Michael Bayliss has been an activist for the past decade within the environmental and post-growth movements. He is the Communications Manager and former Victoria/Tasmanian President at Sustainable Population Australia (SPA). The focus of his work involves advocacy regarding choice for small families and for working cooperatively with our global neighbours to create equitable societies that do not rely on perpetual growth.
Examples of his written work can be found at Independent Australia, where we was awarded the most read article of 2018. He has produced videos detailing the impacts of endless growth in Australia and has been interviewed extensively in the media, e.g. ABC News24, Jon Faine Conversation Hour, SBS radio.
You may also be interested in his videos for World Environment Day, his interview with comedian Rod Quantock and introducing the new documentary film ‘8 Billion Angels’
Previously, he has coordinated various grassroots community groups in Melbourne such as Doing It Ourselves and Gnomes Urban Gardening Network. He is a participant in the international Post Growth Alliance, run by the Post Growth Institute. He co-founded Population Permaculture and Planning (PPP) in 2015 as a means to communicate the critical role that town planning plays in the move towards future sustainable communities. PPP has since delivered workshops to activists and environmentalists across Australia. This year he will be helping to launch the Town Planning Rebellion movement.
Michael takes his policies into his home life, where he lives in an intentional shared-living community based on the Retrosuburbia principles, where he looks after a lush permaculture garden. He writes songs around environmental and climate change grief with his band Shock Octopus.
Michael Bayliss has hosted 80 Episodes.
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Season 3 Premiere - Leadership toward This Sustainable Life with Joshua Spodek
January 2nd, 2022 | Season 3 | 1 hr 2 mins
degrowth, joshua spodeck, leadership, population, post-growth, sustainability, this sustainable life
“I started bringing leadership into the environment. Because I felt like there’s a lot of people telling other people what to do, spreading facts and figures. But no-one really making it enjoyable. Saying you’re going to like this, you’re going to wish you started earlier, speaking from personal experience.”
Joshua Spodek is a bestseller author, multiple TEDx talker and host of award winning podcast “This Sustainable Life”. Joshua is a huge advocate for the environment and for system change toward a post-growth planet. He takes his politics into his home life and made some incredible life transformations in his mission to living more sustainably. So, how has a move toward a meat-free life of no food packaging and no plane miles played out for our special guest on the Season 3 Premiere of PGAP? Is this a life of wilful deprivation and martyrdom? Or have these personal challenges transformed his life into one of joy and a different kind of abundance? Joshua tells all through amusing personal anecdotes coupled with an incredibly well-read and researched outlook on the world.
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PGAP Christmas Special with Michael's Seasonal Manifesto
December 24th, 2021 | Season 2 | 51 mins 25 secs
counting backwards, degrowth, holistic activism, michael bayliss, population, post-growth, shock octopus, steady state, sustainable population australia, town planning rebellion
The festive season is upon us as we wrap close to another year in the decade of consequence. To ‘celebrate’, PGAP host Michael Bayliss shares his own personal vision for a post-growth future. He looks back nostalgically on his Melbourne years, reflecting on the many successes and challenges from ten years in many various grassroots community initiatives. He also plays a selection of songs, penned by himself or by friends that espouse the Degrowth values of this podcast even if they may not inspire complete festive cheer. Enjoy!
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Season 2 Finale with Economic Reform Australia
November 3rd, 2021 | Season 2 | 1 hr 4 mins
adelaide, degrowth, economic reform australia, era, mmt, population, post-growth
In this final episode of season 2, PGAP speaks with Economic Reform Australia (ERA) to find out why fundamental changes to our economic systems are a crucial part of a transition toward degrowth. Why do we have an economic system that prizes money and extraction over the environment and prospects for future generations? What is this ‘MMT’ that everyone is on about these days? Why is economics something that everyone should try to understand and not just leave to the academics and experts? PGAP travels to Adelaide to chat with ERA’s very own Bernard Thomson to find out more.
PGAP also speaks with freelance economic thinker Zoltan Bexley to find out more about why Australia’s current economic system results in many poor outcomes for many of us, such as the favourite bugbear on PGAP – Australia’s housing unaffordability crisis.
Please not that opinions of the Guest’s own and may not necessarily reflect those of the whole ERA organisation.
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Feeling the Future through Fiction with Sharon Ede
October 15th, 2021 | Season 2 | 1 hr 10 secs
adelaide, christie walk, degrowth, mage, novel, post-growth, sharon ede, storytelling
“What we feel shapes what we believe. What if we could feel the future before it arrives?”
So reads the back cover of new fiction book ‘Mage’ written by sustainability professional, post-growth advocate and Adelaide local Sharon Ede. In this penultimate episode of the second season of PGAP, Sharon tells us why fiction, story-telling and emotional resonance are essential communications tools for the environmental movement to engage with the broader community. Providing facts and figures to rally the troops over large-scale existential crises has so far failed to work. Engaging people emotionally through storytelling and providing a ripping yarn just might be the missing link. Mage is definitely this kind of book and hopefully this interview will convince you to add 'Mage' to your post-growth library.
