Insight and inspiration in turbulent times.
The Occupy movement is beginning to discover the commons, and the result could be a rich and productive collaboration. This was the lesson that I took from a three-day conference, “Making Worlds: A Forum on the Commons,” hosted by Occupy Wall Street in Brooklyn this past weekend. Rarely have I seen so many ordinary people from diverse backgrounds embrace the commons idea with such ease and enthusiasm.
If ever there was a time when the Transition movement was ideally positioned for take-off, it’s now. The popular appetite for radical change is there – of that, there can be no doubt. It’s no coincidence that the Occupy movement in the US, UK and Western Europe snowballed since early 2011, hot on the heels of the Arab Spring revolts that shook the Middle East and North Africa from December 2010.
– Peak people: The world’s losing its workers
– Monbiot: Is protecting the environment incompatible with social justice?
– Film review: The Forgotten Space (global trade)
– The Entropy of Capitalism & Urban Ag: Interview with Robert Biel
“I’ve been concerned by the extent of ‘burn-out’ I’ve come across – in particular states of exhaustion, the development of cynicism and despair. But also the opposite of these in the form of a kind of ‘pollyanna-ish’ defensiveness where people convince themselves that all is solvable, either through technology or through local community action. “
“Both of these tendencies have increased post-Copenhagen, along with a tendency for campaigners sometimes to blame each other rather than the powerful actors in the political system. This is a common response amongst groups experiencing failure – you begin by minutely examining the reasons for the lack of success and end by attacking each other or alternatively withdrawing altogether.”
On February 6, journalist and activist Chris Hedges wrote a searing article on the Black Bloc. Occupy theorist David Graeber wrote an open letter in reply.
The Black Bloc first appeared in the 80s and has been with demonstrations across the world ever since. The Black Bloc is a tactic, whereby black-clad individuals wearing hoods and masks appear in the midst of a demonstration to trash stores, break windows, etc.
Not involved with Occupy? It’s still important. Occupy is a wild card which could break through the stalemate on energy, climate and politics which bedevils the United States. It could also fizzle out. Or it could take a dark direction, as did some of the radical politics in the 1970s.
– Portland, the US capital of alternative cool
– Are electric or hybrid cars a green marketing myth, or a real solution?
– Is This the Most Beautiful Street in the World?
– Voices from the previews of ‘In Transition 2.0′ (video)
– When the Transition Movement & the Community Rights Movement Start Collaborating, Watch Out!
We are seeing today the first widespread global popular uprising in history that shares a name-tag and an idea: an end to corporate greed, extreme socio-economic inequality and, by deduction, the capitalist system in general. This performance on the world stage is wrestling with notions of publoid space and the challenge of ‘scaling up’.
– The rising global protest movement: job insecurity and the “precariat” (Dr. Standing interview)
– NYT: Occupy Movement Regroups, Preparing for Its Next Phase
– We’re More Unequal Than You Think
– Punishing Protest, Policing Dissent: What is the Justice System For?
Outrageous, snarky, “madly engaging,” bileful—these are a few of the terms that have been used to describe author and social critic James Howard Kunstler. But he’s actually a great deal more than these things, as anyone who’s really come to know him, even if only through his books and Internet postings, can tell you. His most personal writings reveal a human, vulnerable, wonderfully versatile, cheerful side that few people know exists.
We hold these truths to be self-evident:
That the real, physical world is the source of our own lives, and the lives of others. A weakened planet is less capable of supporting life, human or otherwise.
Thus the health of the real world is primary, more important than any social or economic system, because all social or economic systems are dependent upon a living planet.
In the countries of the Global South, women are the primary producers of food, the ones in charge of working the earth, maintaining seed stores, harvesting fruit, obtaining water and safeguarding the harvest. Between 60 to 80% of food production in the Global South is done by women (50% worldwide) (FAO, 1996). Women are the primary producers of basic grains such as rice, wheat, and corn which feed the most impoverished populations in the South. Despite their key role in agriculture and food however, women; together with their children; are the ones most affected by hunger.
– How the Occupy Movement Changed Urban Government
– Tweetin’ ’Bout a Revolution
– Richard Reich: The Downward Mobility of the American Middle Class
– How a Tragic Soccer Riot May Have Revived the Egyptian Revolution
– Chris Hedges and the black bloc
