Community Resilience Example: An Insider's Guide to Sharing City Detroit

City seal of Detroit, Michigan. (Photo: Wikipedia)

by Halima Cassells, Shareable: http://www.shareable.net/blog/an-insiders-guide-to-sharing-city-detroit

Unbeknownst to most who have yet to venture through my beloved city, Detroit is a sharing city. We have been for centuries, and we will continue to be. 

We have a culture where it is commonplace to acknowledge each other when we pass; to share a smile, joke, or story while sitting in the laundromat or on the bus. And we share our wealth. 

Below are some of my favorite sharing spaces in the city. Please feel free to add any that you know of in the comments - I always look forward to discovering more sharing spaces.

                                                                                                    














Scene from a community dinner in the Cass Corridor Commons multi-purpose room

Modeling the practice of collective work and responsibility, the Cass Corridor Commons (CCC) is a space that uniquely nurtures collaboration among community and grassroots organizations via the way the space is utilized and shared within a commons framework.

Currently, eight organizations share the space: East Michigan Environmental Action Council (EMEAC), EcoWorks, Sugar Law Center, Detroit Youth Energy Squad, Uprise, Fender Bender, D. Blair Collective, and the Music Teachers’ Collective.

Bryce Detroit, director of community relations and marketing for the space explains: “Each group residing in the space creates their own agreement with the Commons, and that agreement governs the nature of their relationship. We nurture our internal community by holding regularly scheduled CCC meetings for inter-organizational updates and CCC proposed initiatives, where each organization may raise questions, concerns, and give input - it’s where co-ideation for collaborative programming occurs. The Cass Corridor Commons is an environmental justice, social justice, and cultural activism hub. Our mission is to be a space that fosters collaboration and cross-pollination.”

  

A “Disco-Tech” (Discovering Technology) event hosted by AMP where community members interact, experiment, and create using many forms of media and technology

Just around the corner from the CCC is a building that houses another awesome sharing space: Allied Media Projects (AMP). This organization hosts a national conference, the Allied Media Conference, which brings together thousands of media-makers, artists, educators, and activists annually.

AMP also runs several programs that facilitate information-sharing and empowerment through digital narrative creation within the city of Detroit.

Some of these projects include Detroit Digital Justice Coalition (which helps bring wireless networks to the community), Detroit Future Schools (which has successfully paired hundreds of students with digital media specialists to co-create projects), and the organizing of community events in which folks can exchange stories, ideas, and technical skills.

Jenny Lee, director at Allied Media Projects explains: “At AMP, the concept of media-based organizing and the process of speaking and listening is very important … how [we] construct narratives through the thoughtful participation of a multitude ... and even more importantly the change that happens as we are making media.”

Lee adds that the project is empowering on both a personal and community level. “Power is really growing within grassroots communities,” she says.

“When I see AMP doing the Digital Justice Coalition, the Food Justice Task Force, the Restorative Justice Initiative, the Research Justice Initiative - there’s so many pockets of networked activities emerging. It feels like this ... alchemic process where people are figuring out, how do we create our own power - in their labs which may be gardens or media making processes.”


KGD gardeners work collectively to prepare harvested garlic that will be distributed to members at Earthworks Farm

Speaking of gardens, Detroit leads the nation in urban gardening and farming. Keep Growing Detroit (KGD) is a collective of several organizations, urban gardeners and farmers within the cities of Detroit, Highland Park, and Hamtramck. Currently they are 1,400 members strong.

Members buy in at a rate of $5-$20 per year based on the size of their garden, and become part of a community that buys and shares bulk organic seed and transplants, shares tools and equipment, shares gardening knowledge, shares responsibility in decision making via a series of potlucks, and shares the opportunity to sell produce collectively at market.

“KGD has a grassroots approach to sharing resources,” says Jamii Tata, outreach coordinator for KGD. “We directly deliver compost, woodchips, supplies and tools to regional resource centers across Detroit.”

An educational series for members includes one-day, hands-on workshops in member gardens, community kitchens, and greenhouses that address specific topics from staking tomatoes to canning them.

In addition KGD offers the Urban Roots course, which is a nine-week intensive that pairs master gardening and community engagement training with the intent that graduates are fully equipped to create community gardens and train others.

A few community farms that have been started or run by by graduates include: Feedom Freedom Growers, Oakland Ave Garden and Greenhouse, Earthworks, D-Town Farms.


Youth practice team building at Avalon Village in Highland Park, underneath a Soulardarity Solar Co-op Streetlight

Growing out of the Detroit Black Community Food Security Network, which owns and operates D-Town Farms, is the Detroit People’s Food Co-op (DPFC), an ambitious initiative that will send ripples throughout the Detroit economy.

Slated to open in late 2015, DPFC will be a consumer co-op complex that houses a full grocery store, commercial kitchen for community use, workshop and demonstration space, and office space dedicated to hyper-local investment.

So far the group has garnered community support through a series of community conversations and teach-ins, created an interim board, and is moving steadfastly forward.

There are other co-ops that are also starting in Detroit. The Center for Community Based Enterprise (C2BE) is working with many groups that are either converting existing businesses into worker-owned co-ops, or starting new co-ops. This group is also creating a worker center to be utilized by a multitude of co-ops as a central administrative office.

Another co-operative that is building momentum is Soulardarity. Based in Highland Park (a small municipality wholly surrounded by Detroit), this co-op grew out of the need for public lighting after the electric company repossessed 1200 streetlights from this community.

Co-founder Jackson Koeppel explains, “Soulardarity is building an energy co-op in Highland Park to bring light to the city and promote a solar energy system that residents are responsible for and can benefit from equally.”

Another example of folks getting together and creating a co-operative live/work, multiple benefit situation is the New Work Field Street Collective. In this space, a group of people are continuously, collectively rehabilitating an old house to fit their needs as a collective.

