Maja Göpel in Live Talk about Values with Werner & Mertz Owner

Great interest in the talk with Maja Göpel was encouraging. A live and livestreaming audience of more than 20,000 followed the discussion between Werner & Mertz owner Reinhard Schneider and successful author and political economist Maja Göpel on the provocative question of “Can we still afford values today?” The hour-long Live Talk was moderated by podcaster and sustainability influencer Zackes Brustik.

What guides people today? What inner compass can we follow in light of the never-ending crises and uncertainties the (social) media confront us with every day? What options do people have in shaping their own lives and the future? Göpel and Schneider examined these and other questions in detail. Special attention was given to current affairs, including the rise of poulism in the USA and in many other parts of the world, and the parliamentary elections in Germany on Sunday.

Göpel sees the current dynamics of populism in the USA as a wake-up call for Europe to do things differently. Europe has to develop a counter-movement to the betrayal of Nature and the degradation of human coexistence. “What’s needed is an epicenter, a forum for ideas about democracy, how we treat the planet and each other,” said Göpel.
She also recommends thinking about and integrating what she refers to as “ecological damage creation“. As an example, she mentioned that the lower taxation of meat compared to plant-based products prompts damaging behavior through pricing alone.

Schneider places values in two categories: values that open up one’s own sphere of creativity and values that give people direction. “You can get to sustainability and responsibility if both are maximized. With plenty of space for free choice and strong guiding values that show that everything does not have to be equally good in this space and everything does not have to be tried out just because it can be,” said Schneider. At another point Göpel noted, “There’s a lot of freedom to be gained once we’ve gone through the change, but much can be lost if we frame every suggestion as a ban, renunciation or loss.”

Göpel describes the phenomenon of pluralistic ignorance as “the presumed acceptance of change”. She offered as an example the scientifically proven issues of climate and environment, which remain among the top five topics of interest to society. However, because they no longer come up in many debates, people have the impression that nothing is happening. There is a concerted backlash in climate communication which leads to a spiral of inhibition and feelings of helplessness.

Schneider agreed, saying what’s required is pluralistic resonance. “People have an increasing need for recognition. It would be helpful to create islands of recognition that are accessible in everyday life, where people can pursue and get recognition and truthfulness.” They would see that coherent scientifically verified solutions exist which offer something emotionally positive, good and varied.

In her book Göpel poses three questions essential to restoring trust in the state: Will we have enough? Will we share enough? Who is “we” anyway? Göpel pointed out that all those questions are missing in the current parliamentary campaign. The first question, which involves planetary boundaries, was pushed to the forefront in recent years by Fridays for Future and the like. That there’s scarcely a mention of the issue now leads to great uncertainty. The second question about sharing was highly relevant during the COVID pandemic. The feeling that we were a community sharing the same fate resulted in lower infection rates. The third question about “we” is currently being misused by populist powers to shut out “others”.

For the second question, Schneider offered a practical example from his everyday business, that is, how we handle knowledge. “Making knowledge available is a driver of trust. We demonstrably share our knowledge. What evolves is direction and movement that can be economically successful when it grows and exerts more pull.” Others, in contrast, hinder ecological value creation by using blocking patents, for example. Göpel agreed, saying, “Doing business is a means to an end, to serve the common good. That’s why we have to make instruments that are a good means to an end. They have to effectively ensure that people can work more freely on solutions that maintain prosperity in the medium term. The absence of retaliation is an unsurpassed gain in freedom.”

The Talk in its entirety is available here: diezuversichtlichen.de

Prof. Dr. Maja Göpel is a political economist, best-selling author, honorary professor for the Sustainability Transformation and co-founder of Scientists4Future. She has received several awards for her work, most recently the Science Communication Medal and the Theodor Heuss Prize. In her new book Werte. Ein Kompass für die Zukunft, she offers stimulating ideas on how a society could develop itself further. What values might help to make courageous changes and to stay the course in turbulent times? The idea is to pursue the same goals in spite of having differing positions—assuming that everyone shares the same set of values. As an expert, Göpel has long demanded the transformation in politics, business and society.

Since 2000 Reinhard Schneider has been the managing partner of the Mainz family company Werner & Mertz, known primarily for its Frosch brand. In 2019 he received the German Environmental Award for the integrally sustainable orientation of his company. In his book Die Ablenkungsfalle. Die versteckten Tricks der Ökologie-Bremser. Wie wir unsere Umwelt nicht länger aufs Spiel setzen, he exposed the systematic failure of the economy, politics and society in environmental protection and simulataneously proposed tried-and-tested solutions for a resource-conserving circular economy for the good of people and the environment. With the successful ecological transformation of his company, he convincingly shows that rethinking brings not only social and ethical benefits but also long-term economic advantages.

In the successful format Die Zuversichtlichen (with 20,000 livestreaming viewers) the business leader and author Reinhard Schneider invites authors, networkers and pioneers to talk about currently relevant topics that we have to discuss if we, together, are to drive Germany and the world forward.