October 2015 - P2P-Foundation - lists.ourproject.org

Re: [P2P-F] [NetworkedLabour] Fwd: [historicalmaterialism] NEW FROM VERSO: INVENTING THE FUTURE BY NICK SRNICEK AND ALEX WILLIAMS
by Anna Harris 28 Oct '15

28 Oct '15

Peter, For £2 more you could have got the paperback and the e-book together, (an illustration of convergence towards zero marginal cost), and then given the paperback to your friends! Anna > On 26 Oct 2015, at 10:28, peter waterman <peterwaterman1936(a)gmail.com> wrote: > > Just bought the e-book version and note that it is DRM-free. Does this mean I can send it to all my friends? > > P > > > ---------- Forwarded message ---------- > From: peter waterman <peterwaterman1936(a)gmail.com> > Date: Mon, Oct 26, 2015 at 11:25 AM > Subject: Fwd: [historicalmaterialism] NEW FROM VERSO: INVENTING THE FUTURE BY NICK SRNICEK AND ALEX WILLIAMS > To: Danny <huasquero(a)mac.com>, Dan Gallin <gli(a)iprolink.ch>, Asbjørn Wahl <Asbjorn.Wahl(a)velferdsstaten.no> > > > > ---------- Forwarded message ---------- > From: Historical Materialism News news(a)historicalmaterialism.org [historicalmaterialism] <historicalmaterialism-noreply(a)yahoogroups.com> > Date: Mon, Oct 26, 2015 at 11:02 AM > Subject: [historicalmaterialism] NEW FROM VERSO: INVENTING THE FUTURE BY NICK SRNICEK AND ALEX WILLIAMS > To: historicalmaterialism(a)yahoogroups.com > > > > OUT NOW: > > INVENTING THE FUTURE > > By Nick Srnicek and Alex Williams > > > > A major new manifesto for a high-tech future free from work > > > > ‘A powerful book: it not only shows us how the postcapitalist world of rapidly improving technology could make us free, but it also shows us how we can organise to get there. This is a must-read.’ PAUL MASON, author of Postcapitalism: A Guide to Our Future > > > > “Most important book of 2015” Aaron Bastani, co-founder of Novara Media > > > > http://www.versobooks.com/books/1989-inventing-the-future > > > > ------------ > > > > LONDON EVENT: Inventing the Future: Nick Srnicek and Alex Williams in conversation with Emma Dowling > > > > Tuesday 3rd November 2015 7pm - 8pm, at Foyles Charing Cross Road > > > > http://www.foyles.co.uk/Public/Events/Detail.aspx?eventId=2674 > > > > ------------ > > > > Neoliberalism isn’t working. Austerity is forcing millions into poverty and many more into precarious work, while the left remains trapped in stagnant political practices that offer no respite. > > > > Inventing the Future is a bold new manifest0 for life after capitalism. Against the confused understanding of our high-tech world by both the right and the left, this book claims that the emancipatory and future-oriented possibilities of our society can be reclaimed. Instead of running from a complex future, Nick Srnicek and Alex Williams demand a postcapitalist economy capable of advancing standards, liberating humanity from work and developing technologies that expand our freedoms. > > > > NICK SRNICEK is the author of Postcapitalist Technologies (Polity, forthcoming) and the co-editor of The Speculative Turn (Re.press, 2011 with Levi Bryant and Graham Harman). > > > > ALEX WILLIAMS is a PhD student at the University of East London working on a thesis entitled Complexity & Hegemony. > > > > ------------ > > > > “Nick Srnicek and Alex Williams' project dares to propose a different way of thinking and acting. Given the fizzling of the Occupy moment, a radical rethinking of the anarchic approach is badly needed but just not happening. This book could do a lot of work in getting that rethink going.” DOUG HENWOOD author of Wall Street > > > > > > “Srnicek and Williams demonstrate how a sustainable economic future is less a question of means than of imagination. The postcapitalist world they envision is utterly attainable, if we can remember that we have been inventing the economy all along.” DOUGLAS RUSHKOFF, author of Present Shock: When Everything Happens Now > > > > “Inventing the Future is exactly what we need right now. With immense patience