“What we are about is living the new culture, which includes self-reliance, independence, and sustainability within community,” says NWFSC member Blair Anderson.

Members of the space live communally sharing kitchen and common space. Each member’s talents are input into cottage industries that also have a space in the house. Currently there is a community garden, sewing and garment repair room, and New Work Leather enterprises which bring community production and income into the space.

Detroit also boasts a number of spaces and programs that are open to community members to utilize and share technology and tools. As Blair explains, “We are fortunate to be able to utilize cutting edge-technology to create our products.”

Incite Focus, a state-of-the-art fabrication lab, offers self guided community hours every week. New Work Leather and other small businesses are able to access and learn to utilize their machines, as “technology for community production” is one of the main goals of the space.

The Mt. Elliott Makerspace, is another example of space intended for experimentation and tinkering. It is open to all age groups but geared more for the youth. This space often collaborates with schools and other organizations for events around the city that focus on electronic deconstructing and making.

There is also a makerspace intended for adults in the Recycle Here recycling center. With a focus on bikes, the Hub of Detroit is a place where young people can learn to customize and repair bicycles. They have several programs geared to bike mechanics and often collaborate with other groups in the city to host bike clinics.


The Raiz Up Collective sharing information during a cypher in the park

All of the above-mentioned spaces have an element of information sharing. There are, however, some spaces that are uniquely designed for this intent. We call them popular education spaces. The Raiz Up Collective is an awesome collective that comes together weekly to share info on current events, especially as related to the Southwest neighborhood of Detroit.

Universidad Sin Fronteras which is organized into 8-week discussion modules, like a college course, is another example of information sharing. The distinguishing factor, however is that everyone in the space is uplifted for their unique expertise on their lived experience. There are discussion facilitators, but the collective knowledge and experience of the group is what is most valued.


Community members share a potluck meal at neighborhood Detroit SOUP dinner

In its fifth year, Detroit SOUP, is a unique potluck-style dinner that promotes community projects through microfunding. Participants show up with a dish or snack, and a donation of $5. There are four pre-selected proposals that are pitched at each dinner.

Each of the presenters gets asked questions, and while folks are eating they also vote on which proposal they would most like to back. At the end of the dinner, votes are tallied, and the presenter with the most votes wins the pot of donation money to bring their proposal to life. At each event past winners speak on the progress of their projects.


A Free Market Swap set-up at the Cass Corridor Commons, shortly before excited swappers arrive

Swaps are happening all over Detroit, as people realize they are a fun way to build community, circulate wealth, meet needs, and save money.

Excited teen swapper Zanyia explains, “There were children from 2, to adults of 60-something odd years getting together, giving their time and beloved keepsakes to someone who would appreciate it more than they ever could. It’s just an amazing experience. My favorite part of the swap is the fact that everybody benefited from it. And culture and stories were shared through what people let go; while sitting around clothes, furniture, kitchen appliances, jewelry and so much more, listening to the ex-owner recollect their favorite memories of your new favorite trousers or piece of art. I mean how often in today's society can a sixty-year-old and a fifteen-year-old swap clothes and look hella nice?”


Detail of a Beehive poster, which depicts 500 years of colonialism, corporatism, and resistance in Meso-America

As if that isn’t enough, the Beehive Collective is coming in 2015 to create a graphic poster depicting the power analysis and emergent strategies for solidarity and sharing that exist within the city.

The collective will be housed at the Cass Corridor Commons for several months during which time there will be several community conversations intended to gather stories from Detroiters and co-create a people’s narrative in graphic poster form.

Vermonters Lobby for Public Bank - And Win Millions for Local Investment Instead

Photo by Shutterstock

by Alexis Goldstein, Yes! magazine: http://www.yesmagazine.org/commonomics/vermonters-lobby-public-bank-win-millions-for-local-investment

Right before 2014 came to a close, Wall Street won an enormous victory in the year-end spending bill.

The so-called “CRomnibus” bill, which included language written by Citigroup lobbyists, gutted a key piece of Wall Street reform meant to prevent future bailouts of big banks with taxpayer money.

This win came after the financial industry spent years chipping away at the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, which passed in 2010. Wall Street lobbyists gained little victories along the way, but never stopped asking for more. By making bold and ongoing asks, Wall Street was able to win, even when lawmakers sought a compromise.

There’s another group of Americans, however, with a different agenda for the future of banking - people who are also pushing hard for policy change.

They’re advocates of public banking, and they want to see new banks created that would be owned and operated by the government, usually at the state or city level (this would greatly increase the amount of investment capital available for small business development, local infrastructure, and affordable public transportation, none of which are much favored by private banks seeking a high return on investment).

Gwendolyn Hallsmith in Montpelier. Photo courtesy of Gwendolyn Hallsmith.

Gwendolyn Hallsmith is one of those advocates. She’s currently the executive director of the Public Banking Institute, but she worked previously as a public servant in Montpelier, Vermont, where she resides and ran for mayor in 2014.

Hallsmith also spent some time in divinity school, and you can hear it in her voice - which is soft but strong and deliberately paced. “Perhaps the only thing more dangerous than giving a politician the microphone is giving a former pastor the microphone,” Hallsmith joked at a recent forum on public banking.

To Hallsmith, the main advantage of a public bank is lower-cost financing, which can enable the state to pay for things like building affordable housing, repairing infrastructure, and expanding educational opportunities. And each of these projects creates jobs.

Public banks “allow cities, counties, and states to finance important public priorities without needing to rely on Wall Street and pay the hidden interest tax that Wall Street imposes on all our money,” Hallsmith said.

The quest to achieve public banking at the state and local level has been a long slog. Until quite recently, you had to go back almost 100 years to find the last major victory: the founding of the bank of North Dakota, the only state-run public bank in the United States, which was established in 1919.

