Our First Year of Action
On March 25th, 2025, Arketa Institute went live with its first post on Linkedin. In it, we shared our story and reflected on why we think an initiative like ours should exist.
One year later, the response we’ve received so far makes us feel that indeed: the time is right for finally talking about the limits to growth in finance.
To mark the occasion, we’re looking back at our first year of action and some of the impact it’s had so far. See some of the highlights below.
Education: Speaking at Universities, Connecting Academia and Practice
Since founding Arketa Institute, we’ve been invited to speak at a number of universities and higher education institutions. Steve is currently teaching his History of Economics course at Université Savoie Mont Blanc for the second year in a row. Anastasia and Matt have given guest lectures at colleges like the University of Lausanne and the University of Richmond.
Matt also worked with sustainability education provider ED4S to set up a free online course on the basics of Degrowth & Ecological Economics which is available to the public. Other teaching and academic collaboration opportunities are currently in the works. We look forward to sharing more on those soon.
Universities at which we’ve given presentations and guest lectures to date:
University of Richmond
University of Lausanne (UNIL)
American University of Paris
Franklin University Switzerland
Quinnipiac University
Université Savoie Mont Blanc
Georgetown University
We also recently formally announced the members of our Academic Advisory Board. Each pioneers in their respective fields, these distinguished researchers help keep our work strong on the science and up-to-date with emerging discourse. We are so grateful to have them as advisors!
We will continue to do high-quality science communications and engage both academics and practitioners at events like the USSEE Annual Conference in Ohio this June and Building Bridges in Geneva in October. If you’d like us to speak at your university or institution, get in touch.
Communications: Breaking taboos, normalizing important conversations
A key part of our mission is to normalize conversations around ecological overshoot, Ecological Economics, and the limits to growth in finance, and we have been very busy this year doing just that.
Our collaboration with the animator David Koblensky has led to some beautiful and informative mini-videos that explain key concepts to a wider audience. Follow us follow us on Youtube and Linkedin to be informed when future animations go live.
Matt has spoken on a remarkable 12 podcasts(!), an average of one a month for our first year. His episode of the Moral Revolution podcast was their most downloaded to date. Steve also made an appearance on two podcasts: Bionic Planet together with Matt and LMA Talks Loan Markets, bringing the total to 13.
We have published in various trade outlets such as the Loan Market Association’s Horizons magazine and Resilience.org. This adds to the discourse we began with pieces in the Harvard Law School Forum on Corporate Governance, the ECGI blog, and IEMA’s Sustainable Finance Insight Journal before our formal launch. Notably, the piece Matt and Steve wrote for NextBillion on Global North-Global South relations and how they could shift in a post-growth world was voted their second most influential article of 2025.
So far, our approach seems to be working. These ideas are getting out into the world. Our perspectives have been featured in press coverage like this Corporate Knights cover story or this piece on NZZ Sustainable Switzerland. We’ve also been happy to see others picking up and running with ideas from our reports, like wealth coach Neil Dissanayake reflecting on pensions and Andy Hines considering degrowth as part of his work on AfterCapitalism.
Overall, the response has been encouraging.
Collaboration: connecting with others, building a network
Every project is only as strong as its network and our first year has focused on growing and solidifying ours.
We were heavily involved in Research & Degrowth’s Post-Growth Finance Action Circle, a community of practice for well-established financial professionals exploring degrowth. Arketa Institute was voted in as members of the Swiss Climate Alliance (KlimaAllianz/Alliance Climatique), a network of over 160 Swiss environmental NGOs and leaders addressing climate change.
We are also members of r.3.0, Investors for Purpose, One Planet Lab, the International Degrowth Network, and the Innovative Finance Initiative, each thriving communities in their own right.
Due to our work on the Just Transition and financial systems change, Arketa Institute was also involved in P4NE’s Mapping the New Economy activities and the resulting Fertile Ground report and directory, along with hundreds of other actors working on economic transitions across Europe.
Especially as destruction reigns and social contracts are broken around us, there is a strong zeitgeist change happening. More and more people support refocusing the economy around resilience, wellbeing, and care. Reorienting the financial system will be a key part of that, and we’re here to support anyone who wishes to take that path.
Thank you to everyone who has been a part of our journey so far. We’re looking forward to many more years of collaboration.
For those of you who have yet to yet involved, don’t hesitate to reach out to us. Financial contributions to make this work possible are also welcome. If you haven’t already, subscribe to our monthly newsletter to keep up to date on what we’re doing next.