While health authorities focus on top-down measures to get COVID-19 supplies to hospitals in need, home-grown initiatives are enlisting regular people to create open-source equipment. Rather than wait for the impact of government efforts to persuade manufacturers to move into emergency production of ventilators and protective equipment, the sharing economy is already saving lives with home-made masks and 3D-printed ventilators.

A dearth of adequate medical supplies was implicated in an increase in coronavirus mortality in Italy, compared with Germany and South Korea, where supply was adequate.

Meeting a desperate need for ventilators through open-sourcing

Health authorities say the immediate short-term need is to get more ventilators, which compress and decompress air for patients who are too weak to breathe on their own.

In Ireland, a community called Open Source Ventilator sprang from a Facebook discussion to develop a simplified, low-cost, emergency ventilator that can be produced at scale from mostly 3D-printed components. Developed in collaboration with frontline healthcare workers, the emergency ventilator can be fabricated from locally sourced supplies and materials so its manufacture is not dependent on a global supply chain.

Before you rush out to hack together your personal ventilator, however, health experts warn that ventilators can do more harm than good if they are not properly constructed and operated. It is necessary to have the correct timing and air pressure, filtration, humidity, and temperature. Improper use can damage lung tissue and may even induce pneumonia. Faulty equipment can aerosolize the virus, causing it to infect others. Johns Hopkins has specifications for open-source ventilators. 

Home sewing corps fashion DIY masks

There are open-source projects in numerous cities focusing on producing masks for personal uses and to protect healthcare workers. COVID-19 is one micron wide and most medical masks filter particles down to three microns. So while wearing a mask doesn’t stop all virus particles, it significantly reduces the risk of infection. There is a multitude of how-to videos for how to sew your own mask with the fabric you have but health authorities caution that cotton, as shown in this video, is not good at stopping small particles so air filters should be added to protect down to three microns.  The Federal Drug Administration has guidance on producing and wearing DIY and 3D-printed masks during the pandemic.

Home computing power is put to work for drug research

The previous initiatives are aimed at short-term relief but in order to stop the spread of the disease and curb its deadly impact, we need to develop new drugs. The SARS-CoV-2 virus depends on proteins to reproduce, including an important one called the protease. Researchers want to find a molecule that can latch onto this protein and destroy it, paving the way to a therapeutic drug. That research requires a lot of computational power, which is why computer engineers have found a way for average people to donate their computer processors when they’re not using them. The Folding@home project uses software to unite home computers in a network that functions like a distributed supercomputer that can simulate possible drugs to cure the disease. The project is now over twice the size of the world’s largest supercomputer with more than an exaflop of processing power, meaning it can do a quintillion calculations per second. So far, 77 candidate drug compounds have been identified but users have raised concerns about abuse.

There are a number of ways for average people to get involved in fighting this pandemic and it’s clear that it will take all of us to beat the coronavirus. Whether you want to build a ventilator, sew a mask or contribute your excess computing power for research, the sharing economy means we can all play a part.

##

This article is part of our reporting on the community response to the coronavirus crisis:

• The People’s COVID-19 Response needs you
• The coronavirus pandemic calls us to share more than ever
• 10 ways to share during the COVID-19 pandemic
• Coronavirus catalyzes growing wave of grassroots action despite social distancing
• 14 community-minded books to read during the 2020 quarantine
• Things got a whole lot more local than I expected due to coronavirus
• My new pandemic routine
• How these US immigrants are giving back to their new community during the COVID-19 crisis

The post Open-source medical supplies battle COVID-19 appeared first on P2P Foundation.

We’re forming a global, advocacy innovation lab to Free the Vaccine for COVID-19 and you can take part.

Around the globe we are taking rapid, drastic action to slow the spread of COVID-19. As we come to terms with the daunting path forward, it’s hard to imagine the day we read the headline “COVID-19 Immunizations Begin.” But our experience with our amazing global scientific community teaches us that it’s only a matter of time until we have a vaccine for COVID-19. This day will arrive. And in that there is hope.

