Jeonju, South Korea 2020

Local Futures continued its unique and ongoing collaboration with the city government of Jeonju, South Korea by hosting another Economics of Happiness conference in the city – our sixth in what has become an annual event – on September 4, 2020. Because of health concerns and travel restrictions, international speakers provided pre-recorded presentations and participated in the workshops online.

The conference program included a mix of keynote speeches, panel discussions and workshops organized around the three threads of local regeneration, food and finance with an overall theme of:

Localization for the Safe Society

The keynote speech was given by Helena Norberg-Hodge, followed by presentations from international speakers David Holmgren, Matthew Brown and Michael Shuman, as well as many respected thought leaders from South Korea.

Our first conference in Jeonju resulted in the 2015 Jeonju Declaration on the Economics of Happiness, which commits the local government to:

‘shift its administrative system away from a paradigm that prioritizes
growth and development towards one that puts people first, and…
to create an economy that works for the people and
makes local communities happy.’

Recordings of the 2020 conference can be viewed under the ‘Video’ tab. The official event posters can be downloaded here and here.