Excerpted from a long analysis by Ellen Brown, strongly recommended: “Banks create money when they make loans. Greece could restore the liquidity desperately needed by its banks and its economy by nationalizing the banks and issuing digital loans backed by government guarantees to its ailing businesses. Greece could provide an inspiring model of sustainable prosperity… Continue reading
Date archives "July 2015"
Twelve case studies of Land Based Social Enterprise in the UK
This video accompanies the Shared Assets online site and report, Making Land Work: “”Working at Shared Assets, we come across many inspiring land-based social and community enterprises. This site presents some of the most successful and ambitious examples of community land management in the UK. In previous research, Shared Assets learnt that many community groups… Continue reading
This endless quest for growth will see Greece self-destruct
By Jennifer Hinton Co-Director of the Post Growth Institute Greece’s no vote has left everyone wondering what it all means. While the topline summary is that no won with 61.3% of the vote, this is perhaps not the landslide victory it has been hailed to be. For a start, there is confusion around what the… Continue reading
Messages from the Immaterial Commons: 2) Professional Wisdom and the Abuse of Power
The PsyCommons and its Enclosures – Professional Wisdom and the Abuse of Power. First published in Asylum Commons, commoning and common goods, apart from their intrinsic value, can wake us up to the extent to which valuable human resources have been enclosed for exploitation or social control. Enclosures such as copyright, land, patenting (and bottled… Continue reading
How p2p relationality overcomes the ‘law of equivalence’ through equipotentiality
Capitalism uses market pricing to compare goods, but this ‘law of equivalence’, also allows us to compare people according to various external criteria and this rankism has been one of the key characteristics of modernity. Peer to peer relationaly, by contrast, is based on the principle of Equipotentiality: “This means that everyone can potentially cooperate… Continue reading
The Renewable Energy Economy in Gussing, Austria
The town now has 60 new companies, 1,500 new jobs, and annual revenues of $17 million due to energy sales, all resulting from the growth of the renewable energy sector. The downtown has been rebuilt and young people picture themselves staying there in the future. And other areas are following Gussing’s lead. More than 15… Continue reading
Charter for Social Cooperation in Europe
Charter for Social Cooperation in Europe by P2P Foundation
What is behind the morality play in Greece ?
A brilliant analysis republished from Alexander Douglas: “On the surface, it seems the Greek crisis is all about money. The Greek government has defaulted on a €1.6bn loan repayment to the IMF and is seeking a new bailout programme. Meanwhile, the Greek people are to take part in a referendum that is being billed as… Continue reading
How can we replace bronze age mythology with a mythology for the p2p age ?
… and … do we need to ? The first 18.26 minutes of this video by David Avery are an excellent overview of the key characteristics of bronze age mythology, and comes strongly recommended. Tell us what you think about his alternative propositions! Watch the video here:
The European Parliament Focuses on Commons
The European Parliament is formally focusing on the commons paradigm through a new “Intergroup on common goods,” which is part of a larger group known as the “European Parliamentary Intergroup on Common Goods and Public Services.” The group met for the first time on May 26 in Brussels, at the European Parliament. At this early… Continue reading
Messages from the Immaterial Commons: 1) becoming psySavvy with p2p support groups
PsySavvy – supporting and building resilience At some point in our lives, all of us are likely to find ourselves facing human condition difficulties, challenge, loss, critical choices, disappointment, success, poverty, illness, fame, stress, discrimination, wealth, ageing, abuse, burnout. How well we cope with any of this seems dependent on our beginnings, the mix of… Continue reading
What’s blooming? – Discovering patterns of financial commoning in Germany
By Thomas Mehwald and Wolfgang Hoeschele The article describes the design and working plan of a research study on finance commons in Germany. In the light of the current European currency crisis, approaches like the ones surveyed in the study assume increasing importance, across the continent. The research aims at providing new knowledge of how alternative… Continue reading
Book of the Day: Collective Action After Networks
A very important book about the new forms of political organization. * Book: Organisation of the Organisationless: Collective Action After Networks. By Rodrigo Nunes. PML Books (Mute / Post-Media Lab), 2014. Here is the summary, followed by excerpts through Metamute magazine: “Rejecting the dichotomy of centralism and horizontalism that has deeply marked millennial politics, Rodrigo… Continue reading
One more time: Microfinance doesn’t work
Excerpted from Jason Hickel: “What’s so fascinating about the microfinance craze is that it persists in the face of one unfortunate fact: microfinance doesn’t work. Of course, there are some lovely anecdotes out there about the transformative power of micro-loans, but as David Roodman from the Center for Global Development put it in his recent… Continue reading
Introduction to P2P Class Theory ( 4) : The role of Tech Capital
Excerpted from David Judd and Zakiya Khabir: “Even in a world where the rich like to be worshipped as “job creators,” the people at the top of the tech industry stand out. It isn’t every CEO who gets multiple hagiographic biographies, but it seems that more tech companies than not have a garage-to-riches version of… Continue reading
Essay of the Day: The Scored Society
* Essay: The Scored Society: Procedural Due Process for Automated Predictions. Frank Pascuale and Danielle Keats Citron. John Danaher summarizes the article: “The article looks at the recent trend for using big data to “score” various aspects of human behaviour. For example, there are now automated “scoring” systems used to rank job applicants based on… Continue reading