As the Global Innovation Coop Summit 2025 approaches, we had the opportunity to speak with Yuill Herbert, a recognized expert in climate planning and an active participant in international transition processes. He will open the Summit with a keynote address on the theme “The Tipping Points”, followed by facilitating a collaborative workshop on major global challenges.
In this conversation, Yuill shares his vision of change, his journey, and his perspective on the role cooperatives can play in facing the decisive tipping points of our time.
- You have a unique background in philosophy, adult education, and climate action. What led you to this intersection of critical thinking and ecological transition?
I grew up in the mountains on the west side of Canada. There are still patches of original forest in this region and at thirteen, I was captivated by giant primeval cedars trees more than 1,000 years old. These forests were being destroyed by industrial forestry, and I became an activist, but I also was trying to understand why in the broader sense. This led into an exploration of conservation biology, then economic systems and ultimately to philosophy. Cooperatives such as Harrop Procter Community Forest Co-op demonstrated a counterpoint to the socio-economic paradigm of industrial forestry and were a beacon of hope. At university, I discovered the Antigonish Movement, and the rich history and theory of adult education as a lens through which to understand the world. It was then, and still is, very compelling.
- The theme of the Summit is “The Tipping Points.” In your experience, what makes certain moments or contexts ripe for decisive shifts?
It’s a great theme but ominous to anyone who is following climate change. In this context, tipping points refer to points at which increasing climate change becomes irreversible, for example, the collapse of the polar ice sheets, or the Amazon. There is evidence that these tipping points are imminent. But there are also social and economic tipping points, which can be a source of hope. The reduction in costs in solar power for example, is challenging the power of the petrochemical industry globally, sparking political backlash in countries such as the US. It is also opening up new possibilities for democratic ownership of energy.
- How do you see the role of cooperatives in relation to these tipping points — whether they involve climate, inequality, or global governance?
I strongly believe that cooperatives are a structural response to a potent cocktail of challenges that we face, and one that doesn’t require a violent revolution. Cooperatives counter inequality by preventing the concentration of wealth. They counter economic insecurity by cultivating collective resilience rather than rugged individualism. As schools of democracy, they build trust and accountability in the era of misinformation. And they emphasise needs rather profit, a powerful frame for countering climate change and the ecological crisis.
- You’ll also be facilitating a workshop on collaborative solutions to global challenges. In your view, what elements make a collaboration truly transformative?
Transformative change contrasts with incremental change because it requires us to move beyond first order learning when current practice is improved and second order learning when we question our assumptions and reframe the problem, to third order learning in which we seek to explore and shift our worldview. Academics acknowledge that transformative change is required to solve wicked problems like climate change. If collaboration can shift our worldview, it is transformative. And one of the best ways to make that happen to bring together people with different worldviews to share their perspectives, which requires a high level of trust and a shared endeavour. This is my experience working with First Nations in Canada, for example.
- What would you like participants to take away from your contribution to GICS 2025 — both in your keynote address and in the workshop?
I hope that participants can see cooperatives not as enterprises occupying a niche in capitalist economies but as a structural solution to the great challenges of our time. And if that is a valid argument, then we must stretch our imagination to envision a fundamentally different role for cooperatives in our societies and the pathways to get there.
