By John de Graaf, Front Porch Republic
“Fortunately,” he says, “we here in California believe in climate change. We believe in the ecology of our land. We believe that we can make the positive changes that need to be made so that we have life on this planet.” And not only life, but a good life.
By Sol Trumbo Vila, Open Democracy
We live in a moment of crisis and opportunity, and the Spanish experience shows that it is possible to incorporate veteran left parties, grass roots activists and disfranchised social democratic and progressive voters into broader transformative processes.
By Jacob Moses, Strong Towns
Want to better your community but don’t know where to start? Enter It’s the Little Things: a weekly Strong Towns podcast that gives you the wisdom and encouragement you need to take the small yet powerful actions that can make your city or town stronger.
By Nidhi Gulati, Sarika Panda Bhatt, Project for Public Spaces
Raahgiri Day is one of the world’s most recognizable open streets events—a weekly event in which residents of Delhi, India reclaim their streets from cars.
By William F. Lamb, Carbon Brief
So what do we actually know about climate mitigation in cities? In our new paper, published in Nature Climate Change, we take stock of all the city case studies currently available in the peer-reviewed literature.
By Rob Hopkins, Rob Hopkins blog
In Bologna, a new approach to engagement and civic action is emerging, rooted in the imagination. One driver for this shift is the realisation we are living in what Michele calls “a distrust era”, where people don’t trust public administrations, NGOs, or private businesses.
By Bertie Russell, Open Democracy
The goal is thus not to repeat the tightly-knitted knot and inherited linear understanding of power, but to weave a new political geography, a new terrain of distributed power. No longer is this a challenge of an expansive fiefdom to be owned and controlled, but a series of humans whose relationships need to be collectively organized.
By Rob Hopkins, Rob Hopkins blog
We took everybody on a journey that said the arts too have their place in the life of a city, and that the city doesn’t just have to be about shopping and traffic, that it’s as important for people collectively to share these moments, moments like this, as it is for them to share or to experience moments in their own life.
By John Thackara, John Thackara blog
The notion of the city as a living system generates cultural energy, too: A narrative based on caring – for each other, and for our places – creates the meaning and shared purpose we’ve been so badly lacking.
By Bart Hawkins Kreps, An Outside Chance
Although our geographic and political situations vary a great deal, nearly all cities in industrial civilization have been dominated by car culture for a few generations, and we face many common challenges as we work back towards cities that are safe for everyone who could and should be moving about our streets.