Our privilege to safeguard the global commons

18/09/2025

Below is the introduction to our latest newsletter. To read newsletters in full, sign up now or subscribe on Linkedin.

Dear Planetary Steward, dear friend of the Global Commons Alliance,

While it’s a privilege for some of us to watch the news instead of living the daily disaster headlines, we all wake each morning to stories that catapult us further into the unknown. We read about ever-deeper divisions in society, as climate and nature is further relegated in importance. Most people will have missed this week’s climate risk assessment from Australia, which warned that millions of citizens are at risk from sea level rise and heatwaves – even under a best case scenario.

But if we listen closer to the agitation around us, we may notice that the ecosystem is also rumbling with the sounds of a softer revolution. One where care for our global commons and all living beings is rising. 

• Last week Africa took to the global stage as a leader for nature-based solutions and renewable energy at the Africa Climate Summit and Africa Climate Week, where Earth Commission Co-chair Fatima Denton launched a UNU-INRA critical minerals knowledge hub as well as a report on the economic and justice costs of Africa’s transition. 
• It’s now easier for businesses to integrate nature’s value into financial accounts with the help of a new Capitals Coalition initiative.
• The EU Parliament adopted new measures to prevent food and textile waste.
• And next week in the US – a country that appears more divided than any other – business, political, local and civil society leaders from all over the world will gather in New York for the biggest ever Climate Week NYC.

Partners and members of the Global Commons Alliance will be in New York, including Accountability Accelerator, Earth Commission, Earth HQ, and Science Based Targets Network. From the three-day Nature Hub curated by the Nature4Climate Coalition, to a session from the Science Based Targets Network offering practical guidance to help companies take credible steps for nature by setting science-based targets for nature, we’re looking forward to all the new connections and partnerships that will emerge as we work together toward a just world, on a safe planet. 

The daily news can only show us the realities of systems breaking. It can’t yet show this is part of a process. As we collectively birth a future that puts people and planet first, we begin to outweigh systems that no longer hold us. It is our job to hold onto each other through the havoc, as we build a new world that has space to hold each one of us. From new partnerships to Climate Weeks and the upcoming COP negotiations, it is all of our privilege to safeguard the global commons that hold our living planet together.

With all our best, 

Sebastian Schienle, Director of Partnerships and Programs

Will Tucker, Director of Communications and Resource Mobilization