and care, it sets out a clear and compelling vision of a postcapitalist society. Equally importantly, it lays out a plausible programme which can take us from 24/7 capitalist immiseration to a world free of work.” MARK FISHER, author of Capitalist Realism: Is There No Alternative? > > > > “A conceptual launch pad for a new socialist imagination…” Mike Davis, author of Planet of Slums > > > > > > ------------ > > > > PAPERBACK: SEPTEMBER 2015 / 256 pages / ISBN 9781784780968 / $19.95 / £12.99 / $23.95 (CAN) > > > > AVAILABLE AS AN E-BOOK FROM 13TH OCTOBER 2015 > > > > INVENTING THE FUTURE is 30% off at the moment: > > http://www.versobooks.com/books/1989-inventing-the-future > > > > For more information on university inspection/desk copies visit: http://www.versobooks.com/pg/desk-copies > > > > ------------ > > > > Visit Verso's website for information on our upcoming events, new reviews and publications and special offers: http://www.versobooks.com > > > > Sign up for the Verso mailing list: > > https://www.versobooks.com/users/sign_up > > > > Follow us online: > > Facebook https://www.facebook.com/VersoBks > > Twitter: http://twitter.com/VersoBooks > > Instagram: http://instagram.com/versobooks > > Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/18970808-verso-books > > > Published in http://www.historicalmaterialism.org/news/distributed/new-from-verso-invent… > __._,_.___ > Posted by: Historical Materialism News <news(a)historicalmaterialism.org> > Reply via web post • Reply to sender • Reply to group • Start a New Topic • Messages in this topic (1) > VISIT YOUR GROUP New Members 1 > • Privacy • Unsubscribe • Terms of Use > . > > > __,_._,___ > > > > -- > Recent publications > > 1. 2014. From Coldwar Communism to the Global Justice Movement: Itinerary of a Long-Distance Internationalist. http://www.into-ebooks.com/book/from_coldwar_communism _to_the_global_emancipatory_movement/ (Free). 2. 2014. Interface Journal Special (Co-Editor), December 2014. 'Social Movement Internationalisms'. (Free).3. 2014. with Laurence Cox, ‘Movement Internationalism/s’, Interface: a Journal for and about Social Movements. (Editorial), Vol. 6 (2), pp. 1–12. 4. 2014. ‘The International Labour Movement in, Against and Beyond, the Globalized and Informatized Cage of Capitalism and Bureaucracy. (Interview). Interface: a Journal for and about Social Movements. Vol. 6 (2), pp. 35-58. 5. 2014. 'The Networked Internationalism of Labour's Others', in Jai Sen (ed), Peter Waterman (co-ed), The Movement of Movements: Struggles for Other Worlds (Part I). (10 Euros). 6. 2015. Waterman, Peter. ‘Beyond Labourism, Development and Decent Work’. Global Labour Journal, 2015, 6(2), pp. 246-50. > > More publications, click [////] > > > > -- > Recent publications > > 1. 2014. From Coldwar Communism to the Global Justice Movement: Itinerary of a Long-Distance Internationalist. http://www.into-ebooks.com/book/from_coldwar_communism _to_the_global_emancipatory_movement/ (Free). 2. 2014. Interface Journal Special (Co-Editor), December 2014. 'Social Movement Internationalisms'. (Free).3. 2014. with Laurence Cox, ‘Movement Internationalism/s’, Interface: a Journal for and about Social Movements. (Editorial), Vol. 6 (2), pp. 1–12. 4. 2014. ‘The International Labour Movement in, Against and Beyond, the Globalized and Informatized Cage of Capitalism and Bureaucracy. (Interview). Interface: a Journal for and about Social Movements. Vol. 6 (2), pp. 35-58. 5. 2014. 'The Networked Internationalism of Labour's Others', in Jai Sen (ed), Peter Waterman (co-ed), The Movement of Movements: Struggles for Other Worlds (Part I). (10 Euros). 6. 2015. Waterman, Peter. ‘Beyond Labourism, Development and Decent Work’. Global Labour Journal, 2015, 6(2), pp. 246-50. > > More publications, click [////] > _______________________________________________ > NetworkedLabour mailing list > NetworkedLabour(a)lists.contrast.org > http://lists.contrast.org/mailman/listinfo/networkedlabour