But interest has been picking up around the country. Santa Fe, New Mexico, voted in October to conduct a study on the feasibility of a city-run public bank. And in December, the Seattle City Council’s finance committee hosted experts in public banking to explore the topic.

But nowhere have the steps toward public banking been more successful than in the state of Vermont. There, Hallsmith and other advocates won a small victory against Wall Street through an effort so relentless and strategic that it would have made any banking lobbyist proud.

They combined savvy organizing with data-driven reports and policy briefs to prove the benefits of a public bank - like avoiding fat interest payments to Wall Street banks - for the state’s economy.

And because the original bill put forward by Vermont state Senator Anthony Pollina and others included multiple demands - create a public bank, direct 10% of the state’s reserves to initially fund it, and establish an advisory committee on how best to invest locally - advocates won a decent compromise in the end.

They may not have gotten the state bank they wanted, but they were able to pass new rules that make the Vermont state treasury’s cash balances available for low-cost loans to local projects. 

$10 million additional dollars for local investment 

The step Vermont took is called “10 Percent for Vermont.” Under this law, passed in June, up to 10% of the state treasury’s cash balance - which as of November was about $350 million - can be used for lending and investment within the state. 

The law also created a Local Investment Advisory Committee to advise the treasurer on “funding priorities” and “mechanisms to increase local investment.”

Pollina was one of the main champions of the law. Pollina has been a state senator since 2010, but has a long career in politics; in 2000, he ran for governor as a member of the Vermont Progressive Party against Howard Dean.

“It’s just logical that you’d want to invest it in your own cities,” he said, describing the program as an “economic development tool.”

The final version of the 10 Percent for Vermont program did not create a public bank. But it helped to accomplish some of the same goals, like providing low-cost financing for state projects that might otherwise not be able to secure affordable or long-term funding.

It’s not new for Vermont to enable its treasurer to lend locally - the state has had several similar programs in place since 2012. But typically, according to Hallsmith, the state would “borrow the money from Wall Street to do it.” Now, state officials can use the money from the state treasury’s deposits to do this kind of lending directly.

In 2014, the treasurer’s office made several local investments that counted toward the “10 Percent” total, but were authorized under previous laws.

One example is the Vermont Clean Energy Loan Fund, which allocated $6.5 million in loans to encourage energy efficiency in residential home projects in the state, such as in Shelburne and Rutland counties.

Another is a $2.8 million loan to Vermont’s Housing Finance Agency to support 111 units of multifamily affordable housing.

A third is a loan fund approved in June that allocated $8 million for improved energy efficiency in state government buildings, with the goal of reducing their energy use by at least 5% (the state currently spends $14 million a year on energy bills).

All told, in 2014, Vermont’s treasury lent out $24.5 million to local projects. Even though this money was authorized by prior legislation, it still counts toward the 10% of the state’s cash balance - that is, $35 million - that the treasury may lend to the community.

That means there is still approximately $10 million in additional funds available for local investment - money that the treasurer would not have been able to lend were it not for the 10% program.

The long fight for a public bank in Vermont

Public bank advocates, state Treasurer Beth Pearce, and the Vermont Bankers Association (VBA) all agree that 10 Percent for Vermont is off to a good start. Christopher D’Elia of the VBA said the program has “worked very well under the treasurer’s leadership” and that he believes “the taxpayers will receive a very nice rate of return.”

But the road to get there began with the more dramatic goal of a true public bank in Vermont.

The effort picked up steam in January 2012, when the Vermont House introduced legislation to conduct a study on creating a state bank, with 67 legislators co-sponsoring the bill.

That February, the think tank Demos released a policy brief outlining the potential benefits. They pointed out that the for-profit TD Bank is a juggernaut in the state, holding over $2.3 billion of Vermont’s $10.9 billion total, in 2011.

And yet, in 2010 the bank only made $416,800 in Small Business Association 7(a) loans (which are loans provided to small businesses that meet certain requirements), a 90% decline from the volume of similar loans it made in 2008.

Momentum kept building: In May 2013, the League of Women Voters of Vermont voted to conduct a study on the feasibility of a public bank. That December, a coalition of organizers, business, and individuals called Vermonters for a New Economy published a report again laying out the case for a public bank in the state.

The report argued that a state bank could create more than 2,500 new jobs and add $192 million to Vermont’s Gross State Product (which is the economic output of a state. You can think of it as the state version of GDP).

And because the state no longer would have to borrow money from private banks to finance important projects, the report found a public bank could save the state $100 million in interest payments over 20 years.

All three studies showed significant benefits, and state legislators were starting to listen. Last January, six Vermont state senators (Anthony Pollina, Claire Ayer, Eldred French, Dick McCormack, Jeanette K. White, and David Zuckerman - all Democrats except for Pollina and Zuckerman, who are members of the Vermont Progressive Party) proposed a stand-alone bill to implement the 10 Percent for Vermont program within the Vermont Economic Development Authority (VEDA), which would be granted a banking license and thus become the second state bank in the United States.

In addition, an advisory committee would be created to “to enlist the help of private enterprise and encourage the use and growth of the program.”

The idea didn’t sit well with the treasurer’s office or the Vermont Bankers Association. Both argued that a public bank might hurt the state’s bond rating. Advocates countered that North Dakota’s public bank hadn’t damaged its rating, which was almost as high as Vermont’s - AA- versus AA+.

State Senator Anthony Pollina addresses constituents. Photo courtesy of Anthony Pollina.

The VBA remained hopeful that the state legislature would not follow through with its plan to create a state bank—noting in a January 2014 report that the Vermont Congress showed “willingness to consider other options.” But Vermonters for a New Economy continued to build pressure through a campaign of “Town Hall” discussions.

