The process design at the Tällberg Forum sought to provide a balance between the wide systems level discussions and the more action-oriented search for practical solutions. This was mirrored in the program and its division between larger plenary sessions which explored the wider overarching questions, and the smaller thematic workshops referred to as “Tracks”.

The tracks at Tällberg were theme-specific workshops that ran over three days, making a total time of up to ten hours of conversations available to participants for in-depth work. They were selected to cover a wide array of complementary issues, as illustrated to the left.

Each track was designed to allow participants to explore in greater detail the practical implications of the radical transition we have ahead of us. The focus of each track was on the “learning” needed, in terms of new policies, strategies and technologies as well as new institutional and organizational models.

All tracks fed into a synthesizing process – “Towards a Tällberg Consensus” – that was built around several of the plenary sessions. The aim was to generate a new understanding of the nature of “sustainability”. This had to be both anchored in the social, political, economic and environmental systems, but also it had to have a communicative power that the old concept of sustainability lacked. This required both a new conceptual and practical framework that also needed to find its expression in a new terminology.

Forum participants chose which track to follow. They were encouraged to stay with one track for the three days, not least since the flow of each track was designed to be cumulative. Still, some may elect to move between them. Also, the overall process at the forum was intended to encourage connections between tracks.

The size of the group that follows each track was about 50 people (with some variation from 40-60 people).

Each track had a chairperson responsible for preparing and running the session. Each track also required two co-moderators who jointly facilitated the sessions, and 3-6 contributors who in the course of the three days gave their perspectives through short prepared interventions.

In total, this meant that about 100 forum participants were in some way involved in the tracks.

• All tracks in pdf format
• Conclusions from the Design Workshops 2006