Kumi Naidoo is a prominent South African human rights and environmental justice activist.
Naidoo spoke with Ashley Hopkinson on December 15, 2023. Click here to read the full conversation with insights highlighted.
Ashley Hopkinson: Can you introduce yourself and tell us about yourself?
Kumi Naidoo: Hi, I am Kumi Naidoo, and I am currently a visiting lecturer at Stanford University. I’m working on what is called energizing artivism, which is trying to harness the power of arts and culture for social change and to address the communications deficit that change agents are facing, whether around climate, the well-being economy and so on.
Ashley Hopkinson: Okay, wonderful. Thank you. That sounds like really powerful work. What would you say is the role well-being plays in the current work you do? How do you define well-being?
Kumi Naidoo: So it’s very interesting because, like many things, there is a Global North and a Global South take on what these things mean. So firstly, well-being, wellness, that whole language does not have the same currency in the Global South as it does in the North. In fact, I think that there are even some people who believe that wellbeing has become a bit of an industry in itself, in terms of the different wellbeing offerings that you have, especially in the Global North.
So therefore, it’s important in trying to figure the answer to this question that we don’t homogenize our approaches, thinking that this is how it plays out largely, similarly in different spaces in the world. Having said that, wellbeing is about people finding the balance of being able to meet the professionals, or activists, or change imperatives on the one hand, and being able to do all of that and to do it in a way that energizes them, keeps them balanced.
Ashley Hopkinson: Can you say more about balance as it relates to activism?
Kumi Naidoo: One of the frequent things that I say is, in the moment of history that we find ourselves in, pessimism is a luxury we simply cannot afford. And the pessimism that emerges from our analysis, our observations and our lived realities can best be overcome by the creativity of our thought, our action, and the extent of our moral courage, right? Today we must recognize that, especially for people who are pushing for changes that are necessary to address the climate crisis and the intersecting crises that emerge from it, are finding that we are dealing with what some call eco-anxiety.
So when I think about wellbeing in that kind of global context that we find ourselves in, one of the things that I feel very, very strongly is that participation in addressing the issues that humanity faces, however small or however big that participation might be, is actually the best antidote to the rising anxiety levels. When people have pathways to participation, they break out of their loneliness, they discover that there are other people who are also dealing with it, they build community around it.
Click here to read the full conversation with insights highlighted.
Ashley Hopkinson is an award-winning journalist, newsroom entrepreneur and leader dedicated to excellent storytelling and mission-driven media. She currently manages the Solutions Insights Lab, an initiative of the Solutions Journalism Network. She is based in New Orleans, Louisiana.
* This conversation has been edited and condensed.
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