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Tag: Zeynep Özçam

  • City level policies for the transition to a Circular Economy: learning from London and İzmir | Blog by Zeynep Özçam
    Zeynep Özçam

    City level policies for the transition to a Circular Economy: learning from London and İzmir | Blog by Zeynep Özçam

About

The Centre for the Understanding of Sustainable Prosperity (CUSP) is a cutting-edge research organisation core-funded by the UK’s Economic and Social Research Council and the Laudes Foundation. It takes the form of a rich international network, drawing together expert partners from academic and non-academic institutions as co-producers of the work programme. The overall research question is: What can prosperity possibly mean in a world of environmental, social and economic limits?—We work with people, policy and business to address this question, developing pragmatic steps towards a shared and lasting prosperity.

Contact

Centre for the Understanding of Sustainable Prosperity
University of Surrey
Guildford GU2 7XH

Email: info@cusp.ac.uk
Telephone: +44 (0) 1483 684316

 

Newsletter

A list of past newsletters can be found on the publications page. For future editions, please subscribe via Sender.net.

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📢 Prosperity in a Careless Age | CUSP Newslette
📢 Prosperity in a Careless Age | CUSP Newsletter, June 2025⁠
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It’s hard to remember a time when the concept of care was bandied about so freely on the one hand and thrown so carelessly to the wolves on the other. It’s this haunting paradox which sits at the heart of @ProfTimJackson’s new book on The Care Economy and gives an increasing urgency to CUSP's many recent engagements around care. ⁠
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If you want to catch up on some of them, you’ll find links to a variety of events, lectures, podcasts and interviews in this edition of our newsletter. If you’d like to join the conversation yourself, then why not come and meet us at the Trafalgar Square branch of Waterstones at 7pm on 17th June, where Tim will be in conversation with Jen Morgan from The Health Foundation. ⁠
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Also in this edition:⁠
⚫️ Groundbreaking research on social care, ecotherapy, and psychological flow⁠
⚫️ Contributions to marketing for sustainable lifestyles and rural planning futures⁠
⚫️ The #CorporateBodies podcast—exploring the anatomy of corporate power⁠
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From philosophy to policy, we’re tracing the fault lines of a system in need of repair.⁠
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🔗 All details → cusp.ac.uk (🔝 or link in bio)⁠
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cc #CareEconomy #ProsperityWithoutGrowth #PostGrowthEconomy #Degrowth #WellbeingEconomy #EcologicalEconomics #EconomicsForRebels #RethinkingEconomics #BeyondGrowth #LifeAfterCapitalism #NewEconomics #SustainableWelfare #SustainableLifestyles #PlanetaryBoundaries #GrowthDependency #ManagingWithoutGrowth #SystemChange #Postwachstum #PostCroissance #Decrecimiento #Decroissance #DoughnutEconomics #PostConsumerism #BeyondGDP #Omgroei #ÖkonomieDerFürsorge #PostCrecimiento⁠
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Artwork by Banksy. Photo by steve_l / flickr.com (modified) (CC-BY-NC 2.0)


"A society which builds its civilization on the ne
"A society which builds its civilization on the necessity for violence and on the systematic denigration of care is sowing the seeds of its own destruction."—Tim Jackson, 2025⁠
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#FoodForThought @ProfTimJackson #TheCareEconomy #CareEconomy #CriticalThinking #HumanCivilisation #Humanity #HumanRights #Politics #Peace #Futures #Capitalism #PostGrowth #LifeAfterCapitalism #Degrowth #War #CarelessEconomy #Care #Philosophy #SocialPsychology #ÖkonomieDerFürsorge #WellbeingEconomy ⁠#QuoteOfTheDay


