Organising for transformation: creating a space for system change
Posted on Monday 4 August 2025
It was co-hosted by FixOurFood, YESI and Transformation’s Community and offered a platform for exploring and collaborating with professionals to innovate practices in systems transformation, sustainable change, and adaptive leadership.
A reflexive approach
A key focus of talks and discussions among attendees was understanding the intersection between inner transformation, institutional transformation, and the need for a reflexive, self-aware approach that recognises how individuals are active participants within the very systems they seek to understand or transform.
The conference keynotes Mick Cooper and Zenda Ofir explored how individuals, organisations and societies can contribute to mobilising such transformations. Mick, a leading Psychotherapist based at the University of RoeHampton shared insights around how inner change can facilitate transformations towards sustainability at greater magnitudes.
Zenda, an international evaluation expert, helped explore how society could reimagine evaluation as an essential practice for navigating humanity’s most complex challenges.
Indigenous knowledge
TCX York also hosted TwoBirds Cunningham, who opened up ideas around earth based wisdom and indigenous ways of knowing that could be integrated into approaches to guide transformative change.
Food system transformation was an important part of the conference. Together, attendees took a deep dive into examining what can be learned from food system transformation. The conference explored five international case examples of organising for food system change, with contributions from:
- Nessa Richman, leader of the Rhode Island Food Policy Council
- Noel Didla, chair of the Mississippi Food Policy Council
- Curtis Ogden, facilitator of New England Food Solutions
- Angela Crossland convener of North Yorkshires Food for the Future partnership
- Chris Yap action-research lead for Sheffield's ShefFood Action plan
Conference attendees had the opportunity to learn how each of these cases developed structures and approaches to enable transformations towards more just and sustainable food systems across diverse contexts. These examples provided tangible illustrations of transformation in practice and showcased how local initiatives contribute to global efforts in sustainable development and systems change.
Building equitable networks
Wider food system exploration included several workshops and spark talks. Pavel Cenkl and Kate Rudd facilitated a thought provoking workshop on transformative community through equitable agro ecological networks.
Hannah Gosnell introduced us to the Conscious Food Systems Alliance (CoFSA), a food movement convened by the UNDP to support inner capacities for activating systemic change towards regeneration. Jessica Bockler from the Alef Trust similarly outlined her work emphasising the importance of farmer well-being for cultivating more sustainable practices. Fiona Black then led a hands-on practical ‘Silent Kitchen’s’ workshop using local organic produce as a mode to stimulate creativity and highlight the value of experiential learning for transforming mindsets.
Several tools and methods to support transformations in food systems were also introduced, Suzanne Om presented the Ambition Loop Framework, a tool to recognise positive synergies for system change to help lead systems transformation.
Collaborative engagement models
A variety of models were discussed at the conference as a way for researchers to learn across contexts and develop their practice. Sarah Freed introduced the Agroecology Living Landscape (ALL) - a toolkit to bring about envisaged change in food systems. Kelly Parsons presented work on system mapping to identify deep leverage points for food system change.
Hannah Gardiner proposed a collaborative model of engagement and how this in itself stimulates transformative change. Rebecca Wells also presented work on the ‘Food System Flower’, a visual tool for nurturing positive systemic change. These tools opened possibilities to practical pathways for sustainable transformation.
Planting seeds
Professor Ioan Fazey, conference organiser, said: “This was a day that truly transformed the way people think - we were so proud to welcome people to York and created a space to think differently about some of the most urgent global challenges. The conference sparked many conversations and planted seeds for new engagements moving forwards.
“It underlined the value of gathering diverse voices for collective exploration into future sustainability. We want to extend a huge thanks to all those who contributed and look forward to extending these ideas in South Africa for the upcoming Earth Systems Governance Conference this August.”