But when we do have a vaccine, will everyone have access to it? Herd immunity only works if the vast majority of the herd is immune. Without affordable access for everyone, across the globe, the vaccine can’t really do it’s job. Already governments around the world are investing billions in tax-payer funds into the research and development of diagnostic tools, treatments, and a vaccine for Covid-19. Since SARS outbreak, the National Institutes of Health alone has spent nearly $700 million on coronavirus research and development. This virus is now a global pandemic, yet experience tells us once the vaccine is discovered, pharmaceutical corporations will want us to pay again to acquire it. How do we make sure pharmaceutical companies profits don’t interfere with doctors, public health officials, and our access to tests, treatments, and the vaccine? How do we make this life saving medicine accessible to our family and friends around the globe and reduce infection?

The good news is that we know what needs to be done, and we – you! – have done it before. We have to fight for free access for all with creative, collaborative and convincing campaigns.

TOGETHER WE WILL FREE THE VACCINE FOR COVID-19

Join us as we do the work, together, to make sure this vaccine does all the good it can do. We won’t win through old methods – holding up signs at a traditional crowded protest march is not an option. So together we’ll find new, better ways that work in our current context. We’ll achieve this by creating an advocacy innovation lab with teams around the world crowdsourcing new methods to achieve our objectives. These “Salk Teams” will design and test creative methods to pressure governments and pharmaceutical corporations to ensure publicly-funded diagnostic tools, treatment, and the COVID-19 vaccine will be sustainably priced, available to all and free at the point of delivery.

WHAT WE’RE ASKING FOR AND WHAT WILL HAPPEN:

Once part of a Salk Team, you’ll connect with dozens of interested, talented and committed people from around the world! You’ll get advanced training through weekly online courses with:

• the Center for Artistic Activism, which has worked around the world helping advocates and activists be more effective by using play, creativity, art, and humor.
• Universities Allied for Essential Medicines, a global student-driven organization focused on ensuring that publicly-funded medicines are affordable to the public
• Special guest collaborators – veterans in access to medicines, the arts, design, and campaigns for public health and human rights.

Together with other SALK Team members, you will create experimental actions to move the needle on affordable vaccines.

WHAT THAT MEANS:

• A weekly total time commitment of roughly 2-4 hours over for 3-4 months.
• Weekly inspiration to help you to prepare: video, reading or an individual action you can take from your home etc.
• Collaboration with other participants in your area (from your home)

WHY SALK TEAMS?

WHAT YOU GET:

• A sense of agency in an uncertain time. A sense of community and belonging as well as connection to new friends collaborating with purpose. Your contributions will matter and be part of the solution to help save lives.
• The opportunity to take action on a crisis impacting us all now.
• Ability to take action from home.
• Respect for your time, schedule, and changing demands in the months to come.
• An understanding that if you need a break for illness, to support a relative, or need some for mental healthcare, then that’s OK. You’re part of a big team and together we got this.

WHAT WE HOPE TO LEARN

We hope to learn how to make the COVID-19 vaccine accessible for all. No one knows how to do that, yet, because we can’t do that without going through an innovation process. Within a few months we’ll have created and evaluated the effectiveness of dozens, maybe hundreds, of ideas. Those successes will move forward, developing and evolving into practical methods. We’ll then implement those methods to take huge steps forward in advocacy for access to medicines. Through sharing our work, it will have already reached other regions and inspired new action. There’s no way to innovate on advocacy without a massive amount of experimentation. We hope to learn from those experiments while developing and building a grassroots movement ready to implement them.

WATCH OUR INFO SESSION

We offered two, live online information sessions on Friday, MARCH 27. You can view one here:

CAN YOU SUPPORT OUR COVID-19 WORK?

Help make this happen.
We understand not everyone is able to participate in the same ways. Your donations will help get this program up an running; building infrastructure, materials for producing actions around the world, and creating, translating, and distributing teaching materials. 

UPDATE

Our initial round has begun with roughly 300 participants from 27 countries! If you are interested in the campaign, sign up here to get on the Free the Vaccine newsletter. We’ll send you updates and opportunities to participate.

Find out more at C4aa.org

The post Free the Vaccine for Covid-19 appeared first on P2P Foundation.

The Coronavirus pandemic raises many questions about public health, global diseases and the way we produce and distribute cures and treatments. Who pays for the corona vaccine and how? How is that innovation organised? Who profits?