🎙️Corporate Bodies: New podcast series about
🎙️Corporate Bodies: New podcast series about the strange world of #work.⁠
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Episode 4—The Spirit | How do we create the culture within an organisation? What does it mean to be able to bring your whole self to work … and who gets to do it? ⁠
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Full episode via ➡️ cusp.ac.uk or wherever you get your podcasts from (🔝 or follow link in bio).⁠
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A B O U T⁠
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In this fourth episode of Corporate Bodies, Kate and Mark explore organisational culture, the psychological conditions that enable us to show up fully at work, how professionalism is coded in terms of race, sex and gender, and who gets to feel safe in the workspace. ⁠
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They also interview @immykaur, Co-Founder & Director at CIVIC SQUARE, who talks about the challenges of creating a socially just organisation, balancing the desire to build a good workplace with the need to deliver the work, and the personal impacts of navigating racialised and gendered perceptions of competence and accountability.⁠
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cc #CorporateBodiesPodcast #WorkplaceCulture #GoodWork #Workplace #Podcast #OrganisationalDevelopment #NewPodcast #NewEconomics #SustainableBusiness #AlternativeBusiness #SocialEnterprise #SocEnt #wellbeingeconomy #TheCareEconomy #CivicSquare @wellbeingeconomyalliance @sharedassets⁠
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Corporate Bodies is a production by Mark Walton and Kate Swade, edited by @_katierevell. Artwork by @hanorbb. Supported by @CUSP_uk.⁠


🌿 GREEN HEALING: Can Nature Improve Health—an
🌿 GREEN HEALING: Can Nature Improve Health—and the Planet?⁠
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The healthcare sector contributes significantly to environmental harm. But what if treatment could help both people and the planet?⁠
A new article by CUSP researcher Amy Isham et al explores ecotherapy—nature-based interventions that reconnect people with the environment, offering proven mental and physical health benefits.⁠
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Research shows ecotherapy can ease depression and anxiety, build social cohesion, and nurture pro-environmental mindsets. But to reach its potential, we need wider access, cultural shifts, and trained practitioners.⁠
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📄 Read: Green healing: Ecotherapy as a transformative model of health and social care⁠
🔗 Link in bio | cusp.ac.uk⁠
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cc #Ecotherapy #GreenHealing #NatureBasedCare #ClimateHealth #WellbeingEconomy #PlanetaryHealth #SustainableHealthcare #MentalHealth #NatureAsMedicine #PublicHealth #SocialCare #GreenCare #EnvironmentalJustice #CareEconomy #TheCareEconomy⁠
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Image: courtesy of Tim Foster/Unsplash (modified)


PLACE, A SENSE OF TASTE; or, Why People Like Darts
PLACE, A SENSE OF TASTE; or, Why People Like Darts in Stoke-on-Trent⁠
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As part of his PhD with us, Dr Mark Ball spent over a year playing in a local darts league—not just for sport, but as a way to explore culture, place, and politics from within.⁠
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This immersive, ethnographic approach sheds light on how everyday leisure is shaped by local identity, social class, and belonging. The result is a thoughtful reflection on how something as ordinary as darts can reveal deeper currents in society.⁠
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🔗 Link in bio | cusp.ac.uk⁠/publications⁠
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#Ethnography #CulturalPolitics #PlaceBasedResearch #Darts #StokeOnTrent #DartsLeague #SocialResearch #EverydayPolitics #PostGrowth #ResearchInTheField #ParticipantObservation #LeisureStudies #Belonging #ClassAndCulture #WellbeingEconomy ⁠


Rates of anxiety disorders have increased sharply
Rates of anxiety disorders have increased sharply in the 21st century, sparking debate about their causes. Yet sociology, despite its long-standing interest in mental distress, has said little about this particular “epidemic.”⁠
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By contrast, the rise of depression and antidepressants in the 1980s has often been understood as a neoliberal condition—one shaped by broader social and economic forces. Anxiety, however, is frequently blurred into this story, treated as if it were the same.⁠
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This article argues for taking anxiety seriously as a distinct social phenomenon. It traces how anxiety was once understood through existentialist and psychoanalytic thought, and how these perspectives were later marginalised by medicalised psychiatry. Finally, it explores whether new sociological approaches—particularly the sociology of assets and assetisation — might help explain the current landscape of anxiety.⁠
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📖 Full paper via cusp.ac.uk⁠/publications⁠
🔗 Link in bio⁠
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cc #anxiety #sociology #mentalhealth #neoliberalism #criticaltheory #psychoanalysis #existentialism #assetization #socialchange #publicsociology #careeconomy ⁠
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Image: (CC-BY-ND 2.0) courtesy of Franck Vervial / Flickr


