Surviving the Future

Dr. David Fleming (1940 – 2010) was a visionary thinker and writer who played significant roles in the genesis of the UK Green Party, the Transition Towns movement, and the New Economics Foundation, as well as chairing the Soil Association. He was also one of the early whistle-blowers on oil depletion and designer of the influential TEQs carbon/energy rationing system. He read Modern History at Trinity College, Oxford, and later earned an MBA and then an MSc and PhD in economics (in 1988). These enabled him to better engage with and confound the mainstream, in support of his true passion and genius: understanding that diverse and mysterious thing “community.” Lean Logic was the work of over thirty years.Shaun Chamberlin has been involved with the Transition Network since its inception, co-founding Transition Town Kingston and authoring the movement’s second book, The Transition Timeline. He was also one of Extinction Rebellion’s first arrestees, chair of the Ecological Land Co-operative, and has spoken at venues ranging from Occupy camps to national parliaments. In exploring the cultural narratives charting society’s course he has written and edited diverse publications, including bringing his late mentor David Fleming's lifework Lean Logic: A Dictionary for the Future and How to Survive It to posthumous publication, and creating from it the paperback Surviving the Future: Culture, Carnival, and Capital in the Aftermath of the Market Economy. He is also a consulting scholar at Sterling College, and lead writer of the film The Sequel: What Will Follow Our Troubled Civilisation? His website is www.darkoptimism.org.Rob Hopkins is the cofounder of Transition Network and Transition Town Totnes. He is the author of several books, including The Transition Handbook and, most recently, From What Is to What If: Unleashing the Power of Imagination to Create the Future We Want. An Ashoka Fellow, Hopkins has spoken at TED Global and several TEDx events, and he appeared in the French film phenomenon Demain. He holds a PhD from the University of Plymouth, as well as 2 honoris causas. Hopkins is a director of Totnes Community Development Society, and he runs ‘Imagination Catalyst’ trainings for a wide range of organisations, including Balenciaga and Patagonia. He hosted the podcast From What If to What Next and has collaborated with musician Mr Kit on a music project called Field Recordings from the Future, due out in 2025. In November 2022, he was made an Honorary Citizen of Liège, Belgium, by the mayor of the city. His website is robhopkins.net.

“I would unreservedly go so far as to say that David Fleming was one of the most original, brilliant, urgently-needed, underrated, and ahead-of-his-time thinkers of the last 50 years. History will come to place him alongside Schumacher, Berry, Seymour, Cobbett, and those other brilliant souls who could not just imagine a more resilient world but who could paint a picture of it in such vivid colours. Step into the world of David Fleming; you'll be so glad you did.”--Rob Hopkins, cofounder of the Transition Network