Insight
I spent much of my early adulthood with Dodo, the environmental NGO I co-founded in 1995. From the start, Dodo carved out a unique place in public debate – as a platform for forward-looking, solution-oriented, and multidisciplinary encounters on ecology, sustainability, cities, energy, climate, and livelihoods in the Global South.
It built its strongest reputation as an urban environmental NGO, focusing less on traditional nature conservation and more on sustainable urban life. Its events, activities, and aesthetics were distinctly urban and a little streetwise. In its early years Dodo was mainly about organising events and study groups. Gradually it expanded into advocacy and campaigning. Over time, it became an arena for experimenting with new practices: From urban gardening in Helsinki, to creating climate education materials, to supporting women’s livelihoods in peri-urban villages near Bamako, Mali.
Today, more than 25 years later, Dodo is still alive and kicking. It continues to run an outpost of ecological urban living in the heart of Helsinki, at Veturitallit, facing directly the commercial colossus of Pasila railway station and the Mall of Tripla. A reminder that another kind of city life is always possible.
Process
In my first year at university, conversations about ecological crises, and how activism might confront them, were constant. Then one summer, posters appeared on campus notice boards announcing the founding of a new environmental NGO. A few of us from philosophy, along with others, joined the effort.
The name was chosen carefully: Dodo, after Raphus cucullatus, the flightless bird that went extinct within a century of humans arriving in Mauritius. A symbol of how quickly human action can alter the world.
Six months later we were filling the largest lecture hall at the University of Helsinki. The idea was simple: Make a list of the people who had said something meaningful about the ecological crisis, and contact them by any means we could – letters, email, phone calls, even fax. To our astonishment, 16 of them said yes. We held four events, each drawing more than 200 people. I chaired the seminars, and in that moment gave a public face to the fledgling NGO. By the end, nearly 100 people wanted to join. Study groups were quickly set up to channel that momentum.
For more than a decade, Dodo became known for large-scale events that combined serious, often philosophical conversations with art in its many forms. Its study groups became training grounds for new experts in energy policy, environmental philosophy, deforestation in sub-Saharan Africa, and urban planning for sustainable cities.
Twice in those early years, I helped to redirect and reimagine Dodo’s purpose. Each time, it reinvigorated the spirit of the volunteers and expanded the group. And each time, something big and new followed soon after.
Getting people to believe in and commit to a voluntary organisation is never simple. For me, these “rebirths” of Dodo remain moments of remarkable personal growth – and of pride. They felt like small miracles: Times when a group of people could find new direction in life together, and carry that spirit into the world.
Outcomes
Between 1996 and 2012, Dodo organised an extraordinary series of high-profile events. Presidents, mayors, ministers, leading academics, international thought-leaders, artists, and activists all shared the stage. These seminars, festivals, and happenings helped shape the discourse on ecology and sustainability in Finland – bringing together thousands of forward-looking people who carried those ideas into research, politics, business, media, and other NGOs.
For more than a decade, Dodo also worked with partners in Madagascar and Mali – two of the least developed countries in the world – on projects designed to counter deforestation and to help local communities create new livelihoods beyond logging and firewood.
In the early 2000s, Dodo played a pioneering role in introducing urban gardening to Helsinki. Experiments in courtyards and wastelands evolved into new methods of nutrient recycling and seeded a wave of urban agriculture initiatives.
Dodo also re-framed ecological principles in urban planning debates across the Helsinki region. By developing alternative plans and initiatives, it influenced how a generation of planners and professionals approached sustainability in cities.
And perhaps the most lasting legacy: Over the years, Dodo trained dozens of people who went on to become leaders and experts in ecology, climate, biodiversity, and sustainability – working in governments, cities, intergovernmental organisations, corporations, startups, political parties, universities, and NGOs.
Dodo was more than an NGO. It was a school, a stage, a laboratory, and for many, a launchpad.
Partners
Tuukka Taskinen, Jarde Grå (née Jarno P. Vastamäki), Raino Vastamäki, Antti Immonen, Jepa Pihlainen, Dr. Simo Kyllönen, Johanna Taskinen, Harri Lammi, Jarre Parkatti, Janne Tompuri, Johanna Sinkkonen, Kirmo Kivelä, Johanna Helmivirta, Tommi Laitio, Markus Nevalainen, Saara Korpela, Tea Tönnov, Sami Keto, Sampo Pihlainen, Ella Vihelmaa, Matti Järvinen, Inari Penttilä, Pauliina Jalonen, Lotta Suistoranta, Merja Lang…
Reflection
Many of the topics we explored at Dodo in the late 1990s and early 2000s have since become mainstream. The idea that cities are the primary arenas for solving the global environmental crisis. The need to engage new groups of people in dialogue on complex socio-ecological issues – anchored in sound science, but also in empathy for different perspectives. The events and conferences we created embodied this spirit, and they remain among the things I am most proud of.
At its best, Dodo brought together innovative solutions from both the Global North and the Global South. We tried to present them as truly planetary – initiatives that connected people across borders and seeded new kinds of alliances. All this in a time that largely pre-dated the reach of social media.
Another strength was the way we wove together conversations on good life, personal behaviour, citizen responsibility, emerging technologies, and political action. It was not classical political campaigning. But it was an exploration of ideas and solutions that, a decade later, became defining issues in public debate.
Dodo was also a cradle. Many of the seeds that later grew into Demos Helsinki, and into my own PhD thesis Re-focusing on the Future – Backcasting Carbon Neutral Cities, were planted there. My university studies shaped me deeply, but so did my peers in Dodo.
I remain convinced that genuinely novel ideas rarely emerge inside the rigid frames of markets, government, or legacy science. They come from civic activism – from spaces where people can explore freely, without predefined discourse. Dodo was such a playground: A place where curiosity, conversation, and serendipity between people of diverse backgrounds created something new.
NGO Dodo