Commons Network has been an advocate in this domain (‘access to medicines’) for years. In the next few months, we will publish a series of articles about the problems with the current system and the ideas and visions that exist to change this. Today, we discuss the proposal for a Covid-19 Knowledge Pool.

COVID-19 is a global health crisis that demands an immediate global response. But this crisis also lays bare many other crises in our societies. In many Western countries, the response to the virus has shown the vulnerabilities in our public health systems and other essential sectors of society. One major issue that the coronavirus exposes is the dire state of our biomedical system and the role that pharmaceutical companies play in that system.

• In The Netherlands, for instance, hospitals didn’t have enough test kits because Roche, the world’s largest biotech company, initially refused to hand over the recipe that is needed to perform these tests.
• In the United States, Trump’s ‘corona-minister’ Alex Azar released a statement saying that the government could not guarantee that a potential cure for Covid-19 would be affordable, because the innovation that is needed for that cure would only be spurred by high profits.
• The rush to create a vaccine was delayed for up to two or three years, because in most countries, pharmaceutical companies had sold their vaccine research facilities. And the companies that still had the capabilities to do the research had effectively scaled down their coronavirus research because there was no money to be made.
• Scientists were close to a coronavirus vaccine years ago, and then the money dried up.
• The vaccine market was even called ‘an oligopoly’ by Wall Street analysts at AB Bernstein. In fact, after countries abandoned infectious disease research, most companies also moved away from investing in this field, according to DNDi director Bernard Pecoul.
• In France, it was debated why a testing kit for coronavirus should cost 135 euro, eventhough the production costs are only 10 euros. The sub-optimal availability of tests was cited as a major reason for not testing in the fight against the pandemic in many European countries, leading many people to ask if this had economic reasons as well.

More and more people have now come to realise that the global race to find a cure for Covid-19 and a vaccine is slowed down considerably by the fact that the system we have now runs on market incentives and patent monopolies. Instead of shielding essential knowledge, companies could work together, share research results and new insights.

Moving away from a deficient system

The pharmaceutical industry is driven by profit and guided by shareholders. The research and innovation that is needed to come up with cures and treatments is monopolised. A system of patents and licenses is fine-tuned to produce the maximum wealth for a few multi-billion euro corporations. This is how we have organised the world of medicines today. Our system is not driven by public health needs but by profit and the only logic that counts is that of capitalism.

Our system is not driven by public health needs but by profit and the only logic that counts is that of capitalism

This model is based on the belief that the flow of biomedical knowledge should be privatized and protected through intellectual property rights in order to stimulate innovation. This monopoly model gives pharmaceutical companies the freedom to charge as much as they can get away with. It also stifles innovation where we most need it, like in the area of infectious diseases, because there is no money to be made. And finally, this system makes us, the people, pay three times: once to fund the universities and research facilities that create a lot of the knowledge needed for pharmaceutical innovation, once to pay these companies to produce and distribute, and once to our governments to fund our health care system.

It’s hard to estimate how many medicines are not invented, how much talent is wasted and how many people have to suffer because of what not is being researched and developed. This sytem limits the ability to collaborate, share knowledge and build on each other’s work. The public good of scientific medical knowledge and health related technologies has been transformed into a highly protected, privatized commodity.

The COVID-19 crisis marks a critical moment for generating the change we need. But how do we go from this neoliberal capitalist logic to something else, towards a system that is driven by the needs of the public and the health of the people?

Knowledge commons

The proposal to build  a global knowledge pool for rights on data, knowledge and technologies that was presented by Costa Rica is a great example of a step in the right direction, towards transformational change. On March 23^rd, the government of Costa Rica sent a letter to the World Health Organization, calling for a Global Covid-19 Knowledge Pool¹. In his letter to the WHO, the president of Costa Rica demands a global program to “pool rights to technologies that are useful for the detection, prevention, control and treatment of the COVID-19 pandemic.” It now also enjoys the support of the WHO as well as from the UK parliament and the Dutch government and civil society, which has announced their support the idea of a COVID-19 pool as well.

Why do we need a knowledge pool and why is it transformational?

