I am sceptical for a number of reasons but primarily because I do not see a organic connection with anything that is unfolding on the ground.
What I see unfolding is quite different, and I believe our solutions must be in harmony with these more grassroots trends.

My starting point is the conviction that the famous double movement of Karl Polanyi, in which periods of market liberalization creating social chaos, make place for counter-epochs when the market is re-embedded in society under social pressure, is no longer functioning at the national scale.
We are now in the midst of such a Polanyan moment, in which the systemic crisis of 2008, has created a backlash of left and right-wing populisms, which are destabalizing countries, but do not seem capable to bring about any real systemic change at the nation-state level.

The main reason seems to me is that while Nation and State are operating at the national level, Capital is operating directly at the global level, and can destabilize any local/national attempt at reform. There isn’t any real form of internationalism at the level of political movements and institutions, and the left remains deeply embedded in nation-state logics of neo-Keynesianism. The exceptions, Varoufakis’ Diem25 movement, with its pan-European outlook, have not yet proven to have any real traction, and the inter-national sysem of cooperation is not strenghtening, but weakening.

However, in civil society, we see an entirely different situation. Global open source communities are characterized by the exponential growh of the numbers of code and coders; and a significant part of its workers is trans-nationally neo-nomadic, creating entirely different sub-economic systems; there is a tenfold growth of urban commons in the western cities (which I have documented myself in Ghent, Belgium, but is confirmed by various other studies), and their practices are moving from the mere redistribution of products and services, to actual cosmo-local production (shared code, relocalized material production) of energy and organic food. Many of the exploding number of local projects, are actually not local, but transnational in nature: as Enzio Manzini called them, they are ‘Small, Local, Open, Connected’.

For the network of commons and p2p-researchers associated and partnering with the P2P Foundataion, this means a changing focus, from the mere inter-national, to the truly ‘trans-national’. What is happening in the world today is that next to the geographic nations, there is the emergence of true global neo-nomadic ecosystems of cooperation.
So what I believe needs to happen is a change of focus. Of course, the national and the inter-national remain powerful and will do so for the foreseeable future, but at the same time, we need to build trans-national institutions, and strategies.

Elsewhere, we have argued for new models, such as the Partner State, and institutions for public-commons cooperation at the territorial level. But progressive forces should no longer see policy making as only focused on market value, on their own nation-state only, or on international political cooperation, but rather on the transnationalization of infrastructures. For example, right now, cities are coalescing to regulate the negative effects of Uber and AirBnB, but why not create, through city alliances, global open depositories for the ‘generative’ transformation of all bioregional provisioning systems, i.e. supporting the infrastructure for mutualization that is both local, but can benefit from global transnational knowledge sharing. Imaging having access to a global set of tools to develop FairBNB’s and MuniRide’s. Imagine, like it is already happening in France, building Assemblies and Chambers of the Commons, cooperating at a trans-national scale.

So rather than a World Political Party that would continue the paradigm of competitive politics, endlessly fighting on what is the ‘right program’, I would rather see the development of a global Commons Transition Coalition, rooted in actual reconstructive and prefigurative practice, but which can play a political role by representing the new forces of transformation, at the institutional level of inter-nationality. What we need, is a new configuration between the territorial nations, weakening as we speak , with the emerging transnational nations, growing rapidly.

Photo by NASA Goddard Photo and Video

The post Has the time come for a World Political Party? appeared first on P2P Foundation.

Makerspaces, aka hackerspaces innovation labs or fablabs, are providing local opportunities to realize that vision. Makers share their designs with other makers around the world, prompting new innovation and local production. Popular Science estimates 1,400 active spaces globally. For a global list of hackerspaces, makers spaces, and innovation labs visit Hackerspace.org.

Some hackerspace projects have become traditional enterprises Most remain part of the alternative economy, offering open source designs as well as viable products for sale. Barcelona’s Fab Foundation aims to connect alternative production with the alternative economy through its new project, Fab Market.

Extracted from: http://market.fablabs.io/manifesto/

The Fab Market is a new online shop where you can find a variety of locally made products designed by people from all over the world. All products are open-source and sold ready for use, assembly or fabrication, giving people the possibility to participate in the making process. The more you participate, the less you pay for the product.

Making products that adapt to people’s needs, culture or taste —and giving the buyer direct contact with the supplier— increases transparency in the supply chain and gives the opportunity to know exactly who you are working with and how.

The Fab Market wants to give talented creators, designers or makers a place where they can fabricate their creations for a low price and sell globally at the same time.

We want to invite all FabLabs around the world to become a part of the Fab Market network in order to create a distributed economy. By working together, sharing knowledge, equipment and customers, creates the opportunity for scalability without a great amount of investment.

Extracted from: http://market.fablabs.io/#products

Fab Market wants to offer good designs made to last and therefore all products need to be approved and tested before going on sale. Products have to be fairly easy to fabricate and come with step by step assembly instructions.

Designers and makers can present their creations to the Fab Market, and once they are approved, they are invited to their local FabShop for prototyping and testing.

Extracted from: http://market.fablabs.io/#sell

Designers and makers can present their creations to the Fab Market, and once they are approved, they are invited to their local FabShop for prototyping and testing.

In exchange for excellence, FabLab Barcelona will offer the creators a special discount of fabrication every time their product is sold.

Extracted from: http://market.fablabs.io/#fabshop

We want to welcome all FabLabs around the world to become a part of the FabShop Network.

Sign up now if your lab is interested in accepting the invitation!

Photo by aurelie ghalim

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