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Co-Deciding with Citizens at the EU Level
by Kevin Flanagan 26 Oct '15

26 Oct '15

http://www.ecas.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/ECAS-Publication-online-vers… -- https://twitter.com/flgnk Skype: kev.flanagan Phone: +353 87 743 5660

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an important synthetic manifesto from the P2P Foundation: the ten commandments of peer production and commons economics
by Michel Bauwens 26 Oct '15

26 Oct '15

The ten commandments of peer production and commons economics *For a mode of production and value creation that is free, fair and sustainable!* Michel Bauwens, Berlin, October 23, 2015, for the Uncommons conference As we have tried to show elsewhere, the emergence of commons-oriented peer production has generated the emergence of a new logic of collaboration between open productive communities who created shared resources (commons) through contributions, and those market-oriented entities that created added value on top or along these shared commons. This article addresses the emerging practices that should inspire these entities of the 'ethical' economy. The main aim it to create new forms that go beyond the traditional corporate form and its extractive profit-maximizing practices of value extraction. Instead of extractive forms of capital, we need generative forms, that co-create value with and for the commoners. I am using the form of commandments to explain the new practices. All of them have already emerged in various forms, but need to be generalized and integrated. What the world and humanity, and all those beings that are affected by our activities require is a mode of production, and relations of production, that are “free, fair and sustainable' at the same time. *OPEN AND FREE* 1. Thou shall practice open business models based on shared knowledge Closed business models are based on artificial scarcity. Though knowledge is a non- or anti-rival good that gains in use value the more it is shared, and though it can be shared easily and at very low marginal cost when it is in digital form, many extractive firms still use artificial scarcity to extract rents from the creation or use of digitized knowledge. Through legal repression or technological sabotage, naturally shareable goods are made artificially scarce, so that extra profits can be generated. This is particularly galling in the context of life-saving or planet-regenerating technological knowledge. The first commandment is therefore the ethical commandment of sharing what can be shared, and of only creating market value from resources that are scarce and create added value on top or along these commons. Open business models are market strategies that are based on the recognition of natural abundance and the refusal to generate income and profits by making them artificially scarce. Thou shall find more information on this here at http://p2pfoundation.net/Category:Business_Models *FAIR* 2. Thou shall practice open cooperativism Many new more ethical and generative forms are being created, that have a higher level of harmony with the contributory commons. The key here is to choose post-corporate forms that are able to generate livelihoods for the contributing commoners. Open cooperatives in particular would be cooperatives that share the following characteristics: 1. they are mission-oriented and have a social goal that is related to the creation of shared resources 2. they are multi-stakeholder governed, and include all those that are affected by or contributing to the particular activity 3. they constitutionally, in their own rules, commit to co-create commons with the productive communities I often add the fourth condition that they should be global in organisational scope in order to create counter-power to extractive multinational corporations. Cooperatives are one of the potential forms that commons-friendly market entitities could take. We see the emergence of more open forms such as neo-tribes (think of the workings of the Ouishare community), or more tightly organized neo-builds, such as Enspiral.org, Las Indias or the Ethos Foundation. Yet more open is the network form chose by the Sensorica open scientific hardware community, which wants to more tightly couple contributions with generated income, by allowing all microtasked contributions in the reward system, through open value or contributory accounting (more below). Thou shall find more information on this at http://p2pfoundation.net/Category:Open_Company_Formats 3. Though shall practice open value or contributory accounting Peer production is based on distributed tasks, freely contributed by a open community-driven collaborative infrastructure. The tradition of salaries based on fixed job description may not be the most appropriate way to reward those that contribute to such processes. Hence the emergence of open value accounting or contributory accounting. As practiced already by Sensorica, this means that any contributor may add contributions, log them according to project number, and after peer evaluation is assigned 'karma points'. When income is generated, it flows into these weighted contributions, so that every contributor is fairly rewarded. Contributory accounting, or other similar solutions, are important to avoid that only a few contributors more closely related to the market, capture the value that has been co-created by a much larger community. Open book accounting insure that the (re)distribution of value is transparent for all contributors. Thou shall find more information on this at http://p2pfoundation.net/Category:P2P_Accounting 4. Thou shall insure fair distribution and benefit-sharing through Copyfair licensing The copyleft licenses allow anyone to re-use the necessary knowledge commons on the condition that changes and