As mentioned above, under our current system the privatization of knowledge limits the ability to collaborate, share knowledge and build on each other’s work. This really is artificial because knowledge is by nature abundant and shareable. Hence the current handling of medical technologies not only limits access to the ensuing treatments, it also limits innovation.

The Covid-19 Poll would pool relevant knowledge & data to combat Covid-19, creating a global knowledge commons². It is a proposal to create a pool of rights to tests, medicines and vaccines with free access or licensing on reasonable and affordable terms for all countries. This would allow for a collaborative endeavor, and could accelerate innovation. It would be global, open and offer non discriminatory licenses to all relevant technologies and rights. As such the pool would offer both innovation and access.

Inputs could come from governments, as well as from universities, private companies and charities. This could be done on a voluntary basis but not only. Public institutions around the world are investing massively in Covid-19 technologies and all results could be automatically shared with this pool, meaning this could be a condition attached to public financing.

So, placing knowledge in a commons does not just mean sharing data and knowledge without regard for their social use, access and preservation. It means introducing a set of democratic rules and limits to assure equitable and sustainable sharing for health-related resources. As such it allows for equitable access, collaborative innovation and democratic governance of knowledge. At the same time knowledge commons could facilitate open global research and local production adapted to local context.

Placing knowledge in a commons does not just mean sharing data and knowledge without regard for their social use, access and preservation. It means introducing a set of democratic rules and limits to assure equitable and sustainable sharing

If we consider the COVID-19 pool holistic initiative that treats the knowledge as a commons, not only to accelerate innovation but also recognizing this knowledge as a public good for humanity which should be managed in a way to ensure affordable access for all, it could be transformational. In contrast to the existing Medicines Patent Pool this pool would be global and not primarily focus on providing access to exitisting technologies, but more also on innovation: developing diagnostics, medicines and vaccines.

Transformational change

Instead of proposing tweaks it is now time to challenge the idea of handling medicines principally as a commodity or product, and to propose structural changes in order to approach health as a common good.  This means referring to our collective responsibility for – and the governance of health when reframing biomedical knowledge production. Instead of leaving it entirely to markets and monopoly based business models.

For this we should move to an approach based on knowledge sharing, cooperation, stewardship, participation and social equity – in practice, this means shifting to a public interest biomedical system based on knowledge commons and open source research, open access, alternative incentives and a greater role for the public sector. Knowledge pools are a crucial piece of the puzzle.

The current COVID-19 pandemic demonstrates how it is possible to make transformational changes overnight when acting in times of an emergency. Let us use this crisis to acknowledge the failures of today’s biomedical research model and usher in the systemic change needed. The world after Corona will require the consideration of alternative paradigms –  it is indeed, as Costa Rica, Tedros and now the Netherlands as well rightfully confirmed – time for the knowledge commons to flourish now.

For some more background about commons thinking in the field of biomedical R&D and possible alternatives to ensure access to medicines for all, read our our policy paper ‘From Lab to Commons’. See also last year’s work on ‘The People’s Prescription’ by our allies in the UK, in cooperation with professor of Economics Mariana Mazzucato.

1. The idea of a knowledge pool is to organise the governance of knowledge by pooling intellectual property, data and other knowledge. This can accelerate the development of health technologies and thus stimulate affordable access to the public. In 2010 the Medicines Patent Pool was set up as a response to the unequal access to HIV/AIDS treatments in developing countries. It has proven to be a great success and now functions as a United Nations-backed public health organisation working to increase access to medicines for HIV, Hepatis c and Tuberculosis.
2. Knowledge commons refer to the institutionalized community governance of the sharing and, in some cases, creation, of information, science, knowledge, data, and other types of intellectual and cultural resources.

The post Pooling Knowledge: Private Medicine vs. Public Health? appeared first on P2P Foundation.

‘Environ-Mental Health’
on Saturday 23 February 2019,
from 1:00 to 6:30pm

Click here for booking

featuring special guest Nora Bateson

Nora Bateson , based in Sweden and the USA, is an award-winning filmmaker, social justice-oriented systems thinker, writer and educator.

Her work asks the question:

“How we can improve our perception of the complexity we live within,
so we may improve our interaction with the world?”

Nora wrote, directed and produced the award-winning documentary, An Ecology of Mind, a portrait of her father, Gregory Bateson. Her work brings the fields of biology, cognition, art, anthropology, psychology and information technology together in a study of the patterns in ecology of living systems.