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Exploring Christie Walk EcoHousing with Adelaide Chronicles and Town Planning Rebellion
September 28th, 2021 | Season 2 | 1 hr 3 mins
bremem peace award, christie walk, co-housing, degrowth, mark allen, post-growth, sue gilbey, town planning rebellion
This special and unorthodox episode of PGAP was recorded on-site the Christie Walk ecological co-housing development in central Adelaide to speak to not one, but TWO very special guests. Sue Gilbey is a resident of Christie Walk, host of the Adelaide Chronicles podcast series, an environmental activist, and an advocate for social justice causes. She is the only Australian (so far) to receive the internationally acclaimed Bremen Peace Award. Mark Allen is the founder of Town Planning Rebellion and Holistic Activism. He is a former town planner and former co-host of the City Limits program on Melbourne’s 3CR radio station. In this episode, Sue takes us on a virtual tour of Christie Walk as an example of sustainable inner city community development. Mark provides insight and clarity as to why places like Christie Walk are the exception and not the rule -and why we need to fight back at Australia’s broken property and housing sector (and those who profit most from this status quo).
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Helping the Animals to be not so Anonymous with Adrian Sheriff
September 2nd, 2021 | Season 2 | 45 mins 14 secs
adrian sheriff, animals anonymous, aussie wildlife show, sustainable population australia, wildlife demonstation
Post Growth Australia Podcast travels to Animals Anonymous HQ in the Adelaide Hills to chat with Adrian Sherriff – wildlife demonstrator, native vegetation restorer, and co-host of the excellent Aussie Wildlife Show podcast. As a wildlife demonstrator, Adrian brings native mammals, reptiles and birds to schools, universities and other groups to provide kids and adults an up close and personal education on Australia’s unique and diverse animals. As co-host of Aussie Wildlife Podcast with Steve Crawford, he chats to a range of fascinating guests around everything wildlife and beyond. As someone who sees the bigger picture of human impact on this dry and ancient continent and the impact this has on other species, Adrian also shares with PGAP his vision of a Post-Growth future.
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On The Road with Doone Wyborn and Bindarrabi Intentional Community
August 16th, 2021 | Season 2 | 54 mins 14 secs
bindarrabi, collapse, degrowth, doone wyborn, intentional community, ipcc, post-growth, shock octopus, sustainable population australia
Doone Wyborn is the founder of the Bindarrabi intentional community, inland and uphill of the northern rivers. A former geologist, he worked on the potential of Enhanced Geothermal Systems (EGS) geothermal energy from 1992 to retirement in 2013 and is recognised as a leading Australian authority on this subject. With his finger definitely on the pulse on environmental science and limits to growth, Doone started an intentional community based around community sufficiency, frugal abundance and low carbon living. On a very rainy summer afternoon, Doone shares with PGAP the ins and outs of Bindarrabi community, why societal collapse is a very real and current threat, and why intentional living away from the big capital cities is a very legitimate thing to do!
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Beyond World Population Day: Nandita Bajaj from World Population Balance
July 19th, 2021 | Season 2 | 53 mins 38 secs
animal rights, minimalism, nandita bajaj, pro-natalism, sustainability, veganism, world population balance, world population day
World Population Day may now be a week behind us, but its legacy lives on! In this episode, host Michael Bayliss talks to the new Executive Director of World Population Balance, Nandita Bajaj. WPB is a North American organisation dedicated to tackling the overpopulation issue through education, campaigns and podcasts – they are the makers of the Overpopulation Podcast after all! Nandita and Michael discovered they have many shared values beyond population including minimalism, being childfree and, most excitingly for both of us, we are big on veganism and animal rights! Therefore, our conversation goes in many pithy directions and intersections.
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World Population Day 2021: Beyond population with SPA and Nature's Way Films
July 6th, 2021 | Season 2 | 1 hr 13 mins
democrats, igr, john coulter, limits to growth, nature's way, spa, way to live
This episode of PGAP falls on World Population Day and is also PGAP’s first year anniversary! Instead of celebrating with balloons and confetti – because they’re bad for the environment – we mark the occasion instead by interviewing two very special guests. Dr. John Coulter, former leader of The Democrats and long term member of Sustainable Population Australia, looks back on an ad he posted on The Australia in 1971 calling for limits to growth – exactly 50 years ago. Host Michael Bayliss also talks with filmmaker Dubhaltagh O Hearcain of Nature’s Way Films, to discuss a brand new documentary on overpopulation ‘The Way To Live.’ Both interviewees call for a movement ‘beyond population’ towards a bigger picture of equity and living within the physical limits of the natural world. A gargantuan episode for gargantuan times.