improvements are added to that same commons. This is a great advance, but should not be abstracted from the need for fairness. When moving to physical production which involves findng resources for buildings, raw materials and payments to contributors, the unfettered commercial exploitation of such commons favours extractive models. Thus the need to maintain the knowledge sharing, but to ask reciprocity for the commercial exploitation of the commons, so that there is a level playing field for the ethical economic entities that do internalize social and environmental costs. This is achieved through copyfair licenses which while allow full sharing of the knowledge, ask for reciprocity in exchange for the right of commercialization. Thou shall find more information on this at http://p2pfoundation.net/Category:Licensing 5. Thou shall practice solidarity and mitigate the risks through Commonfare practices As one of the strong results of financial and neoliberal globalization, the power of nation-states has gradually weakened, and there is now a strong and integrated effort to unwind the solidarity mechanisms that were embedded in the welfare state models. As long as we do not have the power to reverse this slide, it is imperative that we reconstruct solidarity mechanisms of distributed scope, a practicde which we could call 'commonfare'. Examples such as the Broodfonds (NL), Friendsurance (Germany) and the health sharing ministriesj (U.S.), or cooperative entities such Coopaname in France, show us the new forms of distributed solidarity that can be developed to deal with the risks of life and work. Thou shall find more information on this at http://p2pfoundation.net/Category:P2P_Solidarity *SUSTAINABLE* 6. Thou shall use open and sustainable designs for an open source circular economy Open productive communities insure maximum particiation through modularity and granularity. Because they operate in a context of shared and abundant resources, the practice of planned obsolesence, which is not a bug but a feature for profit-maximizing corporations, is alien to them. Ethical enterpreneurial entities will therefore use these open and sustainable designs and produce sustainable good and services. Thou shall find more information on this at http://p2pfoundation.net/Category:Design 7. Thou shall move beyond an exclusive reliance on imperfect market price signals towards mutual coordination of production through open supply chains and open book accounting What decision-making is for planning, and pricing is for the market, mutual coordination is for the commons! We will never achieve a sustainable 'circular economy', in which the output of one production processes is used as an input for another, with closed value chains and which every cooperation has to be painfully negotiated in the conditions of lack of transparency. But enterpreneurial coalitions who are already co-dependent on a collaborative commons can create eco-systems of collaboration through open supply chains, in which the production processes become transparent, in through which every participant can adapt his behaviour based on the knowledge available in the network. There is no need for over-production when the production realities of the network become common knowledge. Thou shall find more information on this at http://p2pfoundation.net/Category:Mutual_Coordination 8. Thou shall practice cosmo-localization1 <#sdfootnote1sym> “What is light is global, and what is heavy is local”: this is the new principle animating commons-based peer production in which knowledge is globally shared, but production can take place on demand and based on real needs , through a network of distributed coworking and microfactories. Certain studies have shown that up to two-thirds of matter and energy goes not to production, but to transport, which is clearly unsustainable. A return to relocalized production is a since qua non for the transition towards sustainable production. Thou shall find more information on this at http://p2pfoundation.net/Category:Sustainable_Manufacturing 9. You shall mutualize physical infrastructures Platform cooperatives, data cooperatives and fairshares forms of distributed ownership can be used to co-own our infrastructures of production. The misnamed sharing economy from AirBnB and Uber shows the potential of matching idle resources. Co-working, skillsharing, ridesharing are examples of the many ways in which we can re-use and share resources to dramatically augment the thermo-dynamic efficiencies of our consumption. In the right context of co-ownership and co-governance, a real sharing economy can achieve dramatic advances in reduced resource use. Our means of production, inclusive machines, can be mutualized and self-owned by all those that create value. Thou shall find more information on this at http://p2pfoundation.net/Category: <http://p2pfoundation.net/Category:Sustainable_Manufacturing>Sharing 10. You shall mutualize generative capital Generative forms of capital cannot rely on a extractive money supply that is based on compound interest that is due to extractive banks. We have to abolish the 38% financial tax that is owed on all goods and services and transform our monetary system, and substantively augment the use of mutual credit systems. Thou shall find more information on this at http://p2pfoundation.net/Category:Peerfunding 1 <#sdfootnote1anc>The concept is from Jose Ramos, http://p2pfoundation.net/Category:Cosmo-Localization -- Check out the Commons Transition Plan here at: http://commonstransition.org P2P Foundation: http://p2pfoundation.net - http://blog.p2pfoundation.net <http://lists.ourproject.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/p2p-foundation>Updates: http://twitter.com/mbauwens; http://www.facebook.com/mbauwens #82 on the (En)Rich list: http://enrichlist.org/the-complete-list/