Her book, Small Arcs of Larger Circles released by Triarchy Press, UK, 2016, a revolutionary personal approach to the study of systems and complexity is the core text of the Harvard University LILA program 2017-18. Her new book, Warm Data, will be released in 2019 by Triarchy Press.

A big shout out to VMIAC – https://www.vmiac.org.au/  – The Victorian Mental Illness Awareness Council – who have generously provided their spacious event venue for this independent ‘not-for-profit’ public forum.

The event is ticketed – to book please go to Trybooking – https://www.trybooking.com/BARTZ

Any proceeds will go to the International Bateson Institute – http://internationalbatesoninstitute.org/

Nora Bateson’s father, Gregory, the subject of her award-winning film, ‘An Ecology of Mind’ – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vnL0ZB1SzZY and https://vimeo.com/ondemand/bateson

critiqued the biomedical model of mental illness (genetic determinants and chemical changes) and proposed a much broader, more integrated socio-ecological epistemology of mental health.

He developed the notion of the double-bind and contributed enormously to the growth of family therapy, and community and ecological systems approaches to communicative and relational health and our understanding of mental illness.

“Rigor alone is paralytic death, but imagination alone is insanity.”

― Gregory Bateson, Mind and Nature

“We are most of us governed by epistemologies that we know to be wrong” 
― Gregory Bateson, Steps to an Ecology of Mind

Gregory Bateson’s first wife was the anthropologist Margaret Mead, who went on to become president of the World Federation for Mental Health.

“Never depend upon institutions or government to solve any problem. All social movements

are founded by, guided by, motivated and seen through by the passion of individuals.”

― Margaret Mead

“Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.”

― Margaret Mead

Environ-Mental Health will be conducted over four sessions from 1:00 to 6:30pm:

1. a ‘scene-setting’ Warm Data and Mental Illness short presentation from Nora Bateson
2. a dialogue on resistance to and transcendence of the status quo hegemonic model with VMIAC Human Rights Adviser and mental health advocate and consultant, Indigo Daya
3. a dialogue on attachment, love and biological, psychological, socio-cultural diversity with systems family therapist, educator and author of ‘Rethinking Love’, Claire Miran-Khan
4. a dialogue on climate/environmental/relational threats/opportunities – mutual self-help, media ecology open dialogue and peer support with MemeFest founder Oliver Vodeb and Laceweb curator Les Spencer.

Intention: The purpose of the event is to engage with and explore the full range of situations, contexts and relationships and determinants and dynamics that influence mental health and mental illness in the 21^st Century.

What to expect: to participate in a lively, thought provoking exploration of our current global and local social, cultural, political, economic, ecological and cosmological challenges and opportunities and how they impact our individual and collective emotional, psychological and mental health.

Anticipate: the offering up of many solutions to currently intractable mental health system crises, a broadening and deepening of the context and relationships relevant to mental health and mental illness and much ‘food for thought’ for the forthcoming Victorian Royal Commission into Mental Health.

Consumers: Consumer/survivors of institutional psychiatric services are encouraged to attend; as are mental health professionals; carers, family and community members; as well as human rights and social, cultural, democratic, ecological and climate justice advocates and activists. 

Here’s the ticket booking link again: https://www.trybooking.com/BARTZ

Inclusion: If cost is a barrier for you, please contact Daryl Taylor on 0497 097 047 to discuss how you can secure a place.

Nora Bateson’s social media sites and links are listed below:

Engaging Emergence: https://vimeo.com/258433882 

Twitter https://twitter.com/NoraBateson?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor

WordPress: https://norabateson.wordpress.com/ 

Medium: https://medium.com/@norabateson 

Linked in: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nora-bateson-b4a2456/detail/recent-activity/posts/ 

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/norabateson 

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/norabateson/ 

Website: https://batesoninstitute.org/ 

Film: http://www.anecologyofmind.com/ 

Reviews: http://www.anecologyofmind.com/reviews.html 

Vimeo: https://vimeo.com/ondemand/bateson  

In 2019 the Victorian Royal Commission into Mental Health will begin deliberations.

