FLVS 2020 is a five-day online convening designed to kickstart a new type of political engagement for lawyers, academics, policymakers, business, media and civil society worldwide to share and generate knowledge, practice innovation and engage in normative co-production for empirically-responsible legal system change.  Our platform is being developed to support you in your jurisdiction to get the knowledge, support, skills, networks, partnerships, and financial resources to make change happen.

By legal system change we mean changes to laws, policies, procedures and practices in your jurisdiction. Empirically-responsible legal system change are reforms, innovations and solutions which are aligned with and informed by the most recent developments in the fields of cognitive science,  systems science and technology. 

FLVS 2020 is for individuals and organisations who (1) recognise that we share a finite planet and we need to have better infrastructure for our collective decision making (2) are disillusioned with current divisive forms of political engagement and who want to do more than vote every five years and (3) are willing to engage in an unique experimential learning journey for the co-creation of new bottom-up processes for inclusion and participation in public policy making. If you recognise that old divisive forms of political engagement are failing us and new processes for our collective sensemaking, decision making and action are now required, and you are prepared to commit 2-3 hours and less than the cost of one meal per month to learn how you can become a policy or systems entrepreneur, then this summit is for you.

Yes! We are in a new renaissance moment. Top-down, bureaucratic and compromised political systems are proving ineffective to address societal challenges. Advancements in the fields of science and technology provide us with new opportunities to increase participation and inclusion in our law making processes. FLVS 2020 is for you once you are ready to work to effect transformation of your society so that it is empowering to the vulnerable, protective of the ecology, ethical and empathetic in its governance and economics. If this describes you, then this ten (10) year movement to radically shift anthropocene systems on this planet needs your voice, your expertise, and your collaboration.

We are being extremely picky! Our speakers present a carefully curated group of people with proposals and policy innovations worth spreading and skills worth sharing. We have designed a unique speaker engagement process and are providing every speaker with a special online treatment. FLVS Speakers must be courageous enough to raise their voice even if others do not agree.  At FLVS Speakers may be placed in dialogues with others with opposing views, and must be prepared to engage respectfully with others who may have conflicting discourses. Do you think you have what it takes to be under the spotlight? Send us a message to contact@futurelaw.io  Our team will investigate your request and reach out to you if you are selected to participate.

Yes. This is not just a five-day summit. We’ve invested into production, which allows for recording of all our FLVS2020 tracks as well as its storage – so that you have ongoing access to some of the cutting edge tools and methodologies for legal system change we will be sharing. Lifetime access of all recordings are available for those on the Negotiator, Master and Benefactor tracks. Negotiate the New Normal with us or master a new skill set with the Future Law Collaborative. Take your legal practice to the next level and see what we can do on a longer term together. 

Margaret Mead, an American cultural anthropologist, famously said “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has.” Every transformational legal shift from the abolition of slavery, women’s suffrage, worker rights, civil rights, ecological justice, LGBT rights has been started by a handful of people.

We embrace the ‘think global act local’ perspective and through our Networked Communities of Practice (NCoPs) on some of our most pressing global challenges, we share knowledge cross-jurisdictionally, map systems, identify high-leverage strategic intervention points, produce powerful change narratives and model laws and provisions for legal system change.  With the help of our partners, affiliated organisations and those who engage on this 12 month journey (Learn | Leverage | Lobby | Legislate | Litigate) with us, we aim to support Future Law Ambassadors worldwide through leading edge research, education, technical and financial support to become policy and system entrepreneurs pioneering and leading legal system change movements in their local jurisdictions. Through the Negotiating the New Normal (NTNN) platform for collective sense-making, negotiation and action we are inviting participants to collaborate on the development of a 10 year action plan aimed at legal reforms for a safer, more just, more ecologically resilient future

FLVS2020 is not just calling lawyers and policymakers to the table. We are calling all disillusioned voters, unimpressed with the options presented every election cycle. We are calling all human rights activists both weary and wary of shallow Identity Politics being wielded as a distraction as entrenched dysfunction and disparities persist. Whether you are working within the systems of governance, commerce, education, health, environment, information or technology trying to bring about change from the inside; or you are on fringes, pursuing new frontiers of more humane, holistic and sustainable existence, the time is now! 

