Firekeeper Process

Our dedication is to explore, understand, discover, articulate, practice, and experiment with healthy structures, such as spaces, processes and practices for fostering a contemporary and embodied ethic grounded in radically shared aliveness. Together with our Firekeeper Circle, a network of diverse thought and action leaders from across the world, we inquire into the subtle, invisible and hidden aspects that call for transformative shifts. We delve into what else is possible when we come together, learning from and with each other with courage, humility, and respect across disciplines, perspectives, scales, sectors and cultures. We are dedicated to activating the dormant aspects of our shared humanity and cultivating a shared and ethical common ground where our various actions and contributions are rooted. 

The Firekeepers of the WorldEthicForum include regenerative farmers, community builders, researchers, artists, activists, practitioners, and engaged citizens representing different organisations, initiatives, networks and institutions committed to the societal transformation towards a culture of care and kinship.

The Firekeepers are persons and representatives of larger groups deeply committed to ecocentrism and the deepening of relationships in their workplaces, communities, and projects. They are intimately connected to the land and places in their being and work. Through dialogue, deep listening, writing, painting, co-creative engagement, community building, action research, and other forms of expression, they work toward strengthening the connections between all forms of life, raise awareness, help shift deeply ingrained individual and collective patterns and dynamics and create and enliven relationships across perceived boundaries.

We call it firekeeping—caring for and tending to the flame. It allows us to experience deep transformative movements as a group body, finding shared and fertile ground in the midst of complexity and diverse perspectives.

Firekeepers contribute to creating a healthier, regenerative, and caring planet through their work. 

Annually, we meet in person as a circle. So far, these gatherings have taken place in Pontresina, Switzerland, in August. The upcoming meeting will take place from 28–30 August 2024. During the rest of the year, we work online and in working groups, deepening and working on concrete next steps for the thematic strands at the heart of our work.

Among the Firekeepers are various councillors of the World Future Council, Vandana Shiva (Alternative Nobel Prize winner, matroness of the WEFo), the philosophers/authors Bayo Akomolafe (Narrative Philosophy), Andreas Weber («Enlivenment») and Minna Salami (MsAfropolitan), MIT professor Otto Scharmer (Presencing / Theory U), Christian Felber (Economy for the Common Good), Helmy Abouleish (greening of the desert in Egypt), Marie-Claire Graf (Youth Ambassador for Climate), Carlos Álvarez Pereira (Vice President Club of Rome) and many more engaged people from fields such as art, law, ethics, natural medicine, agriculture, politics, transformation, peace work.

Click here to see the full circle of Firekeepers.

Collective donation fund

We created a collective donation fund to ensure that individuals facing financial constraints can participate in this meaningful endeavour. Your donation will help ensure that diverse voices are heard at the WorldEthicForum. If you feel inspired to contribute, click on this link.

Thematic priorities for the coming years

From the findings during our time in Pontresina and conversations that have percolated since, so far, seven topic strands have crystallized and will be explored together in depth over the next few years.

  • Ethical Ground Work: exploring, excavating, and critically reflecting different ethical questions and possible perspectives of a world ethic — including required competencies — that enables radically shared aliveness and adapting and translating it to diverse contexts and scales.
  • Decolonisation – Equity – Diversity – Inclusion: gesturing toward a future that transcends colonial patterns and integrates the awareness for an inclusive, equitable, and diverse society, including the sharpening of the definition of what our common understanding of these terms are and practices that embody that.
  • Healing – Restoration – Reconciliation: establishing new, equal, and trusting relationships. It may include learning about the past and present, acknowledging and remedying harms that have taken place in the past, and taking action to build a just and equitable future for all.
  • Stewardship of Bioregions – Agriculture and Food: taking into account that political, cultural, and economic systems are more sustainable and just if they are organized around naturally defined areas (i.e., flora, fauna, landforms, climate, and watersheds) and working towards a world in which borders are set according to ecological and cultural “permeable boundaries”.
  • Youth, Children, Elders, Parents – Intergenerational Dialogue: bringing together the voices and wisdom of different generations and sitting with the big(ger) questions of our times. Leaning into regenerative attitudes and steps together while learning through passing knowledge *up and down* the different age groups.
  • Kinship – Relating to all Living Beings: engaging in a world filled with relationships and rooting ourselves in cosmovision where all forms of beings - including watersheds, forests, mountains, animals, air, and so many other expressions of life - are acknowledged and respected equally. Hence adapt our actions and ways of beings accordingly.
  • Responsible Economy – New forms of Economy: working towards new and responsible forms of economy through exploring their required structures, ingredients, and contextual implementation on a micro and macro level.