do we build our way out of environmental and social devastation? With: master green builder John Abrams of South Mountain Company; Matt Petersen, founder and executive director of Global Green USA, on rebuilding New Orleans; and Stewart Brand, founder of Whole Earth Catalog, on innovations in improving the lives of residents of slums and favelas in the Global South. Moderated by Terrence McNally, host of KPFK's Free Forum. (B1)

Social and Regenerative Forestry
Modern science meets ancient wisdom to regenerate the world's forests. With ethnobotanist, eco-forester and permaculture designer Tom Ward and permaculturalist Brock Dolman of the Occidental Arts and Ecology Center. (B2)

Race, Class and Power: Structural Analysis and Fairness – Part 2
(See Friday, 2:45, A3 for more info.)(B4)

Mother Jones Presents: Investigate This!
What is the state of environmental investigative journalism in a corporate media culture running on obfuscation, spin and disinformation? Hosted by Mother Jones editor-in-chief Monika Bauerlein; with Douglas Fischer of The Oakland Tribune; Julia Whitty, environmental correspondent for Mother Jones; and Margot Roosevelt, environmental reporter, Los Angeles Times. (B5)

Indigenous Visionary Plant Traditions
First Peoples have long used key sacred plants as powerful healing tools and to communicate with the "mind of nature." Bioneers associate producer and editor of Visionary Plant Consciousness, J.P. Harpignies and ethnobotanist/artist Kat Harrison are honored to host deeply experienced practitioners of sacred plant traditions from the International Council of 13 Indigenous Grandmothers, including Mazatec Elder Julieta Casimiro; Maria Alice Campos Freire, a Madrinha in Brazil's Santo Daime Church; traditional Cheyenne dance leader, sculptress and writer Margaret Behan Red Spider Woman; and Bernadette Rebienot, Omyene healer and master of the Iboga Bwiti Rite. (B6)

Girls Gone Mild? Reclaiming Feminism's Radical Edge
Join diverse women leaders in conversation about valuable lessons from the past and today's new approaches to winning women's human rights. Hosted by Linda Burnham, co-founder of the Women of Color Resource Center; with Yvonne Bynoe, commentator and author of Encyclopedia of Rap and Hip-Hop Culture; Charlotte Brody, executive director of Commonweal; Patti Chang, former executive director of the Women's Foundation of California; Samhita Mukhopadhyay, editor of feministing.com; and Andrea Cristina Mercado, lead organizer for Mujeres Unidas y Activas. (B7)

Eco-Art Strategies: Towards a Culture of Sustainability
This panel highlights the work of three passionate eco-artists, and examines how each combines art with ecological awareness, activism, and public engagement. Moderated by Sam Bower, executive director of greenmuseum.org; with Susan Leibovitz Steinman, editor/co-founder of the Women Environmental Artists Directory (WEAD); Anne-Katrin Spiess, an artist, founder and publisher of "LAND" (Landscape, Art and Design), an online journal for environmental art; and Daniel McCormick, an artist and designer working on environmental restoration projects throughout the United States. (B8)

Theatre of the Oppressed Training – Theater for Change-Makers
Developed by Brazilian theater director and activist Augusto Boal, Theatre of the Oppressed is a form of popular theater made by and for people who are changing the world. This training will introduce you to the practice of Theatre of the Oppressed; you will participate in a series of experiential exercises that will provide you with an overview of how to use this technique to analyze issues and empower people to solve their own problems. Participants will have the opportunity to produce an interactive performance piece. With Bay Area Theatre of the Oppressed trainers Jessica Bell and Rosa Gonzalez. (Y2)

FRIDAY EVENING 7:30 pm – 10:00 pm

BIONEERS MOVING IMAGE FESTIVAL
Discover the films and filmmakers who are making a better world.

Live from Dharamsala: The Grandmothers Spacebridge
Don't miss this one-hour film of the live "spacebridge" dialogue between the Bioneers community and the 13 Indigenous Grandmothers at the 2006 conference. The film features highlights and behindthe- scenes prayers and interviews. The Grandmothers will be present along with filmmakers Kim Spencer, founder of Link TV, and Cynthia Jurs.