You can expect some interruptions and participants breaking the ice with a fresh new phrase “Hey, do you hear me well?” We are being mindful of occasional hiccups and connectivity issues. Having attendees from all around the world, who are facing a vis majore situation brought by the virus, we cannot guarantee a 100% flawless live broadcast. However, you can expect us to do our best to be ready and well prepared and open about the challenges we collectively face during this time. You may also expect an incredible lineup and much more than just speakers and panels. We’ve partnered with expert facilitators to bring high level engagement to you and make collective sense-making and negotiation possible with a variety of digital tools

Many think we have migrated into the virtual domain because of the pandemic, yet FLVS 2020  originated well before the onset of COVID-19 in March 2020. We did not want to leave too much of a carbon footprint, travel to different conferences and collect an assortment of plastic badges. Our team has been working remotely and engaging virtually for over three years and we know digital tools are far from being on the level of providing the best viable experience which could replace the in-personal meeting. At the same time we know about features that make this experience twice as effective as a real life one can ever be. Let’s explore them together at the FLVS2020.

You may. We have several different options and offer spotlights, panel coverage as well as an option for hosting a series of hands-on experience, a demo or a workshop. You can see these options in our Partnership deck and contact us for more information. 

You’ll receive all important information through the email with which you registered. Keep an eye on our social media platforms, as we will be announcing our latest confirmed speakers, tracks and details of the FLVS2020 agenda. 

You don’t want to miss the opportunity offered to you at the FLVS2020 experience! Register for an early-bird discounted ticket and make sure you get the best options offered at the summit.

We will be visiting the virtual domain, hosting speakers from all around the world and talk about the incremental issues here on Earth as well as those we face in outer space. Join FLVS2020 sessions and travel to these destinations from the comfort of your couch. 

The Future Law Collaborative is where our team actively engage and find roles that fulfill their passion and calling. We recommend that you join the Collaborative and this will give you access to updates and tasks and roles where you can find your best fit.

The New Normal wil be anything we enable and empower. We truly believe it is in all our hands. What do you wish the New Normal to be? We wish it to be; Regenerative & Circular so that our planetary ecosystem and its diversity thrives; Intersectional & International so that the human rights of all are protected regardless of ethnicity, age, gender, disability, sexual orientation or their geographical location on the planet; Ethical, Empathetic & Empirically-Sound so that it does not require deception or oppression to enforce, the sheer humanity, truth and pragmatic benefits evangelize and convert; Bottom-Up, Participatory & Transparent, so that ordinary citizens are included in decision-making beyond the seasonal ballot and truly feel like the empowered employers of elected officials, and not their helpless, bewildered subjects. Of course, we are open to the “how” we get there in the next ten (10) years and the details of “what” success  looks like and this is where the Negotiating process comes in at the five-day summit!

Negotiation is nature at its most balanced. Everything in the organic world is connected, integrated and responds in tandem with everything else whether symbiotically or competitively but always serving whole, from the bottom to the top of the food chain. Dictatorships (hard) and revolutions against them which yield softer or secretive dictatorships,  is human dysfunction and it has led us to where we are today, because they are unnatural. While we embrace leadership and mentoring we also believe in the power of collective, multilateral, multi-disciplinary, multi-dimensional thinking and learning – we call it the meta-legal approach to system change. Everything needs to find a relationship to the whole. Teachers must learn from the students as well. Lawmakers must converse with the public for whom they are making the laws. The conversation, collaboration and co-creation never ends. If we are going to break the pattern of top-down governance and decision-making that disenfranchises and disempowers the citizenry, we must open up seats at the table for all willing voices to negotiate the future.

The legal profession is one of the most conservative fields; upholding the status quo as is, maintaining order as is, trusting the precedents of yesteryear, shaped by yesteryear’s collective intelligence and realities. There is also less personal profit and advancement to be made by radically challenging the status quo. It is easier to be a corporate lawyer for a chemical plant than to advocate on behalf of the population sickened by its pollution. Therefore we are not surprised that radical system change has not exactly been the purview of this sector.

This does not mean there have not been revolutionary legal, environmental and social justice activists swimming against the current, challenging and changing legislation. In fact, we have not only been inspired by them…we are them.

The co-founders of Future Law Institute like many of you (lawyers or not) have made that personal journey through the Legal Archetypes. Starting off as Transactional fresh out of law school. Then evolving to Transformative, when we realized we could wield the power of the Law to help fight for the vulnerable and the victims of injustice and change the world and then Transcendent, when we realized changing the world means surpassing just our legal field and becoming systems-thinking, multi-disciplinary and multi-national in our approach.

A movement like this can only be started by those who have been through that journey with a powerful and personal empathetic anger about injustice and ecological devastation, driving them, keeping them stubbornly focused on this mission.

For further information we kindly ask you to contact the FLI support team at contact@futurelaw.io.