By David Bollier, David Bollier blog
DisCOs, by contrast, start from a different set of premises about humanity. They regard we humans as a cooperative species whose members need and want to engage with others, personally. Earned trust among people and open collaboration can then achieve some remarkable things.
By Josh Davis, Grassroots Economic Organizing
Lately, I’ve been mulling over what I think is a better metaphor for the cooperative movement, or rather, a better metaphor for what I hope to see the cooperative movement become: not an ecosystem, but an organism. Not a collection of disparate entities occupying the same space, each working for its own survival, but rather a single entity with many parts and pieces that play different roles in the functioning and health of the larger whole; a whole which in turn supports each of its constituent parts.
By Stacco Troncoso, Ann Marie Utratel, Hackernoon
So, what do we mean by a DisCO? It stands for Distributed Cooperative Organizations, and it’s a set of organisational tools and practices for groups of people who want to work together in a cooperative, commons-oriented, and feminist economic form.
By Nathan Schneider, P2P Blog
I frequently encounter a notion, among those drawn to cooperatives, that a cooperative should be an amorphous, faceless collective in which old-world skills and norms of leadership can be discarded.
By Nithin Coca, Shareable
Whether it is growing congestion due to ride-hailing apps like Uber and Lyft, rising housing costs due to Airbnb, or increasing agitation from gig workers being forced to work longer hours for less pay, cities are at the forefront of the battle to control the exploitative platform economy.
By Steve Rushton, Occupy.com
Jackson, Mississippi, will be “the most radical city on the planet," Chokwe Antar Lumumba, the city's mayor, pledged at the People's Summit in Chicago, where he spoke last July after his landslide election win.
By Transformative Cities Staff, Transformative Cities
In January 2011 Som Energia started to apply for the necessary permits and soon after entered the market as a non-profit cooperative committed to producing 100% renewable energy from hydroelectric, solar, biomass and wind power.
By Tabita Green, YES! magazine
Instead of focusing only on piecemeal solutions for various forms of social ills, we must consider that the real and lasting solution is a new economy designed for all people, not only for the ruling corporate elite.
By Michel Bauwens, Nathan Schneider, Commons Transition
Cooperatives are a way of introducing people to a radical vision of the commons that also includes familiar stuff like Visa, Associated Press, and the credit union down the street. But I wouldn’t claim cooperatives are sufficient. They’re a starting point, a gateway to more diverse and widespread commoning.
By Nithin Coca, Shareable
How can cooperatives work together? In Japan, cooperatives have banded together to form the Japan Cooperative Alliance (JCA), an umbrella organization that seeks to promote inter-cooperative collaborations, lobby for pro-cooperative policies, and provide better information and education about cooperatives to the general public.