Interview with Steve D’Esposito On The Radical Center and The Move To Resolve
Introduction:
Recently, Steve left his position at Earthworks, which he founded, to become president of the nonprofit, Resolve. (See our recent post at: https://fairjewelry.org/archives/509)
(Steve D’Esposito, President of Resolve)
When I look at the last five years, I see that much of the momentum toward ethical sourcing in the jewelry sector can be traced back to Steve’s work and vision. He was instrumental designing the “No Dirty Gold” campaign, in creating the Initiative for Responsible Mining Assurance, in building relationships across sectors, and in creating the Madison Dialogue meeting which brought people from the sector together for the first time.
This is the second time that Steve has been interviewed on this blog. This time, I caught up with him before the official announcement and talked about the move.
~Marc Choyt, Publisher
Marc Choyt: What led you to leave Earthworks and join Resolve?
Steve D’Esposito: I have spent more and more of my time over the last few years, building bridges across the sectors and trying to identify leaders who want to actually develop and test solutions.
Resolve is perfectly suited to house this work. Resolve has intention, it has a result in mind—we refer to this as the “solve” part of the Resolve mission. But Resolve can also serve as a neutral ground, a place from which all who share that intention can work. That space is more difficult to create within an advocacy and campaigning organization.
I have been developing a concept which seeks to incubate, support, catalyze and credit some of the initial steps that companies and organizations are taking to put solutions in place. Where risk-taking and entrepreneurial activity is recognized, and those willing to take a step forward are recognized and rewarded. We will organize this work within a new initiative that we are calling the Earth Solutions Center at Resolve. It fits perfectly into the Resolve structure. We will also organize a Science Solutions capacity. This allows us to tap into both consensus building and facilitation expertise with science and technical expertise.
In fact, I first started talking to Resolve about potentially partnering with the Earth Solutions Center (which was going to be an independent organization). The conversation fairly quickly turned into a conversation about integration and an offer to run Resolve.
Marc Choyt: How does this tie into your work with the Madison Dialogues? Are you going to continue to support the efforts to create an “ethical platform?”
Steve D’Esposito: A lot of work is underway in the jewelry sector— I see a number of cutting edge projects from retailers, miners, and others.
The Madison Dialogue is a forum, a discussion group, and a very important one. It’s created an opportunity to foster relationships. It is a virtual entity. It’s great for information sharing and dialogue. It is, as you put it, an “ethical platform” and I will continue to support it—100%. Resolve will certainly support Madison Dialogue and similar efforts—whatever we can do, we will do.
The Earth Solutions Center can be a complement in that it creates a venue for testing, incubation and experimentation in an open-source, transparent format.
Marc Choyt: Have your efforts to work within the Radical Center space been hindered by your involvement in Earthworks, leading you to want to make this change?
Steve D’Esposito: It’s the result that matters. Earthworks has played and will continue to play a critical role as a catalyst. I look at the landscape and I see the need to be additive; to put some additional tools in the toolkit. I want to create space that works for Earthworks and Oxfam, Anglo Gold Ashanti and Rio Tinto, Leber Jewelers and Tiffany, and others. I am not looking to organize a love-fest here, but I do see places were opportunities are being missed and I want to capture those opportunities.
For me personally, what changes is that I have intention but I don’t have a specific dog in the fight.
Marc Choyt: Would you be interested in helping the Manufacturing Working group?
Steve D’Esposito: Yes, the Manufacturing dialogue is just the type of thing that I would be interested in supporting. Let’s explore what’s needed. Is it simply support, technical assistance, strategic guidance, someone to help the trains run on time? I would also like to look at current examples of emerging good practice.
Marc Choyt: Recently I was asked by another journalist, “What is responsible large scale mining?” I didn’t know quite how to answer that question, so I’m posing it to you.
Steve D’Esposito: Work is underway to develop a frame work for responsible mining through IRMA but that work is slow and plodding and is not fully resourced. CRJP is also doing work on gold and diamonds, but they face the challenge of how to more effectively engage stakeholders. ICMM has some excellent principles but verifying that you are credibly meeting your commitment to principles is a challenge without a set of standards or criteria.
At the same time if you survey the current landscape, you see companies innovating and getting results on the ground. I suspect that the best way to define responsible, large-scale mining is to survey best practice at current operations on an issue-by-issue basis. Where is good reclamation happening? Where has community sanction been achieved, etc.? That would be an interesting portrait to paint and one that may help the industry if it was actually painted.
Marc Choyt: Do you think that large scale mining can be called, “sustainable?”
Steve D’Esposito: Society needs and wants minerals and materials that are sourced from the Earth. The challenge that we have is to define responsibly sourced minerals and material and to create incentives for mining projects that can contribute to sustainable development. The fact is that with mining, you are depleting a resource. To the extent it stays in economy via recycling, that’s advantageous. So long as economy needs metals, then it is really a question of how society meets its mining and mineral needs more responsibly. The question that needs to be asked is, does that project contribute to responsible, ethical sourcing and sustainable development?
Marc Choyt: Are you going to continue working on mining issues with Resolve? How will it be different from what you did at Earthworks?
Steve D’Esposito: Yes. Mining issues and a broader set of natural resource and public health challenges.
I like your “radical center” reference. Within that, I would really like to focus on both theory and practice. The key is finding the right projects and organizations to test the theory in practice and then adapt the theory . The collaboration piece is key. So it involves finding the projects which people want to work with.
We need to show people that solutions exist, that they are practical, achievable and are good business. I take very seriously the business challenge—”let’s find a solution to this together.” That is a risk I am willing to take.