‘The royal commission is going to give us the answers we need. It is going to change lives. It is going to save lives. Only a royal commission will help us build the mental health system our community deserves.’
― Daniel Andrews, Premier of Victoria

“VMIAC welcomes the Labor Party’s promise of a Royal Commission if re-elected. We believe that an inquiry into mental health services in our state is long overdue and urgently needed. As a peak organisation representing Victorian people with an experience of mental distress or emotional issues, VMIAC hear hourly from people who are hurt and distressed by their lack of access to support, or their treatment within Victoria’s mental health system. The impact of treatment is often worse than the problem people presented with. VMIAC believes that the terms of reference to this Royal Commission must be wide ranging and led by the people experiencing these traumas. We need the Royal Commission to have the same focus as any royal commission: the people who’ve been hurt, not the people with the power to harm.”

― Maggie Toko, VMIAC CEO

https://youtu.be/cC0txyEaRQ0 and: https://www.vmiac.org.au/royal-commission-into-mental-health/

“Mental illness remains a serious health issue in Victoria and throughout the country, with one in five Australians experiencing a mental health illness or disorder, and almost half experiencing a mental health condition at some point in their lives. In addition, the national suicide rate has spiked to its highest rate in the past decade, more than 3000 Australians, and more than 600 Victorians, taking their own lives in a year. In the face of these challenges, however, Victoria also has the lowest funding per head of population of all the states and territories for mental health – despite significant funding boosts from the State Government. This has led to what many refer to as a ‘broken’ mental health system, which is what Premier Andrews has said he hopes to fix with the results of the royal commission.”

― Amanda Lyons, Journalist, RACGP

Source: https://www1.racgp.org.au/newsgp/professional/will-the-promised-victorian-royal-commission-into

“The dominant model of progress and development reflects one particular worldview: modernity. Modernisation is a pervasive, complex, multidimensional process which characterises our era. Industrialisation, globalisation, urbanisation, democratisation, scientific and technological advance, capitalism, secularism, rationalism, individualism and consumerism, all part of the processes of cultural Westernisation and material progress (measured as economic growth) …. In contrast, psycho-social dynamics are all about relationships: between us, separately and together, and with other things or entities, both physical and metaphysical. They describe the ways in which social conditions affect individual psychology and behaviour and vice versa, and how perceptions, expectations and values influence the intrinsic meanings of life events and social situations, and so affect our emotional responses. These interactions can bring satisfaction, happiness, contentment and fulfilment – or cause stress, depression, anxiety, isolation, insecurity and hostility. They frame how we see the world and our place in it, and so what we do in the world, shaping our personal lives and, collectively, the societies in which we live.”

― Richard Eckersley, Is the West Really the Best?

The post ‘Environ-Mental Health’ – a dialogue with Nora Bateson appeared first on P2P Foundation.

Watch the video if you haven’t already and check the rest of the info on this site.

Video: We-Guild, YouTube​

The post We-Guild: The Social Safety Network appeared first on P2P Foundation.

Eleni Katrini: Analysis: Imagine living in a neighborhood where you can learn from your neighbors, grow your own food, participate in your child’s education, and invest back to your community’s well-being through your daily transactions. If you’re reading this article, you’re probably interested in or already involved in a community garden, daycare cooperative, trade school, tool library, or other hyperlocal initiative. These projects, which can be found all around the world, allow communities to build their collective agency in solving everyday needs and create a local sharing culture, thus providing an alternative for more sustainable and socially just communities.

While the field of “urban commons” has been around for a while, there’s limited research that investigates the relationship between initiatives like those listed above and physical space. My doctoral research at Carnegie Mellon University’s School of Architecture in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, takes upon this exciting challenge of identifying spatial patterns of sharing practices. In my research, I’m drawing from the fields of the commons, social practices, human behavior, architecture, and urban design, while investigating four contemporary case studies of sharing culture in London, U.K., and Athens, Greece. I’m interested in learning what a daycare cooperative, an alternative currency, a cultural center, and self-governed refugee shelter have in common with regards to their spatial attributes. Some of my early findings might be useful to others researching sharing and the commons, but more importantly, I think they can be insightful to those who are on the ground, working on amazing sharing and collaborative initiatives.