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Fwd: How many wake up calls do we need?
by Michel Bauwens 25 Oct '15

25 Oct '15

---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Jenny Zapata-Lopez - 350.org <350(a)350.org> Date: Sun, Oct 25, 2015 at 6:36 AM Subject: How many wake up calls do we need? To: Bauwens Michel <michelsub2004(a)gmail.com> Friends, *Yesterday, Hurricane Patricia made landfall here in Mexico.* It was the strongest hurricane ever recorded. (At one point, Patricia would have been a “Category 7” hurricane, except that the measurement scale only goes up to Category 5.) By the time you read this, the worst part of the storm will have passed us. Thankfully, early reports indicate that the damage has been surprisingly limited here, but the risk of extreme flooding remains for much of the Gulf Coast of the United States. This massive storm was a powerful wake-up call. A lot has been said in the press about whether and how much Hurricane Patricia can be directly linked to climate change, but one thing is certain: *our rapidly warming oceans and atmosphere mean stronger, more frequent megastorms.* The strongest storm ever, in the midst of one of the most prolific hurricane seasons on record, after the hottest June, July, August, *and* September ever recorded.1 Drought impacting communities from Thailand to California. Reports that the world’s biggest fossil fuel company has known (and lied) about climate change for over thirty years.2 I don't know about you, but this moment feels *urgent *to me*.* It also feels urgent because we're approaching an important crossroads: The U.N. climate summit in Paris is a little over a month away, and it could actually send a signal that the world is finally ready tackle the climate crisis in a meaningful way. Just this week, negotiators met in Bonn to prepare, and my colleagues who were there say that this summit promises to be a real fight. Meanwhile, a broad coalition of groups from around the world is calling for a huge day of action on the eve of the big gathering in Paris. *If this moment feels as urgent to you as it does to me, help us make it count:* *Join us on November 28th-29th for the Global Climate March. Find an event, or start one of your own.* <http://act.350.org/go/8464?t=1&utm_medium=email&akid=8194.360134.DXVYkp> We need a bold, ambitious deal in Paris that keeps at least 80% of fossil fuels in the ground and finances a just transition to 100% renewable energy by mid-century. It will only happen if the climate movement shows up big though -- both before the summit, and afterward. *How many wake-up calls do we need? I hope you'll join me the last weekend of November. <http://act.350.org/go/8464?t=2&utm_medium=email&akid=8194.360134.DXVYkp>* Thank you, Jenny Zapata-Lopez ------------------------------ 1. "2015 Likely to Be Hottest Year Ever Recorded," *New York Times*. <http://act.350.org/go/8570?t=3&utm_medium=email&akid=8194.360134.DXVYkp> 2. "Exxon Knew Everything There Was to Know About Climate Change by the Mid-1980s—and Denied It," *The Nation*. <http://act.350.org/go/8571?t=4&utm_medium=email&akid=8194.360134.DXVYkp> ------------------------------ 350.org <http://350.org?akid=8194.360134.DXVYkp> is building a global climate movement. You can connect with us on Facebook <http://facebook.com/350.org?akid=8194.360134.DXVYkp>, follow us on Twitter <http://twitter.com/350>, and become a sustaining donor to keep this movement strong and growing. <https://act.350.org/donate/build/?akid=8194.360134.DXVYkp> Want to change your email address, location, or language? Click here <http://350.org/update?akid=8194.360134.DXVYkp>. You can unsubscribe from this mailing list at any time. <http://act.350.org/cms/unsubscribe/unsubscribe/?akid=8194.360134.DXVYkp> -- Check out the Commons Transition Plan here at: http://commonstransition.org P2P Foundation: http://p2pfoundation.net - http://blog.p2pfoundation.net <http://lists.ourproject.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/p2p-foundation>Updates: http://twitter.com/mbauwens; http://www.facebook.com/mbauwens #82 on the (En)Rich list: http://enrichlist.org/the-complete-list/

