[sudo-discuss] discussing the commons this tuesday

[Jacob Levin]

Hello,

A group of people are getting together at Sudo Room Tuesday evening at 7:30
to talk about David Bollier's work on the commons and I wanted to see if
anyone from the Sudo Room community wanted to join us. David Bollier is one
of the leading common advocates in the US, and believes the language of the
commons will allow us to think our way out of the market/state argument
that currently consumes most of what passes as political debate in this
country. This is part of an ongoing discussion group we've put together to
talk about some of the intellectuals and activists, including Bollier
himself, who are coming to Oakland in early August for a conference. For
more details about the conference or discussion group email me at
jjflevin at gmail.com. You'll find links to the texts we'll be looking at
below. Hope some of you can make it!
Jacob

*“The commons provides us with the ability to name and then help constitute
a new order. We need a new language that does not insidiously replicate the
misleading fictions of the old order – for example, that market growth will
eventually solve our social ills or that regulation will curb the world’s
proliferating ecological harms. We need a new discourse and new social
practices that assert a new grand narrative, a different constellation of
operating principles and a more effective order of governance. Seeking a
discourse of this sort is not a fanciful whim. It is an absolute necessity.
And, in fact, there is no other way to bring about a new order. Words
actually shape the world. By using a new language, the language of the
commons, we immediately begin to create a new culture. We can assert a new
order of resource stewardship, right livelihood, social priorities and
collective enterprise.” *

The primary text we'll look at is David Bollier and Silke Helfrich's
introduction to the recently published "Wealth of Commons":
http://wealthofthecommons.org/essay/introduction-commons-transformative-vision
For those who want more explicit example of what this resurgence of the
commons looks like, this article he wrote back in 2001 looks at how
community gardens, open source software and blood banks can all be best
described using the language of the commons:
http://www.yesmagazine.org/issues/reclaiming-the-commons/the-cornucopia-of-the-commons
And if anyone would rather listen/watch instead of read, this interview
offers a great window into how Bollier thinks about the world:
http://69.195.124.81/~erratica/2013/03/20/david-bollier-on-the-commons-paradigm/
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