So, what have I learned so far?

Space acquisition and appropriation: In their early stages, sharing programs tend to run into the challenge of acquiring a space. Many cities often limit themselves to residential and commercial uses, with very little opportunities for communal, nonprofit uses. Even after a group has found a space, it is usually a space not designed for sharing. Given the inherent dynamism of sharing initiatives’ activities, they tend to be creative in appropriating their spaces to accommodate emerging needs. Towards that end, a large open floor-plan space is usually preferred as it allows for flexibility and can afford a wide range of activities.  

Identity and interactions: Sharing initiatives aspire to engage with the wider public by being open and accessible to all. To this end, it’s important to consider the spatial attributes of a place — large, open doors, for instance, serve as porous spaces, inviting people outside of the group inside. However, beyond the physical “openness” of the space, there are non-spatial conditions such as territoriality and the projected identity of the group that can create barriers between the initiatives and the adjacent community. In those cases, the group needs to make an effort to engage with the neighborhood by extending its activities to adjacent public spaces. Nearby parks, sidewalks, or squares could be instrumental in providing a fertile ground for facilitating interactions between the initiative and those who may not have made it to the group’s physical location.

Local ecosystem: Finally, for an initiative to be fully supported, it needs to be embedded in the daily routine of the people involved. The proximity of people’s homes to the space is critical. That does not necessarily mean that sharing initiatives should be located in purely residential areas. Finding a place that has a good mix of residential area and local commerce is important for the initiatives to place themselves within a supportive ecosystem of people, organizations, and businesses.

This piece is based on the paper “Creating the Everyday Commons; Towards Spatial Patterns of Sharing Culture,” published by Bracket Magazine.

The post Creating the everyday commons: The need to consider space in sharing initiatives appeared first on P2P Foundation.

Watch the video if you haven’t already and visit our site for further info:
www.we-guild.co.uk

Remember that it’s a project in the making and it needs your support! So you can help make it happen by doing all that social media stuff (liking, following and especially sharing it!) and join the mailing list.
Or if you can think of other ways to support us we’d love to hear from you.

Let’s make We-Guild happen!

Reposted from  We-Guild’s website

The post We Guild: a peer to peer social safety network appeared first on P2P Foundation.

Nearly one in three working Americans is an independent worker. That’s 53 million people – and growing. We’re lawyers and nannies. We’re graphic designers and temps. We’re the future of the economy. And we’re stronger together than we are alone.

Freelancers Union is the largest and fast-growing organization representing the 57 million independent workers across the country. We give our 375,000+ members a powerful voice through policy advocacy, benefits, and community.

Membership is free and open to freelancers of all kinds, from graphic designers to contractors to entrepreneurs to moonlighters. Freelancers Union offers:

• Benefits such as health, dental, term life, disability, and liability insurance
• Community, including SPARK, local freelance hubs in nearly 25 major cities
• Advocacy for policy change, such as the annual Freelancing in America survey and the Freelance Isn’t Free campaign
• Resources, including the #1 blog for freelancers

Freelancers Union was founded by Sara Horowitz in 1995. In 2008, we launched Freelancers Insurance Company, the first portable benefits model for freelancers, providing independent workers with high-quality, affordable, and portable health insurance. The union’s National Benefits Platform, launched in 2014, helps freelancers across America access benefits, including retirement, life, liability, dental and disability insurance.

Since its founding, Freelancers Union has fought for and won protections for freelance workers, including Unincorporated Business Tax reform and successfully advocating for new models for health care. In 2016, Freelancers Union led a victorious campaign to enact first-of-its kind legislation in New York City giving freelancers unprecedented protections from nonpayment.

For more information, and to join us: https://www.freelancersunion.org/

The post The Work Revolution: How Freelancers Got a Union appeared first on P2P Foundation.

This book is a work of intense dedication, with an imperative and belief that we must document the current situation and focus on developments into the future for peer work in this country. It’s development and production has been a triumph of collaboration; co-produced and written by 29 leading ‘lived experience’ peer workers, lived experience advocates and allies from across Australia.

It consists of a collection of evidence and perspectives collated to reflect and inform the mental health and broader human services and disability sectors on current thinking, practice, literature, activities and challenges of lived experience peer work in this country.

