Photo by Lynn Friedman

The post Can the Commons offer a renewed vision for Europe? appeared first on P2P Foundation.

Anyone interested in survival in today’s Europe, should read this book.”

Srecko Horvat, Philosopher, DiEM25

This is the press release for European Alternative’s recently published Shifting Baselines of Europe. It’s a very readable tome which includes, among many outstanding contributions, an edited version of my interview with Ahora Madrid’s heads of Citizen Participation and Transparency. You can download the book from this link: Shifting Baselines of Europe.

European Alternatives: With contributions by Etienne Balibar, Ulrike Guérot, Gesine Schwan, Renata Avila, Barbara Spinelli, Andreas Karitzis, Lorenzo Marsili, Jonas Staal, among others, and interviews with city governors from Madrid to Naples. 

What if another Europe already exists? The new book of European Alternatives follows this question and explores a Europe beyond Neoliberalism and Nationalism. Etienne Balibar opens the book, asking for “Our European incapacity”. In her reply Ulrike Guérot reflects on what “Our European capacities” could be. Together they tackle the fundamental crisis underlying the European integration process, the missed opportunity to become a Union of Citizens by giving up on national sovereignty.

The publication is inspired by a meeting of 80 activists, researchers and artists from across the continent which took place in 2016. European Alternatives invited them to its biannual Campus to develop strategies for an open and democratic Europe. Many of the projects presented at the Campus are to be found in the book:  from the municipal level to the level of transnational media, from technology and counter-surveillance to a concrete proposal to revive the European refugee policy.

The book  proves that a shift towards a new way of thinking and doing politics is not only possible, but actually already happening.

About the Authors

European Alternatives works to promote democracy, equality and culture beyond the nation states. With offices in four European countries and a network of activists and local groups stretching to over fourteen, the organisation is unique in being at once a breeding ground for new ideas and proposals for politics and culture at a European level and in being a political and cultural actor with a truly transeuropean activity, staff and support base.

Daphne Büllesbach is Managing Director of European Alternatives and curator of Transeuropa Festival, a bi-annual cultural, political and arts event. She holds degrees in Political and Social Sciences from London, Paris and Cambridge.

Marta Cillero is responsible for Communications at European Alternatives. She studied media studies, journalism and communication in Madrid, Istanbul and Chicago, and has a background in gender studies.

Lukas Stolz is special projects collaborator at European Alternatives and previously worked as a campaigner with Democracy International. His research interest lies in the intersection between politics, cultural theory and art and he holds a degree in Philosophy, Politics and Economics from the University of Witten/Herdecke.

Photo by 15mmalagacc

The post Book of the day: Shifting Baselines of Europe appeared first on P2P Foundation.

Behind any “rebel city” there is an active structure of social movements, civil organizations and citizens claiming their right to own their city’s future. Cities that become spaces of radical innovation and democratic regeneration when citizens get tired of useless and corrupt bureaucratic processes for regeneration. Cities like Barcelona, where the leader of the radical municipal anti-eviction platform won the city elections last year; or Messina, the Sicilian city whose mayor, Renato Accorinti, has been working towards a more participatory and democratic political structure for nearly four years.

Naples is one of these examples: in the Southern Italian city more than 20 buildings are occupied and used for a wide variety of political, social and cultural events that try to achieve better conditions for citizens. The re-elected independent mayor of the city Luigi de Magistris, has been actively engaged in the process of establishing an active network of cities with alternative governments able to speak on behalf of the people.

At a moment in which European and national institutions are losing the support of citizens, the core idea of ‘the cities of change’ is to reject market logic as the only rule establishing order in political structures: instead, cities of change put citizens at the centre of the decision-making process. Governments defend citizen participation in political institutions that protect and strengthen the commons. Naples was the first Italian city to establish a “Department of the Commons” and the first to change the municipal statute by inserting the “commons” as one of the interests to be protected and recognised as a fundamental right.

Seven new occupied buildings in Naples

Citizens and social movements transformed these spaces into places “that create social capital in terms of collective uses with a commons value.”

The city of Naples recognised seven public properties occupied by citizens and associations as “emerging commons and environments of civic development” through a Council Resolution in 2016. All these buildings were public properties, which had for years been in a terrible state of neglect and decay. Citizens and social movements transformed these spaces into places “that create social capital in terms of collective uses with a commons value.” The seven properties identified by the Resolution are very different in terms of origin and historical evolution, but they share the fact that Neapolitans were worried about speculation and the possible privatisation of the buildings. This concern drove them to take the decision to act first and restore them to the public interest.

The municipalist government of De Magistris has allowed social organisations to continue developing processes of cultural creation and productive innovation: Government Resolution no. 446/2016 has as its objective “the identification of areas of civic importance ascribed to the category of the commons.” Immediately after its publication (the resolution is dated 1 June  2016 but was only publicised recently), some members of the City Council criticised the Neapolitan Government, because according to them it would be better for the city to sell or rent these public spaces to increase the city’s income. The Government was also accused of “legalising” an illegal occupation of public buildings. However, Resolution 446/2016 does not provide leases or concessions for the social movements that occupy the spaces; it only acknowledges the  “civic use” they do with them.

What has not been outlined is who has the official responsibility for maintaining the spaces (regular checks, cleaning etc), and so it is unclear if this is the Government’s responsibility, the occupants’ or both. The Resolution specifies that “the person temporarily in custody of the property management of municipal assets identified as a “common good” will have to respond to the principles of good performance, impartiality, cost management, and resource efficiency, respecting the public interest.”

What makes a public building a “common good” in Naples?

Resolution 446/2016 is important because it recognises the social value of the experience of living in occupied spaces and not only the economic value of the properties.

The Neapolitan Administration defines common goods as “the tangible and intangible assets of collective belonging that are managed in a shared, participatory process and which is committed to ensuring the collective enjoyment of common goods and their preservation for the benefit of future generations.” The administration has also created a “Permanent Citizen Observatory on the Commons” which studies, analyses, proposes and controls the management and protection of common goods. The Observatory has eleven members, all of whom are experts in legal, economic, social or environmental fields. Seven of these members are appointed by the Mayor and four are citizens selected through simple online procedures.

Following the spirit of the cities of change, Resolution 446/2016 is important because it recognises the social value of the experience of living in occupied spaces  and not only the economic value of the properties. It is also important because it establishes “the recognition of public spaces as part of a process of constant active listening and monitoring of the city and its demands, in relation to the collective use of spaces and protection of the commons.”

In order to analyse the forms of management and regulation of the occupied buildings, there are public discussion tables where citizens share decision making power with the Administration. Each space is different so the required management and the profile of the spaces varies from one to another. At the same time they are united through a commitment to the protection of the commons with the objective of keeping cultural, social and political issues alive, for example in the form of workshops and training centres for women, children and unemployed citizens.

Naples is just one of the hundreds of cases of new municipalism that are spreading around Europe. There are more and more examples of cities working on testing new citizenship initiatives and possible relationships with local institutions, looking for creative responses to the challenges of urban development, social harmony, and integration of migrants. What is needed beyond this is to deepen transnational cooperation between these experiments, to facilitate the exchange of knowledge in order to deal more effectively with the problems that nation-states seem unable to solve.

Cross-posted from PoliticalCritique.org

Photo courtesy of Pug Girl on Flickr.com

The post What Makes an Empty Building in Naples a Commons? appeared first on P2P Foundation.