About

The Second Renaissance project provides an introduction and guide to this moment of civilizational crisis and awakening – and the emerging ecosystem related to it.

It aims to provides an accessible entry-point – a gateway – for people to discover and make sense of this emerging moment and field. A bit like a curated art gallery for an emerging area of art.

We’re motivated by the increasing need to present these ideas and emerging ecosystem to others in an accessible way. Our experience has shown that the space can be difficult to discover, engage with, and make sense of.

For instance, there are many new terms associated with it: Metamodern, Metacrisis, Integral, Teal, Liminal Web, GameB, Regenerative, and more. This can make it confusing: it’s hard to understand what they all mean, how they all fit together – even if they point to the same thing or not. Overall, there is a lot of information and content out there, comprising many perspectives and approaches. Navigating all of this can be overwhelming and bewildering.

The project offers a simple framing narrative, along with introductions to key ideas, as well as a wiki and forum for community contribution and conversation.

Read on for more detail about what we’re creating and why, and who is involved in the project.

Who is involved

This project was initiated by Life Itself with support from a variety of partners and collaborators.

It is now led by a curatorial team with participants from several organizations. We're also privileged to have ongoing input from an amazing set of advisors.

Curators

• Rufus Pollock, co-founder Life Itself – Curatorial Lead
• Catherine Tran, Life Itself Research – Research lead
• Danielle Johnson, Limicon – Onboarding Lead and Deputy Wiki Lead
• James Baker, Intentional Society – Curator and all-round Advisor
• Lauren Wigmore, Life Itself Comms –Communications
• Simon Grant, Life Itself Senior Research Associate – Wiki Lead
• Sylvie Barbier, co-founder Life Itself – Design and Narrative

Advisors

• Alexander Beiner, co-founder of Rebel Wisdom
• Daniel Thorson, Emerge Podcast
• Peter Limberg, the Stoa
• Phil Chen
• Naryan Wong, Cultivating Leadership and Limicon
• Joe Lightfoot, Collective Blooming
• Isabela Granic, McMaster University and Liminal Learning
• Jamie Bristow, Mindfulness Initiative
• Oren Slozberg, Commonweal
• Richard Bartlett, theHum and Microsolidarity

Why: Background and Motivation

At Life Itself we've been working in "this space" for a decade.

We started mapping this emerging ecosystem formally in 2019/2020. In September 2020, We released "The State of Sensemaking" our first, preliminary report on what we were finding. Following over a year of further research, in 2021/2022 we published "Paradigmatic Integral Pragmatic (PIP) Changemakers" report. This contained our first effort at delineating the key characteristics of this emerging ecosystem along with a browsable directory of over hundred organizations in the space.

This present work both builds on this mapping work and represents an evolution.

Specifically, we’ve increasingly seen the need to be able to present these ideas and emerging ecosystem to others in an accessible way. This is based both on our own personal experience and from discussions with many others.

What: A Gateway

In short, we need a gateway to this space: a simple, accessible way for people to find out about key concepts, initiatives and actors and how they are connected.¹ A useful gateway would provide, at least the following:

• A name so people can easily remember and refer to it
• A core narrative that delineates and frames it
• Accessible presentation of key ideas, themes etc
• Pointers to more info and pathways to get involved
• Situated relative to things people know which provides both the "oh, ok i know that part" feeling as well as social credibility "oh this connects to these other areas that are already known"

How: Intro, news and wiki

What that means is we plan to provide (at least):

• Intro: to second renaissance and key themes and concepts
• Newsletter: to provide a simple, curated and accessible way in to both discover ideas (one per issue) and news
• Wiki and/or forum: as a space for community and contribution

These three parts complement each other. A wiki on its own can be bewildering, even a bit overwhelming and scary, especially for newcomers. A newsletter on its own does not have the richness of a wiki knowledgebase and does not offer an avenue for contribution. By offering both with a clear vision and principles you can get best of both worlds.

Deeper motivation: five whys

We the initiators for this project want to create a gateway for the "second renaissance" because …

• We want more people to get involved in second renaissance type stuff (ideas, projects etc), especially people on the edge or close by (and eventually broader society to see) because …
• We want a movement for a second renaissance because …
• We want a a paradigmatic transition to happen …
• We want that because it is key to addressing the (meta)crisis and bringing forth a radically wiser, weller world (see the front page of this website 😉)

Gallery metaphor

Imagine the world or art where there is all kinds of different art going on. Suppose we’re noticing a new type of art emerging but it doesn’t even have an agreed name yet. It’s hard to find and even talk about – you go to some show in someone’s basement and feel a vibe etc but hard to even describe to your friends (remember there’s no name etc).

To help, we propose to create a gallery to help showcase this new kind of art so people can more easily find it and talk about it – to highlight a center of an emerging field.²

The gallery has a vision statement and in curating it brings certain sets of artists together to really present them to the public and to that community. Both so the broader society can see them – and so they can see themselves.