In March, 23 Vermont towns voted on resolutions urging the creation of a state bank, with 19 towns ultimately approving it. The votes were not legally binding, but they demonstrated broad support because each town needed to generate petition signatures for at least 5% of its legal voters to even hold the votes.

At the end of March, Pollina abandoned the stand-alone version of the public bank bill and instead inserted a modified version as an amendment into a large, must-pass economic development bill (seven other senators offered the amendment along with Pollina).

Now, instead of VEDA implementing the 10 Percent program and getting a banking license, the treasurer’s office would oversee the program and chair the Advisory Committee.

This amendment didn’t completely abandon the idea of a public bank: It mandated that the Advisory Committee give a report in January that include a recommendation on whether to eventually turn VEDA into a public bank.

But the VBA opposed even that. And after Pollina’s amendment, it announced that it planned to fight in the Vermont House to get the public bank recommendation removed from the overall economic development bill.

The Vermont Bankers Association was successful in that. But the 10 Percent program survived, albeit in an amended form. 

Can other states learn from Vermont’s fight?

Approximately $10 million is left to be invested from the 10 Percent program, and there are many options. Presentations to the Local Investment Advisory Committee have provided plenty of ideas for how to invest that money.

In November, the committee met to discuss potential investments in infrastructure, like water supply projects or bridges (during the meeting, Karen Horn of the Vermont League of Cities and Towns pointed out that one-third of the state’s bridges are structurally deficient).

And in December, committee members discussed possible transportation investments. This month, the treasurer’s office reports on its progress with the 10 Percent program, make a preliminary recommendation on how to loan the rest of the money, and will take proposals through March 1.

The 10 Percent program was also given a built-in sunset, so the program will either end or be renewed in July. The loans already made won’t go anywhere - the $2.8 million in loans for new affordable housing, for example, is good through 2024. But, once all the loan money is paid back, the treasurer’s office won’t be able to loan the additional $10 million locally if the program isn’t renewed.

“The sunset shows again how difficult this struggle is and how strong the opposition can be,” Pollina said. “We are fighting the banking interests every step of the way.”

But the odds for renewal seem good. Even d’Elia of the Vermont Bankers Association said that his group supports a continuation of the 10 Percent program. “We would be supportive of the program continuing in the sense that, as the money comes back in, it gets lent out again,” d’Elia said.

But when asked if he would support an increase in the program, d’Elia expressed familiar concerns about cash flow and the state’s bond rating. And the Bankers Association remains firmly against a state bank: “We see no reason to create a state bank in Vermont,” d’Elia said.

Perhaps the VBA is right to be nervous about a possible expansion of the program. After all, by reducing a state’s need to borrow from Wall Street, public banks threaten private banks’ profits.

But thus far, it’s advocates who may have paid a steeper price than private banks: Hallsmith alleges that she was fired from her job as a public servant because she advocated for a public bank in her private time. She has an open case with the Vermont State Supreme Court.

But Hallsmith remains positive about the public bank movement and its momentum: “Once we realize the power of credit creation - using money we are now sending to Wall Street - I don’t think there will be any stopping it,” she said.

Could other cities and states stand to benefit from emulating what Vermonters have done? Pollina thinks so, noting that similar programs “could help states and cities dig out of the Grand Recession.”

That’s exactly the kind of idea that thinkers like Mike Krauss of the Public Banking Institute are hoping to spread across the country.

Public banking is “a way to enable prosperity at the local level,” he said.

Vermont’s continued work on expanding local lending is a small step toward such prosperity. And if advocates can continue to combine their demands for a public bank with increases in local lending, they can ensure a small win for their city or state, even when the effort ends in a compromise. Those advocating for public banks in the rest of the country would do well to learn from the fight waged in Vermont.

Corrections: This article originally stated that 19 towns in Vermont voted on resolutions supporting a statewide public bank, and that 15 passed it. In fact, 23 towns voted on resolutions and 19 passed them. Also, the article originally stated that Gwendolyn Hallsmith lives with her husband and son, which she does not.

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Alexis Goldstein wrote this article for YES! Magazine, a national, nonprofit media organization that fuses powerful ideas with practical actions. Alexis is a former Wall Street professional who currently serves as the communications director for The Other 98%. She is the co-host of the radical finance and economics podcast Disorderly Conduct. Follow her on Twitter at @alexisgoldstein.

FairCoop: Virus of Cooperation Infects a New Economy

by ROAR Collective, ROAR Magazine: http://roarmag.org/2015/01/faircoop-cooperation-new-economy/

The ‘Robin Hood of the Banks’ strikes again. This time the aim is to create a worldwide cooperative to develop and expand a new economy of the commons.

By Pablo Prieto and Enric Duran

Some revolutionary activists have an amazing ability to avoid the economy. 

We have been iron-branded with the idea that the economy is not only evil, but the cause of all evil; that we should stay away from it and feel guilty about being involved with it. Like don Quixote, we are sane and pure-hearted, but we refuse to see this one truth: we need a new economy.

A new economy begins with a new kind of money. If you’ve managed to live in something close to a gift economy: congratulations, you’ve made it! This only works for some of us, though, living in relatively small communities, and not on a global scale. 

You have to realize that you’re not really changing your neighbors’ world by trading Ubuntu installs for massage; you’re not overthrowing the hyperarchist system of human domination by paying for your tofu in rainbowcoins, now, are you?

While complementary currencies do a great job at local level, they’re just that: they complement other parts which together make up a whole. And what we really need is to build up a whole new way to live in this world.

Here we go! So, we need money, we need decentralized international markets, financial tools, solid trade networks … a financial system, after all. Money, or food for that matter, aren’t harmful: bulimia or capitalism are. 

