How the coronavirus is forcing us to think beyond market and state Published: 17 July 2020 Analysis The Corona crisis demonstrated in fast motion the dilemma into which market-state-thinking leads. This is where commons come into play, i.e. what people do and are able to do with each other in a self-determined, self-organised, needs-oriented manner and without any marketing interest. By Silke Helfrich
The Potato Park of Peru Published: 25 January 2016 Up to 4.000 potato varieties are growing in Peru in a high-altitude Sacred Valley of the Incas. Six Quechua communities have been able to maintain the integrity of their biocultural traditions and fragile ecosystem. By David Bollier
How the Bangla-Pesa tapped the Value of an Informal Community Published: 25 January 2016 What if a poorer community created its own currency to foster social exchange? We interviewed Ruddick, the founder of the Bangla-Pesa to learn more about his remarkable experiment in community-based money. By Will Ruddick
Farm Hack: A Commons for Agricultural Innovation Published: 22 January 2016 In 2011, a community of farmers, designers, developers, engineers, architects, roboticists and open source thinkers came together in Boston, Massachusetts, to explore a simple yet radical idea – that great improvements in agriculture could be achieved by reducing barriers to knowledge exchange. By Dorn Cox
Venezuela: "We Are One Big Conversation" Published: 21 January 2016 Cecosesola is a network of about sixty cooperatives and grassroots organizations in Venezuela, with about 20,000 members. The cooperatives sell at weekly markets and provide community-backed loans, among many other services. By Silke Helfrich
How I Have Been Conducting Research on the Commons Without Knowing It Published: 20 January 2016 Making commons come alive again in everyday life seems like a revolution that can be interpreted through two lenses. Is it a rediscovery of precapitalist and prestate organizational principles or is it a break with the current political order? By Étienne Le Roy
The Ethical Struggle to Be Human: A Shack Dwellers Movement in South Africa Published: 19 January 2016 In 2005 Black shack revolted because they felt betrayed by the government. After that they started to organize their protest. Their demand for recognition goes beyond the liberal tradition of “inclusion” in a political or legal system. By Nigel C. Gibson
Fire and Frost: The Virtues of Treating Museums, Libraries and Archives as Commons Published: 19 January 2016 Civilization can't affort to lose archives and libraries. Free, unrestricted digital access is the key, and the creativity and action of citizens is what turns it in the lock. From the book "Patterns of Commoning" By Michael Edson
Commons and Alternative Rationalities: Subjectivity, Emotion and the (Non)rational Commons Published: 18 January 2016 Andrea J. Nightingale points out that emotional attachments to land, seascape and community can help subjectivities to foster successful commoning. By Andrea J. Nightingale
India: Women Protect Common Forest Rights in Rajasthan Published: 18 January 2016 Nichlagarh, an adivasi village in the forest region of Southern Rajasthan, is caught between the bureaucratic regime of the Forestry Department (FD) of India and progressive legislation that claims to restore the traditional rights of commoners. By Soma KP and Richa Audichya
Southeast Asia: Regionalism of the Commons Published: 29 October 2015 Some countries, as Vietnam, fear it, others, like Thailand, have high hopes - what can be expected of ASEAN's neo-liberal project? About its future perspectives and an alternative vision. By Bonn Juego
Lecture and Discussion: 800 Years of Commons Published: 15 September 2015 David Bollier and Michel Bauwens of the Commons Strategies Group/P2P Foundation discussed the role of the commons and peer to peer production in meeting people’s needs and the many enclosures of the commons that are abridging their fundamental rights.
Radical Goals for Sustainable Development Published: 6 January 2015 The coming set of Sustainable Development Goals will seek to protect ecosystems, conserve resources, and, as with the Millennium Development Goals, lift millions of people out of poverty. Now that solid legal ground must be developed further. By Barbara Unmüßig
Key Note: Financialization of nature and resource protection Published: 17 December 2014 The conference “Legal Remedies for Resource Equity”, whick took place on September 15th, focused on the use of environmental law to prevent the negative impacts of global resource extraction. A documentation of Barbara Unmüßig's keynote and presentations of the speaker's corners. By Barbara Unmüßig
Lecture: Ocean of Life Published: 16 December 2014 Oceans have always played a key role for life on earth. In his lecture, marine conservation biologist and author Callum Roberts (University of York, England), describes the distressing dimension that the relatively short human rule of the seas has reached throughout the past decade. By Kristin Funke
Commons based peer production: an introduction Published: 8 July 2014 Is our economy essentially wrong? It beliefs in abundant material resources and meanwhile infinite immaterial resources like knowledge and design are maintained artifically scarce, but there is an alternative. By Michel Bauwens
Turning things right-side up again Published: 5 June 2014 Even if the commons economies cannot provide an answer to each and every question today, one thing is certain: they are emerging in practice in diverse forms all over the world. And: their growth is unstoppable! By Dr. Heike Löschmann
Infrastructures for Commoning Published: 31 May 2013 Keynote "New Infrastructures for Commoning by Design" (Miguel Said Vieira ) - Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung Watch on YouTube This external content requires your consent. Please note our privacy policy. By Miguel Vieira Said
Economics and the Common(s): Opening Speech Published: 23 May 2013 Opening speech by Barbara Unmüßig - Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung Watch on YouTube This external content requires your consent. Please note our privacy policy. By Barbara Unmüßig
Doing away with “labour”: working and caring in a world of commons Published: 14 May 2013 A Keynote by Daniela Gottschlich. By Daniela Gottschlich