Morph Bags is not a typical company. You could even say it’s unusual.
My wife and I launched it to make meaningful impact through our products, the ways in which we operate, and broader efforts we engage in through our communities. This includes identifying and recovering materials that would otherwise be wasted, partnering with skilled makers, and demonstrating what circular production can look like in practice. But sustainable products alone aren’t enough. Getting to a genuinely sustainable economy requires new ways of thinking, communities willing to work together on hard problems, and institutions willing to be challenged.
That’s why teaching and community engagement have remained central to my work, rather than sidelines to Morph. They are expressions of the same set of values and commitments that gave rise to it. I work to build community, share ideas, build programs, and advocate for change that goes well beyond that which is directly impacted by our products and operations. This page shares examples to help paint a fuller picture of the collective effort towards positive systems change.
— Chris Oestereich, Founder, Morph Bags
University Teaching & Guest Lecturing
Thammasat University — School of Global Studies
For the past decade, I’ve lectured at Thammasat University’s School of Global Studies in Bangkok, teaching courses centered on systems thinking, social innovation, advocacy, and social enterprise. The program I teach in, Global Studies and Social Enterprise (GSSE) features an active learning model designed to put students in direct contact with real problems and real constraints. GSSE’s approach is built around engagement rather than passive instruction. Students work through genuine challenges, test ideas, and develop the skills and confidence to drive change themselves. It’s been one of the most rewarding parts of my work, and it shapes how I think about almost everything else I do.
In 2017, I led the launch of an effort to develop case studies focused on social entrepreneurship and social innovation in Southeast Asia. The SGS Case Centre was established through a grant partnership between SGS and The HEAD Foundation. We started this effort to develop contextually relevant cases for our students. The case studies are relevant to educators and learners who wish to better understand social endeavours in non-governmental organisations, international development organisations, social enterprises, and community-based efforts to address complex challenges.
Why I Teach
Guest Lecturing: Asia, the US, and Europe
Beyond Thammasat, I’ve had the privilege of sharing and teaching about circular economy and systems thinking to groups across Asia, as well as the US, and Europe. I’ve done so in classrooms, businesses, workshops, community settings, and conferences in working to help people rethink resource use. My teaching aims to share new ideas, while helping participants understand things like their importance, how to recognize or utilize the ideas, and when they might be of use. Rather than a definitional understanding, the goal is to have people demonstrate understanding by using the ideas in order to affect future choices, actions, and outcomes.
If you’re organizing a program or interested in developing something where this perspective might add value, I’d be glad to hear from you.
Community Building, Education, & Collaboration
We’re living through times of upheaval and rapid change. Complex challenges, the so-called wicked problems, are mounting all around us. Community building is an unalloyed force for good amid this uncertainty. Bringing people together around shared interests and concerns is foundational. It opens the door to things like knowledge sharing, trust building, and collaboration. As much as we believe in Morph’s potential for driving change, we are far more certain in the importance of community-building. The more we come together, the stronger we become.
CircularSTL
CircularSTL works to develop a circular economy in the St. Louis region, bringing together businesses, government, community groups, nonprofits, universities, and individuals to highlight innovative models and initiatives that help realize an economy that eliminates waste and keeps materials in circulation. I co-chair CircularSTL and am actively involved in building the coalition, developing education and resources, and supporting local circular economy efforts directly. Learn more: circularstl.org
The Circular Design Lab
The Circular Design Lab was born from a question a small group of us were asking at Thammasat: how could we foster a community capable of helping address some of the biggest challenges facing cities like Bangkok? I co-founded the CDL alongside Jett Virangkabutra, Courtney Savie Lawrence, and Praewa Satutum — all of us volunteers, most of us lecturers at Thammasat’s School of Global Studies.
The CDL brings people together to address environmental and social challenges using systemic design as a path to explore systems intervention possibilities with a systems thinking lens. Our approach centers genuine community participation and we spent a lot of time outside of our workshops building the community ties that fed such participation.
In our workshops, participants would share their perspectives and work towards a shared understanding of a problem, and then work together to dig deeper and try to understand the forces that were driving the undesired outcome. From there, we looked to design change that delivers positive impact.
We also held panel discussions with diverse voices on topics relevant to Bangkok and beyond, which featured breakout discussions designed to make every attendee a participant. We also held social meetups on a regular basis to help build the relationships that foster participation and sustain a community over time.
Each program featured a different challenge, but all of them focused on making change that would benefit the impacted community. Learn more via the CDL’s site: circulardesignlab.org
Programs
CDL Workshops & Events
The CDL’s workshop series took participants through a structured systemic design process as they focused on some of Bangkok’s most pressing challenges. Workshops were complemented by curated panel discussions featuring diverse expert voices, that also included breakout sessions that every participant’s knowledge and perspective, and social meetups that helped build a lasting community. In less than twelve months, what started as an experiment among a handful of people became a grassroots collective.
The Incubation Network’s Circular Innovation Jam
The Incubation Network (TIN) was a joint initiative between SecondMuse and The Circulate Initiative that ran from 2019-2022. During that time, I partnered with TIN on a variety of programs that worked to spin up solutions to the growing plastic waste challenge in support of ” a thriving circular economy in South and Southeast Asia.” Circular Design Lab and Linear to Circular partnered with TIN to launch the first Circular Innovation Jam, a series of online workshops which brought together teams for a virtual design sprint to work on the plastic waste challenge in Thailand. It was one of many programs TIN led at developing inclusive solutions to advance circular economies for plastics and waste management across South and Southeast Asia.