Money can and should be used for the common good - and by money we don’t mean fiat currencies, of course. Fiat currencies are created and controlled by an evil structure, and used for tyranny and planetary destruction (also, we don’t see a way we are ever getting any of that pie).

We need to create our own monetary system - a better one, one that will suddenly make theirs obsolete and their banks worthless, just like the electric car would do with the gas distribution network. And we need the transition to be fast enough so they don’t have time to react and use it for their benefit. What you’ve just read is the definition of the term disruptive technology.

In 2008, when Satoshi Nakamoto created Bitcoin, he came up with two disruptive technologies at once: the blockchain, a public, universal, unalterable digital ledger, and the proof-of-work (POW), a new network p2p security system. Together, thanks to the power of cryptography and the Internet, they allow us to decentralize, and hence democratize three things:

• Economy. The blockchain allows us to securely store and move our own money with no need for intermediaries. This automatically renders the current financial system useless, and is only the beginning of a new way to organize the whole economy.
• Politics. If we use banks and pay our taxes, the government will do whatever they please with our money, or maybe what the banks please. If we instead use our money to support the projects we would like to see happen, they will eventually happen. What matters here is that with the blockchain we have the real freedom to choose between supporting central governments or supporting a new, distributed way to organize our lives.
• Culture. Decentralizing technologies empower the p2p network society as a new way of thinking and doing that’s quickly replacing many old-regime institutions and central authorities.

Anyway, individualistic approaches to this new technology - like bitcoin - are very interesting experiences, but frightening. We can even picture a gloomy future ruled by cold algorithms and controlled by relentless DACs (decentralized autonomous corporations). 

We probably wouldn’t like that much. Maybe the solution to state hierarchy is not completely math-based individualism. Maybe a middle path (as David Harvey would put it) is needed, where the potential of decentralization and the capacities of cooperations could join together.

A disruptive technology is not revolutionary in itself, unless it comes wrapped in a new system of governance, and also in a new ethical paradigm, one that’s broadly and honestly accepted, never imposed. 

Revolution is not only a political change, but a cultural and individual mindshift. The perfect political system won’t work unless we first learn how to love each other. Any revolution prior to that will lead to disintegration of power only long enough for the next populist leader to figure out how to get hold of it.

And well, we also need to go further than a new financial system …

Productive businesses are usually forced to make a big profit to pay back their debts to financial institutions. The so-called real productive system needs to be freed from the parasite, and when that happens we will clearly see how the financial system has absolutely nothing to offer to society, how it was all a gigantic scam, and how most of it is simply disposable.

We (including you) have a lot of work to do in building a peer production/commons-based framework of initiatives, and this framework cannot depend on credit coming from the old banking system. A new system must be built at the same time.

These thoughts inspired the creation of FairCoop. One of us, Enric Duran (co-founder of the first integral cooperative) chose a cryptocurrency, Faircoin, anonymously encouraged a community take-over of said cryptocurrency, and bought a significant amount of all existing coins at a low price, unnoticed.

Enric then brought together people from the CIC, the P2P Foundation, the Dark Wallet team, and other activists, to co-design an initial vision of how FairCoop could help build a worldwide cooperative: An Open Coop totally independent from banks or states, where everyone could have control of their own projects and money, yet overseen by a collective structure acting as a trust network. Success is about trust, even in post-capitalism.

This collective structure design is subject to very general, but nonetheless clear ethical principles taken from hacker ethics, the integral revolution, and the p2p model of social organization. 

Money dynamics are neither controlled by a central authority nor completely unregulated, but managed collectively in a less anarchist and more participatory way. The decision-making method is fairer than the representative system but more agile than some of those huge, endless assemblies we used to enjoy.

FairFunds are important among FairCoop’s currently available tools. They will provide funding to projects that fall into the above-mentioned principles, and that can add to the common good. 

More than ten million Faircoins - about 20% of total supply - is already deposited in the FairFunds, and will be used to fund projects related to wealth redistribution to local communities worldwide, people empowerment, and the creation of commons and free technology.

FairMarket, our worldwide collaborative fair economy marketplace, is another space where we can change the way consumers and producers organize to exchange interesting goods and services, in a way that avoids middlemen and also helps the planet. This aspect of our project is currently in development for an upcoming beta launch.

Returning to the cryptocurrency, Faircoin has certain features which make it fit the FairCoop purposes. Basically, the process of extraction is different than that of Bitcoin (POW). It’s called minting (POS, proof-of-stake). But yeah, it was mostly about the name. Which currency you choose doesn’t actually matter that much. 

The most important features of this new system are not imprinted as algorithms in the code; instead they will come from the human input and democratic participation of all members.

With the creation skills available in our p2p commons networks, we’re sure that the Faircoin of the future will join the decentralized technology of the blockchain and the human-centered values of cooperation.

At any rate, besides the tools we have working or designed already, what matters most in FairCoop is the open process. 

In a world changing as rapidly as ours, where disruptive technologies are aggregating and creating an unprecedented multiplier effect, the way we can become as successful as possible is by also aggregating simultaneously, coming up with new and better ideas day by day, building our knowledge and experiences in our own FairCoop ecosystem.

We do not destroy the system by attacking it with our wooden spears. We are creating a valid alternative, and have started developing it.

FairCoop aims to provide new, free, collaborative economic, social and technological tools for everyone, and will try to make sure they are used in a cooperative way for the creation and expansion of the commons worldwide. An Earth cooperative to build the fair world of the future.

We can all help to make this happen. You can learn about the different ways to get involved here.

Pablo Prieto is a scientist working on the science of a post-capitalist world. He is a member of FairCoop.

Enric Duran is a post-capitalist activist and co-founder of the Catalan Integral Cooperative and FairCoop. He is widely known as the “Robin Hood of the Banks” for his legendary anti-capitalist bank swindles.

Can You Imagine a City Where Trees and Swing Sets Matter More Than Cars?