Some of the writers and contributors (plus over 40 other people who workshopped some of the material) have pioneered peer work in Australia. Others have focused on researching and reporting about the efficacy and experiences of peer workers and services. Further perspectives are from the point of view of those allies who opened doors to enable persons with lived experience and peer workforces to take their rightful, respectful place in services. The publication’s development has been financially supported by a collaboration between Mind Australia and Flourish Australia.

Very few realize that the development of peer work in Australia has a thirty-year history. It has evolved from being a disruptive consumer-led practice to being accepted as an important element of good recovery. People with mental health issues, families and service providers now expect peer work to be a part of the mix of support offerings that are available. This book, a world first, seeks to articulate the need for further development of more specialized elements of contemporary peer work practice.

Readers will develop a new understanding of the powerful and deeply meaningful work that peer workers undertake, including being a vital component of a multifaceted team and being agents of culture change. They will see the empathic way in which peer workers walk alongside people who have experienced similar distress and support them without trying to ‘fix’ their situation; rather they support the person to believe in themselves, so that they discover their own solutions, self-agency, self-advocacy, strengths, capabilities and possibilities. Peers achieve this by using their personal lived experience purposefully and their professional experience in ways that no other profession can replicate. Peer work bridges the gap between people accessing services and people who treat, support and care about them.

The book helps explain why Australia has seen phenomenal growth in the peer workforce over the past five years. However, peer work is still a comparatively under-utilised approach to service delivery, and formal peer supervision, career development opportunities and evaluation has lagged behind implementation of peer workforce roles.

“Peer work in Australia” is a valuable resource for decision makers, service providers, policy writers, funders, people accessing mental health services, carers and family members, peer workers, managers, researchers and academics, clinicians, students and lecturers in human services and related areas.

Photo by AlishaV

The post Book of the day – Peer Work in Australia: A new future for mental health appeared first on P2P Foundation.

In Mumbai, the right to water in people’s settlements (known as slums) was revoked in 1996 when the Maharashtra Urban Development Department instructed all municipal corporations to stop water infrastructure being installed in them.

Since then, the right to water and sanitation has been deeply neglected in these communities. An estimated three million people in Mumbai have no access to water and lack of sanitation forces 70% of them to defecate in the open. Those living in people’s settlements buy expensive, low-quality water from private suppliers – a time-consuming activity, especially for women, young girls and children.

Photo credit: Pani Haq Samiti

Against this backdrop, Pani Haq Samiti (PHS, Committee on the Right to Water) came about. Its members included people’s settlement residents, activists, academics and non-governmental organisations. It relied on voluntary donations while other institutions and organisations helped with technical expertise, research support, advocacy strategies, strategy and legal support, all of which helped mobilize people.

As the mobilisation took off, people demanded greater transparency, and this coalesced into the Pani Haq Abhiyaan (Right to Water movement), creating widespread awareness of water privatization by raising it with political parties, elected officials, members of the Legislative Assembly and Parliament.

Eventually, widespread agitation and fierce campaigning across the city resulted in denial of water to people’s settlements being shelved, and two state judges stating that whether homes are deemed ‘legal’ or ‘illegal’, Article 21 of the Indian Constitution – the right to life – intrinsically implies it is the responsibility of the government to provide water to all. On 9 January 2017 a circular was issued to all municipal officials to implement the policy.

The judgment and subsequent policy change have been the campaign’s biggest achievements. People have been the biggest beneficiaries of this as water connections will be available to them, irrespective of the ‘legality’ of the settlement. Moreover, water provided will be through the Municipal Corporation, and not expensive private sources.

Exhibition on Mumbai’s water by Pani Haq Samiti at Marine Drive. Photo credit: Pani Haq Samiti

“The transformation from successfully fighting against privatisation into a broader water rights movement, concerned with the denial of rights to the most vulnerable people and communities is remarkable. The positive court decision to defend water access for all would not come about without strong social mobilisation.”

– Satoko Kishimoto

Would you like to learn more about this initiative? Please contact us.

Or visit panihaqsamiti.org

Transformative Cities’ Atlas of Utopias is being serialized on the P2P Foundation Blog. Go to TransformativeCities.org for updates.

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