"In much of [our] talking, thinking is half murder
"In much of [our] talking, thinking is half murdered. For thought is a bird of space, tat in a cage of words may indeed unfold its wings but cannot fly."—Kahlil Gibran, 1923⁠
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#QuoteOfTheDay #KahlilGibran #OnTalking #TheProphet #Wisdom #CriticalThinking #Mindfulness #PhilosophicalQuotes #IntellectualHistory


🎙️Corporate Bodies: New podcast series about
🎙️Corporate Bodies: New podcast series about the strange world of #work.⁠
⁠
Episode 3—Creating the Body | What happens when you accept an employment contract? What are the unspoken and unexamined things that happen when a new person is recruited into an organisation? In this third episode of Corporate Bodies, Mark Walton and Kate Swade explore the feudal history of employment contracting, and how that plays out in working cultures today. ⁠
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Full episode via ➡️ cusp.ac.uk or wherever you get your podcasts from (🔝 or follow link in bio).⁠
⁠
A B O U T⁠
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Kate and Mark are joined by @liambarringtonbush, the founder of @radHRorg, to explore the challenges and dangers of not looking closely enough at how we welcome new people into companies. In a wide ranging conversation, they cover the problems with traditional recruitment processes, the optimum size of organisations, and the “exponential complexity” of bringing new people into a team.⁠
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They talk about the impact of practices from social movement spaces becoming more mainstream, and it’s important to consider power when thinking about new ways of working. The conversation includes some practical steps organisations can take today as well as some larger and more challenging provocations. ⁠
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cc #CorporateBodiesPodcast #WorkplaceCulture #Podcast #OrganisationalDevelopment #NewPodcast #NewEconomics #SustainableBusiness #AlternativeBusiness #SocialEnterprise #SocEnt #wellbeingeconomy #TheCareEconomy @wellbeingeconomyalliance @sharedassets⁠
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Corporate Bodies is a production by Mark Walton and Kate Swade, edited by @_katierevell. Artwork by @hanorbb. Supported by @CUSP_uk.⁠


New research from Oxford and CUSP analysed 14,000+
New research from Oxford and CUSP analysed 14,000+ care homes across England—and found a clear pattern: for-profit homes deliver better care when more residents pay privately.⁠
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In contrast, public and not-for-profit homes offer more consistent quality regardless of how care is funded—often outperforming for-profits when no self-funders are present.⁠
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These findings raise serious equity concerns. If quality depends on ability to pay, then wealthier areas may be getting better care—deepening inequalities in the social care system.⁠
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📄 Full study via cusp.ac.uk⁠
🔗 Link in bio⁠
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cc #SocialCare #CareInequality #HealthEquity #AdultSocialCare #CareHomes #ResidentialCare #Inequality #PublicPolicy #CarelessEconomy #CareEconomy #SustainableWelfare #WelfareJustice⁠
#SocialPolicy #PublicHealthResearch


Parliamentary Work

APPG Logo
CUSP is acting as the secretariat for the UK All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) on Limits to Growth. The APPG provides a platform for cross-party dialogue and collaboration on shared and lasting prosperity in a world of environmental, social and economic limits. It aims to contribute to a growing international debate on redefining prosperity and developing new measures of progress. The APPG is chaired by Caroline Lucas MP and Clive Lewis MP, and its membership is drawn from both Houses and all main political parties.

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