Singapore’s Gardens by the Bay (Photo: Shutterstock)

by Jason F. McLennan, Yes! magazine: http://www.yesmagazine.org/issues/cities-are-now/can-you-imagine-city-trees-swing-sets-matter-more-than-cars

This article appears in Cities Are Now, the Winter 2015 issue of YES! Magazine. 

If there’s one thing that’s certain, it’s that the future hasn’t hap­pened yet.

How we will live a few decades from now is anything but clear, despite predictions from our wisest architects, planners, politicians, philosophers, futurists, and science fiction writers.

For anyone committed to creating a more sustainable and just culture, here’s a sobering exercise: Try looking into the past as a way of tracking society’s expectations for itself. Look back a few decades and see how yesterday’s visionaries predicted we’d be living now.

I must do this routinely in my work in setting standards and developing tools for change at the International Living Future Institute.

So I can tell you a common thread weaves through most fictionalized, artistic, and scien­tific forecasts: that the ongoing march of technological progress will continue unabated, further mechanizing our experience as humans and separating us from nature until everything we need is provided by machines and computers whose intelligence surpasses that of their operators.

A companion theme in futuristic prophecies is the subjuga­tion and taming of nature or, in extreme cases, nature’s total elimina­tion. In these depictions, there is little room for non-human life.

Think for a moment about the sheer bulk of stories you’ve read and movies you’ve seen, and how many of them warn of a bleak future for society - books such as Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World and Cormac McCarthy’s The Road, and a catalog of dystopian cinema: Metropolis, Blade Runner, Road Warrior, Terminator, and WALL-E, just to begin the short list.

The current epidemic of zombies chasing after us through our popu­lar culture is, I think, nothing less than a psychological manifestation of our species’ sense of worthlessness. The undead trudge through our cities consuming us like a cancer. What better symbol of hopelessness and lack of self-worth could we possibly conjure up?

After World War II, there was a brief age of technological optimism. People, particularly Americans, believed in the promise of new frontiers. We saw residential and commercial potential in everything from our emerging suburbs to our rising office towers - we even pictured our­selves living “soon” on the moon or in terraformed space colonies.

In the mid-20th century, we were suddenly (and curiously) willing to dump models of living and community that had worked well for hundreds of years in favor of these new ideas.

We raced to build an automobile-dependent world, lined with interstates and freeways that would pro­vide the straightest path toward the idealized future. Usually these new freeways carved through our least affluent neighborhoods, separating rich from poor - and typically, black from white.

It is tragic that many of our first and largest social experiments in reshaping community were conducted in disadvantaged com­munities, most often populated by African American residents.

Most of these social experiments supplanted viable working communities with “new urban visions” that increased crime and diminished community bonds. It should not be lost on us that planning paradigms have often tested ideas on the poorest among us, only to reinforce race and class distinctions once the polished plans are eventually implemented.

Many famous architects of the last century proposed plans for communi­ties that, while well-intentioned at the time, had seriously negative outcomes.

In 1924, architect and planner Le Corbusier unveiled his Radiant City, a proposal to bulldoze the heart of Paris and replace it with tall, monolithic tow­ers - something Paris wisely ignored. Unfortunately, his ideas gained traction in American planning circles, and cit­ies here lacked the wisdom of French city planners.

Chicago’s Cabrini Green and St. Louis’ Pruitt-Igoe (both public housing projects) mimicked Le Cor­busier’s model only to be torn down after a few decades because the living conditions in these concrete environ­ments grew so dreadful.

Frank Lloyd Wright’s Broadacre City concept, which in the 1950s pictured “people living in parks connected by highways,” brought us the decentralized sprawl that now mars our landscapes, separates people from the natural world, and discour­ages healthy walkable communities.

Meanwhile, no positive, ecologically grounded conception of the future has been presented convincingly to counter these assumptions in our collective con­sciousness. Most futurists, whether bas­ing their predictions on fact or fiction, seem so focused on techno-marvels they omit resilient environments and healthy communities from the stories they prof­fer.

As a result, a more pessimistic, less natural set of mythologies has shaped our default assumptions about where we seem to be headed.

We have grown used to imagining an increasingly mechanistic future, with greater and greater densities, but what we have forgotten is that a future that crowds out the natural world is not simply bleak. It is impossible. A world without a healthy and vibrant natural biosphere cannot sustain human life. 

Debunking the “inevitable”

Despite what the commercial real-estate industry or science-fiction authors might want us to imagine, our future does not have to be defined exclusively by megacities, mile-high skyscrapers, machines that do every­thing for us, and hyperdensity filled with flying cars.

This “culture of inevitability,” defined by popular cul­ture as well as market-driven develop­ment - despite being an imaginary concept - lulls us into inaction because it can seem futile to resist something so inescapable.

Remember: The future hasn’t happened yet. With enough people, wisdom, and ideas it’s possible to resist the culture of inevitability. We’ve done it before.

Human history is filled with remakings of cities, towns, cultures, religions, governments, and more. We changed every community in America after World War II from ones that functioned primarily around walking and streetcars, to ones that function to serve automobiles.

Now, clearly, it is time to switch to a more resilient paradigm. Human behavior is shaped in large part by our ability to pursue what we can imagine.

The task before us now is to harness the power of imagination to create a dif­ferent future - one of our own choosing, and one crafted to sustain our communi­ties, ourselves, and the other creatures with which we share this planet.

The seven-mile Cheonggyecheon Stream runs through downtown Seoul, South Korea. The stream had at one time been covered over by roads and eventually an elevated highway. In 2005 it was uncovered and turned into a popular public square. Photo by Adzrin Mansor.

Reimagining a more livable future 

The Human Revolution

To take control of our next evolution, we must embrace and prioritize what it means to be human; what it means to live in concert with nature.

