The OWON FILM

The Global Assembly of 2021 was the first time a Global Citizens’ Assembly was ever held. 100 people were chosen out of the entire human family through a randomised lottery process, ranging from an elderly seamstress in Brazil to a teenage student in Wuhan, a goat herder in Socotra to a real estate agent in Argentina. They met for 69 hours over 11 weeks over Zoom, learning about the climate and ecological crisis, deliberating together once they became fully informed and then coming to their final recommendations. Their Peoples’ Declaration was presented at the famous COP climate conference in Glasgow in 2021. 

This was a first in history, where the human family met itself for the first time in this unique way and it was a profoundly transformational experience for all involved. 

The documentary team have been analysing and reviewing over 850 hours of footage of these online meetings as well as gathering many hours of new footage interviewing participants as they are now four years later. 

The film tells the story of this historic event from the perspective of the assembly members themselves, then and now. We have been conducting international shoots in Turkey, Argentina, Thailand, India, Morocco and Germany to capture the lives of a few selected participants and shoots are planned for Ireland, India, Zambia and Los Angeles. With each shoot, our mosaic of the human family grows in both size and vibrancy. 

As well as the participants’ voices, we also hear the reflections of the absolute pioneers in this new field of deliberative processes as well as the reflections of cultural leaders like Turkish writer Ece Temelkuran and legendary artist, activist and producer Brian Eno.

This film will be the first time that the true potential for these processes will be exposed to a global audience and the depth of transformational human experience shared widely. It will mark the first time that these processes slip out of the shadows and enter the mainstream of public consciousness.