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S2 Ep10: Living Simply with Ted Trainer
June 24th, 2021 | Season 2 | 53 mins 31 secs
degrowth, limits to growth, paul ehrlich, post-growth, simplicity institute, ted trainer, the simpler way, transition towns
In this episode of PGAP, host Michael Bayliss talks to Dr. Ted Trainer from The Simpler Way. And what is the simpler way? Is it a descent into sacrifice, frugality and deprivation? Or is it a systemic change away from a wasteful, globalised growth based economic system towards localised self-sufficiency, self-governance, lives of leisure and reconnection with the natural world? Ted reassures us to much relief that it is definitely the latter!
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Tassie Perspectives 3: North Facing in the North West with Caroline and Kirk
June 2nd, 2021 | Season 2 | 1 hr 13 mins
For PGAP’s third and final episode on Tasmanian Perspectives, host Michael Bayliss returns back to the Northwest to with Caroline Smith and Kirk Hall. Caroline and Kirk share their reasons for relocating from the mainland and why a future of ditching rampant consumption and returning to a life of voluntary simplicity, local communities, permaculture and degrowth are critical – not only for Tasmania – but anywhere and everywhere!
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Tassie Perspectives 2: Damning the Matrix with Mike Stasse
May 25th, 2021 | Season 2 | 50 mins 51 secs
damn the matrix, degrowth, ian lowe, limits to growth, mike stasse, post-growth, spa, sustainable population australia
"Degrowth is happening whether we like it or not" - Michel Stasse
In the 'Tasmanian Perspectives’ series, PGAP host Michael Bayliss travels around the Apple Isle to interview Post-Growth mainlanders who have resettled in Tasmania and to discuss their reasons why.
In this episode, I travel to the Huon Valley to meet with Michel Stasse, long-time Degrowth advocate, founder of the 'Damn The Matrix' blog and DIO superhero who self-built an impressive self-sufficient, off-grid eco home in the Huon Valley. -
Tasmanian Perspectives Part 1: Tania Brookes
May 5th, 2021 | Season 2 | 58 mins 32 secs
cent, claire taylor, live well tasmania, permaculture, reseed centre, tamania, tania brookes
The ‘Tasmanian Perspectives’ series of PGAP examines the lives, projects and perspectives of Post-Growth game changers who have left the mainland to start a new life in Tasmania. What made them decide to jump the Bass Strait? How is it all working out for them? Should you follow by example and make the move yourself? For the first episode, PGAP had the absolute pleasure of chatting with Tania Brookes from the Reseed Centre in Penguin.
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S2 Ep6: The Economics of Arrival with Katherine Trebeck
April 14th, 2021 | Season 2 | 1 hr 1 min
economics of arrival, katherine trebeck, post-growth, weall, wellbeing economy alliance
How does a society know when enough is enough and it is time to stop growing, developing, consuming? How does a society know when it has ‘arrived’ and doesn’t need to keep striving for more? How does a society know when it hasn’t yet 'arrived' and where further material growth is still, on balance, a good idea? What are the ceiling limits to look out for?
Well, who better to come to my rescue on this philosophical quagmire of a question than Dr. Katherine Trebeck, co-Author of "The Economics of Arrival: Ideas for a Grown-Up Economy."
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S2 Episode 5: Changing our Story on Population with Karen Shragg
March 31st, 2021 | Season 2 | 1 hr 33 secs
author, degrowth, karen shragg, moving upstream, overpopulation, post-growth
Why does modern society persist in pursuing its endless growth experiment when it is so obvious that this is unsustainable? Why is modern neo-liberalism so resistant to change even when the writing is so clearly on the wall? PGAP talks to environmentalist, naturalist, educator, poet and author of new book “Change Our Stories, Change Our World” – Karen Shragg. Karen, who lives in the USA, discusses several of the modern myths and stories detailed in her new book from greed, inequality, religion, anthropocentrism, and the all to misunderstood topic to which she focuses the majority of her activism and advocacy – overpopulation.
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S2 Episode 4: How we can have an Inspired Evolution with Amrit Sandhu
March 16th, 2021 | Season 2 | 1 hr 10 mins
amrit sandhu, conversation, inspired evolution, life coach, meditation, mindfulness, positive thinking, post-growth, spirituality
*One of the downsides of becoming intimate with Post-Growth is that one becomes acutely aware of the human impact on our planetary systems. One is continuity at loggerheads with growth based economies that are pulling in the opposite direction of where they should be going and what they should be doing - and the people just don’t seem to stop! *
Now I don’t know about you, but this can often fill me with depression, anxiety, existential depression and morose apathy. And this is just on one of my rare good, well-adjusted days. So how do we keep ourselves hopeful, in good spirits and avoid turning into one of those bitter, cynical sterotypes that our younger selves were adamant we'd never become? Why do all those life coaches and spiritual types all seem to look so happy, smiling away with those big white teeth which look like they’ve never had to down a surly cup of black, treacly coffee in ages? P-GAP talks to Amrit Sandhu - life coach, conversationalist, fellow podcast host -of Inspired Evolution - and long-term smiler, laughter and optimist – to give us some sagely advice.
PGAP is made possible with the support from Sustainable Population Australia