Creating a truly living community will mean changing our role on - and as a part of - the planet. It starts by re-imagining our role as a spe­cies - not as separate from and superior to others, but inextricably linked to all other life and with a profound purpose as steward or gardener, helping to ensure that each act of our doing creates a net positive benefit to the greater web of life.

Instead of Homo sapiens we become (a term I have coined) Homo regenesis. Homo regenesis, which suggests moving beyond our current state as Homo sapiens, is suggestive of our next evolution to a state of being with a profound love of life; an affection for and affinity with living organisms and natural systems that is prioritized over a fondness for technology and mechanized systems.

Understanding Homo regenesis means understanding the fundamental truth that only life can create conditions for life.

The Building Revolution

Next we’ll need to build models of the future we seek - now. My organization, the International Living Future Institute, has been pushing the Living Building Challenge as an essential framework for all new buildings.

With the Living Building Challenge we are proving it is possible to build within the carrying capacity of any given ecosystem - building structures that are completely powered by renewable energy, working within the water balance of a given site, treating their own waste, and doing so with materials that are nontoxic and local.

The Bullitt Center in Seattle is one such model - a six-story office building completely powered by the sun when averaged over the course of the year, with composting toilets on all six levels.

The Bullitt Center is a symbol of a revolution in modern architecture: bigger than the major­ity of buildings in the United States, yet free from the burden and legacy of fossil fuels in the country’s least sunny major city.

Throughout the world, living schools, parks, homes, offices, and museums are cropping up in a variety of climate zones against various political backdrops. Currently more than 200 of these transforma­tive buildings are taking shape in communities as far flung as New Zealand, China, Mexico, Brazil, and in nearly every U.S. state.

If these diverse projects can achieve Living Building Challenge goals, there is no limit to how broadly we can apply these systems. Because we now have the technology to build truly regenera­tive communities, it is no longer a stretch to imagine the “living” para­digm as the new normal.

The Scale Revolution

Another relevant topic in the context of this discussion is something I call the “Boundary of Disconnect.”

I define the Boundary of Disconnect as any system’s metaphysical and tactile boundary at which the individual (or any species or colony of species) is no longer able to connect or relate to the totality of the system itself. This concept is all about scale, and how we as humans should best live and relate to each other within the communi­ties we build.

In our current model of the built environment, we typically develop without heeding scale, or build slavishly to the scale of the automobile. We binge on materials, energy, and water, climbing higher and sprawling farther without considering the natu­ral, social, or emotional consequences.

But if we were smarter about the appropriate scales for our systems - building, agriculture, transportation - we would minimize problems that arise from disconnectedness. As the writer Richard Louv put it: When den­sity is disproportionate to nature and we are disconnected from our earthly surroundings, we succumb to “nature deficit disorder.”

When it comes to scale, a powerful litmus test for any community is its ability to support and nurture children. Child-centered planning would focus on our most precious and delicate citizens.

It would heed the advice of Enrique Peñalosa, a former mayor of Bogotá, Colombia, who wrote, “Chil­dren are a kind of indicator species. If we can build a successful city for children, we will have a successful city for all people.”

The good news is that a child-centered city is not simply generous; it’s practical. And what nurtures small people often helps our elders as well.

For starters (this is a very incomplete list) we would: involve children in local food production; sprinkle bike racks, sport courts, public art, and natural playgrounds throughout the city; eliminate poisonous substances from the built environment; design sheltered public waiting areas; install swings designed for all ages across the metropolis; create “sound parks” powered by fountains, wind chimes, drums, and live-music performances that amplify the music of nature; scat­ter courtyards linked to public spaces that offer acoustic and visual privacy from the street; get rid of most advertising.

Even if more and more people are moving to cities, we can design streets, sidewalks, and pathways at a scale that is safe and pleasant when experienced by someone under four feet tall rather than designing everything around the scale of 3000-pound automobiles.

We can design neighborhood features that support child development through welcoming natural systems such as flowing water, trees, and a myriad of ways for children to interact with the living world rather than merely being presented with a lifeless concrete jungle. 

The Living Community Revolution

Ultimately, Living Communities of the future are both scaled to the human dimension and include func­tioning ecological systems throughout, where greater biodiversity and resil­ience can occur.

Instead of flying cars and moon colonies, Living Communi­ties will be filled with ultra-efficient, nontoxic Living Buildings that generate their own energy on-site using renew­able resources, capture and treat their own water, are made of nontoxic sus­tainably sourced materials, and inspire their inhabitants. But only if we start imagining and insisting now.

The game-changing success of the Living Building Challenge is proof that Living Communities are feasible within a fabric that supports strong social and cultural networks. As we imagine and then build examples of this new paradigm, it is essential that we do not use our most economically disadvantaged as guinea pigs.

Indeed, the human dimension of our cities must be carefully considered as we go forward to overcome the legacy of racial and economic prejudice that has pervaded city planning in the past.

Perhaps in the future, popular books and films will portray how we overcame mind-numbing odds and defeated the seemingly unstoppable Culture of Inevitability, and instead embraced a new vision for the way we will live on the planet - one that puts people and life squarely where they belong: at the heart of our communi­ties.

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Jason F. McLennan wrote this article for Cities Are Now, the Winter 2015 issue of YES! Magazine. Jason is CEO of the International Living Future Institute. He is the creator of the Living Building Challenge, as well as the author of five books, including his latest: Transformational Thought.

Growing Collective Consciousness from the Voices for the Climate

by John D Liu, Permaculture Research Institute: http://permaculturenews.org/2015/01/02/growing-collective-consciousness-from-the-voices-for-the-climate/

Decade of the Protester? Why the Uprisings are Far From Over

by Jerome Roos, Roar Magazine:

http://roarmag.org/2014/12/protests-2014-global-uprisings/

In 2011, TIME Magazine selected “the protester” as its person of the year. Perhaps “person of the decade” would have been a more accurate depiction.