The Incubation Network’s Circular Innovation Jam — the Incubation Network partnered with the CDL and Linear to Circular to launch the first Circular Innovation Jam, a virtual design sprint developing inclusive solutions to advance circular economies for plastics and waste management across South and Southeast Asia.
The ASEAN Workshop on the Promotion of CSR for Social Welfare and Development
The CDL was invited to lead workshops for the ASEAN Workshop on the Promotion of CSR for Social Welfare and Development — a convening that brought government representatives from across the ASEAN region together to work collaboratively on advancing corporate social responsibility and sustainable development. It was a meaningful opportunity to bring systemic design methods directly to the policymakers engaged in some of the region’s most consequential decisions.
CircularSTL Symposia
- I’ve helped shape and facilitate two annual CircularSTL Symposia, bringing together leaders across sustainability, policy, civic institutions, and business to share knowledge, build shared understanding, and co-create a roadmap toward a more circular St. Louis.
Siam Motors Group & the Thai Government – In collaboration with my CDL co-founder and a member of Thailand’s Government Innovation Lab, Dr. Jett Virangkabutra, I’ve co-led programs for Siam Motors Group and the Thai government, bringing circular economy and systems thinking frameworks to corporate and public sector audiences at scale. The former led to the development of at least one product made from waste generated by the firm, filling a resource need while broadening team members’ perspectives and encouraging cross-pollination and collaboration across traditionally siloed units. The latter handed community members the reins as they were allowed to design change which improved the mix of waste entering an incinerator, while doing so in ways that benefited the community. That approach led to the desired improvement in the incinerator’s performance, while also increasing incomes, supporting local food production via community gardens, and the unexpected benefit of waste smell reduction in the street via the removal of compostable organics from the waste stream.
Local Programs in St. Louis
I’ve been teaching classes on circular economy and systems thinking to local audiences across St. Louis, including programs with Principia College, where I taught case studies as part of Principia’s annual Impact Challenge focused on climate change, as well as MICDS, and many more organizations and schools throughout the region.
Selected Collaborations & Engagements – My work has included a wide range of programs and initiatives:
- Covestro – Supported an effort to develop 3D printing filament with waste from Covestro’s operations. The project was going to be ended in favor of one that was older and closer to providing direct, measurable benefits, so we asked to take over the project and Covestro supported us as we did so. We managed to develop a prototype filament that produced sturdy models, but its appearance did not meet our expectations. This project was headed back for additional testing and prototyping around the beginning of the pandemic. Those circumstances led to the end of this specific project, but our learnings and relative success with prototyping led us to look for additional possibilities, which led to the formation of Morph.
- The Ellen MacArthur Foundation’s Disruptive Innovation Festival — the Ellen MacArthur Foundation was among the CDL’s early organizational collaborators and we’ve participated in their flagship annual festival.
- The Systemic Design Association – We engaged in multiple programs with the Systemic Design Association, including an interview in which we shared our story and learnings from launching CDL, as well as leading workshops for systemic design facilitators.
- The RSA — the CDL’s first lab was funded in part by a seed grant from the Royal Society of the Arts. I served as an RSA Global Ambassador and Bangkok Network Lead, and have contributed to multiple RSA programs.
- The CDL’s work has been published in the RSD Symposium Proceedings (RSD9).
- UNDP’s SEA Circular Program — a regional initiative focused on reducing marine plastic pollution across Southeast Asia, with which the CDL collaborated.
- Bangkok Design Week — I brought the CDL’s work to Bangkok’s annual design festival, reaching a broader public audience.
- The Circular Economy Club –
- And more — the CDL took part in many additional programs and collaborations over its active years, and my broader work continues to evolve.
Tools for Systems Thinking
Some of the most useful things I’ve built aren’t products. They’re tools for thinking — and I’ve made them freely available for others to use.
The Zero Waste Game
The Zero Waste Game is a hands-on group exercise that makes the circular economy tangible. Participants work with physical materials representing different waste streams, sorting and categorizing them to surface the resource value embedded in what would ordinarily be discarded. By doing rather than listening, players internalize what waste really is, not an endpoint, but a signal that value is being lost somewhere in the system. The game has been used in classroom and professional settings and is available for workshops and events.
Idea Triage
Idea Triage is a tool I created that allows workshop participants to put forth topics they might like to explore in the program. Once everyone has had a chance to share, they work together to create clusters which are then named. Next, individuals get to opt-in to whatever cluster they prefer. this gives them the chance to collaborate with others on a topic of mutual interest, rather than being assigned to a group and then trying to find something to work on with potentially divergent interests.
The templates is shared on the Doughnut Economics Action Lab (DEAL) site, so you can check it out and download a copy for your own use there. View the tool at doughnuteconomics.org
Speaking & Collaboration
Whether it’s a classroom in Bangkok, a conference in Europe, or a community meeting in St. Louis, I’m always glad to share ideas and experiences related to the circular economy and systems thinking to new audiences.
If you’re organizing something and think this perspective would add value, I’d love to hear from you.
Humanity’s Choice: Paradigm Shift or Bust
With that, I’ll welcome you to check out my tedX Chiang Mai talk. It’s an urgent call for change to bring human civilization back within the Earth’s ecological limits.