Summary
I’m a design strategist, researcher and facilitator in pursuit of ways to foster systemic change. I bring a decade of experience in deploying design, futures and systems approaches to a wide array of complex challenges - from ocean plastics to urban resilience.
Background
Originally trained as an architect at the University of Sheffield and the Royal College of Art, I founded the Bucharest Urban Lab (Urboteca) in 2013 in the desire to establish a European platform to exchange skills, experience and knowledge about collaborative city-making, where I remain a trustee. I changed career track in pursuit of systems change for sustainability in my role as Principal Design Strategist at Forum for the Future.
I have come full circle through being awarded a PhD scholarship from the London Interdisciplinary Social Science DTP to research the role of systems approaches for urban resilience capacity building. As part of my research, I am the co-host of the Urban Resilience Dialogues podcast.
#urbanresilience #systemschange #designfutures
Research
How might systems approaches bridge urban resilience knowledge - implementation gaps?
The term urban resilience is a broad umbrella concept that connects traditionally disparate disciplines, such as disaster risk reduction, urban planning, ecology or community development. While its meanings are still under construction, the use of the term by practitioners and policy makers has skyrocketed in recent years. This has led to increasing gaps between urban resilience knowledge and its implementation.
Given the complex and interdisciplinary nature of urban resilience challenges, there is a pressing need to investigate how these gaps emerge, as well as to develop interventions to address them. The IPCC Research and Action Agenda (2018) identifies capacity building as a key approach to addressing these gaps.
Within this context, my research seeks to explore the role of systems approaches in bridging knowledge – implementation gaps in urban resilience. The site of this action oriented research is the capacity building programme organised by the International Urban Resilience Academy, a multi-stakeholder partnership that aims to support mid-career urban professionals (researchers, practitioners, policy makers). My research seeks to develop and test novel approaches to capacity building, as well as to explore the role of social learning approaches in the context of a community of practice for urban resilience professionals.
Selected publications
Angheloiu, C., & Tennant, M. (2020). Urban futures: Systemic or system changing interventions? A literature review using Meadows’ leverage points as analytical framework. Cities, 104, 102808. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cities.2020.102808
Angheloiu, C., Sheldrick, L., & Tennant, M. (2020). Future tense: Exploring dissonance in young people’s images of the future through design futures methods. Futures, 117, 102527. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.futures.2020.102527
Publications
Journals
Angheloiu C, Tennant M, 2020, Urban futures: Systemic or system changing interventions? A literature review using Meadows' leverage points as analytical framework, Cities, Vol:104, ISSN:0264-2751
Angheloiu C, Sheldrick L, Tennant M, 2020, Future tense: exploring dissonance in young people’s images of the future through design futures methods, Futures, Vol:117, ISSN:0016-3287
Chambers R, Hart N, Ranger S, et al., 2019, The Marine CoLAB: Taking a CoLABorative, Values Based Approach to Connect People to the Ocean, Frontiers in Marine Science, Vol:6
Angheloiu C, Sheldrick L, Tennant M, et al., 2019, Future tense: harnessing design futures methods to facilitate young people’s exploration of transformative change for sustainability, World Futures Review, Vol:12, ISSN:1946-7567, Pages:104-122