“The environmental crisis is increasingly serious, what happened in recent days in the Modena area is yet another proof of this. We propose an assembly of citizens drawn by lot, as in Bologna: 100 people representing the entire Modena community consulted for strategic decisions on social and environmental investments”. The proposal of the States General of the climate is from an assembly of citizens of the Pianeta association led by president Stefano Rimini (in the photo). “The images of Pavullo and the mountains, of the flooded rivers and streams, of the displaced and isolated families – Rimini points out – remind us how the real challenge is the climatic one, in symbiosis with the social and political one: The growing inequalities, the climate crisis and the democratic crisis are connected and co-dependent”. For this reason “our movement, Pianeta, promotes participation and activism by bringing issues of social and climate justice to the forefront of politics. And in Modena we are very happy that some of our members – Laura Ferrari, but also Chiara Giovenzana and Giulia Vaccari – were candidates in the local elections on the progressive front”. These challenges “are overcome with attention to others, with tolerance, with the awareness that every individual and social nucleus is dependent on the environment and the surrounding society”. For this reason in Modena in the coming months “we would like the entire city and the new council to promote general states of the climate (together with the third sector, the private world and the environmentalist and progressive movements) with a permanent assembly of citizens, for decisions strategies on social and environmental investments”. In general, participation “must not be a frill or a minor delegation, but a key point for this city, transversal to all sectors. And new tools for involving and participating citizens and civil society are needed. It must be carried forward to example tactical urban planning, but also open science, deliberative assemblies. Citizens demand that the new administration be able to give space to innovation, to competent young people with European experience, to civil society”.