We live in tumultuous times. Since 2011, every year seems to have brought more protests, more rebellions, more uprisings - and 2014 has been no different in this respect.

Indeed, the past year has seen some of the most spectacular mass mobilizations and some of the most persistent social unrest to date. A genie has been unleashed from its bottle and refuses to go back in.

At the same time, it is clear that the days of innocence are over. There is less patience for drum circles or endless deliberations over process. Faced with a relentless assault by the neoliberal state, protesters now simply seek to secure some of the most elementary ingredients of a just, humane and democratic society. 

Millions have marched to demand answers in the case of the missing 43 students in Mexico, to secure justice for unarmed people of color murdered by racist police in the US, to express solidarity with the heroic Kurdish defenders of Kobani, to save the lives of hunger-striking prisoners in Greece, to resist draconian new anti-protest laws in Spain - and the list keeps on growing.

We have learned as well. We have all seen that, in many parts of the globe, the hopeful uprisings of recent years have taken a decisive turn for the worse. 

In Egypt, the vicious counter-revolution that took off in earnest in 2013 was solidified with the election of the US-backed tyrant Abdel Fattah el-Sisi this year, culminating in the recent acquittal of the former dictator Mubarak himself. 

Meanwhile in Syria, three years of civil war and state brutality have given rise to a monster - the self-styled Islamic State - which went on a rampage through Iraq and Kurdistan over the summer. In Egypt, Libya and elsewhere similar extremist forces are on the rise. Revolutions are not to be taken lightly.

In many respects, 2014 was a very dark year. Between Israel’s monstrous war on Gaza to the shooting down of a civilian aircraft over the Ukraine, and from the world’s appalling inaction in the face of the ebola outbreak in West Africa on to the thousands of migrants who drowned off the Mediterranean coast this year, there seemed to be little to be hopeful or excited about. 

Some of the most spectacular mobilizations, from the Euromaidan revolt in Ukraine and the royalist rebellion and military coup in Thailand to the middle class protests that rocked Venezuela, originated not from the left but from the right.

But 2014 also witnessed the steady rise of new progressive forces. 

In Greece, the conservative-led government just collapsed over its failure to appoint a new president, triggering snap elections to be held on January 25, with the radical left party Syriza slated to win. 

In Spain, meanwhile, the new leftist party Podemos was founded in January to compete in the European elections, and now, less than a year later, already finds itself catapulted into first position in the polls. Spanish activists hopefully observe that “the fear is changing sides.” In 2015, the European austerity doctrine will face its most serious challenge to date.

The most inspiring actions, however, continue to be those led by ordinary people clamoring for justice and dignity in the streets. 

This year, Mexico witnessed its largest street demonstrations since ’68 and the most serious challenge to President Peña Nieto and the PRI. Hong Kong saw the birth of a serious pro-democracy movement, in many ways one of the most significant protests in Chinese-controlled territory since the 1989 Tiananmen square revolt. 

Brazilians continued to take to the streets in the millions during the World Cup, while Bosnians - transcending deep-seated ethnic cleavages - briefly erupted into a full-blown workers’ revolt earlier this year.

At the same time, the United States has been experiencing an outright anti-police and anti-racist revolt following the police murder (and the subsequent acquittal of the killers) of Michael Brown in Ferguson and Eric Garner in New York. 

The St Louis suburb in particular witnessed a small-scale urban insurrection during the summer while the Bay Area has lived up to its reputation as a hotbed of radical activism and black liberation with a series of marches, protests and clashes in the past month. New York has been mobilizing in force for weeks now. Anti-police protests continue across the nation as I write these words, and are unlikely to subside anytime soon.

Still, all of the above clearly pales in comparison to the heroic struggle the Kurds have been waging this year, beating all odds to drive ISIS out of the capital of their self-governed canton of Kobani. Of course the context of the Syrian civil war - no doubt the bloodiest in decades - makes the Kurdish case incomparable to the situation other movements find themselves in. 

For all the stories of heroism and tales of revolution emanating from Rojava, it is clear that Kurdish advances remain precarious in the face of the fascist ambitions of ISIS, the imperial ambitions of the US-led coalition and the regional ambitions of Turkey, Iran and Saudi Arabia. Yet the Kurdish experiment in democratic autonomy still stands tall as a shining beacon of hope in a desert of despair.

Looking back, if 2014 has shown us anything it is that none of the structural causes that gave rise to the post-2011 cycle of struggles have ever been truly addressed. In many ways, as the world financial system and global economy continue to careen into the abyss, while state violence is ramped up in order to deal with the increasing social unrest in response to ever widening social inequalities, the worldwide wave of mass protests and outright revolts is only likely to further intensify. 

In fact, it now looks like the only effective strategy capable of restoring a sense of “order” to the ancien regime is the Egyptian approach: to sacrifice all democratic pretensions with outright state repression in order to instill an all-pervasive sense of despondence and hopelessness.

For a while in early 2014, the world appeared to be going down the latter road - towards ever greater despondence and demobilization. But recent months have provided hope that other outcomes may still be possible, not just in Europe, Asia and the Americas but even in the midst of the horrors of the new Middle Eastern wars. Indeed, it seems that the winds of change are slowly picking up again. 

Around the globe, grassroots movements appear to be re-finding their footing. What if 2011 was really only just the beginning? The mere thought triggers goosebumps. If 2014 was anything to go by, the decade of the protester may yet be ahead of us. And who knows what possibilities may still lie beyond?

Jerome Roos is a PhD researcher in Political and Social Sciences at the European University Institute, and founding editor of ROAR Magazine. Follow him @JeromeRoos. This piece was originally written for TeleSUR English.