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Re: [P2P-F] [NetworkedLabour] an important synthetic manifesto from the P2P Foundation: the ten commandments of peer production and commons economics (Orsan Senalp)
by Michel Bauwens 24 Oct '15

24 Oct '15

thanks Orsan, here is the link in our blog: http://blog.p2pfoundation.net/the-ten-commandments-of-peer-production-and-c… -- Check out the Commons Transition Plan here at: http://commonstransition.org P2P Foundation: http://p2pfoundation.net - http://blog.p2pfoundation.net <http://lists.ourproject.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/p2p-foundation>Updates: http://twitter.com/mbauwens; http://www.facebook.com/mbauwens #82 on the (En)Rich list: http://enrichlist.org/the-complete-list/

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Martin Fink on copyleft
by Karl Robillard 24 Oct '15

24 Oct '15

Nathan Willis wrote the following on Linux Weekly News : "On the final day of LinuxCon Europe 2015, HP's Chief Technology Officer Martin Fink delivered a bold keynote about software licensing. Fink recapped the negative effects of license proliferation and addressed projects that use their choice of license as hostile act against the competition. He then ended the session with an extended appeal to move the open-source software industry away from permissive licenses like Apache 2.0 and toward copyleft licenses like the GPL." The complete article is at http://lwn.net/Articles/660428/. This is related to the Apache vs GPL blog post http://blog.p2pfoundation.net/why-apache-defeated-the-gpl-license-developer… -Karl

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Fwd: On behalf of Jana Revedin: invitation to the presentation of "La ville Rebelle" / "Rebel Cities"
by Michel Bauwens 21 Oct '15

21 Oct '15

---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: newsletter(a)locus-foundation.org <newsletter(a)locus-foundation.org> Date: Wed, Oct 21, 2015 at 5:44 PM Subject: On behalf of Jana Revedin: invitation to the presentation of "La ville Rebelle" / "Rebel Cities" To: mailinglist(a)locus-foundation.org * Invitation to a reading from and discussion about the bookInvitation à la lecture/debat Wednesday, 25th November at 19:00Mercredi, 25 Novembre à 19h Goethe Institut Paris, 17 avenue d´Iéna * * REBEL CITIESHOW TO DEMOCRATIZE URBAN DESIGN LA VILLE REBELLEDEMOCRATISER LE PROJET URBAIN* Éditions Gallimard Alternatives - Collection Manifestô A dialogue between *Jana Revedin*, director of the publication, and the co-authors *Salma Samar **Damluji, Marie-Hélène Contal, Philippe Madec* and *Marco Casagrande*. *Jana Revedin**,* *directrice de la publication en dialogue avec **les * *co-auteurs* *Salma Samar **Damluji, Marie-Hélène Contal, Philippe Madec* *et* *Marco Casagrande.* *REBEL CITIES* is a collection of theoretical texts from architects from all corners of the world who share one conviction: that the paradigm of functionalism, the source of the 20th century dogma of the unlimited exploitation of resources and authoritarian planning practices, has had its day. This linking of progress with productivity has seriously unbalanced the fair division of urban and natural resources on our planet. *REBEL CITIES* raises the question of how to imagine a more emancipating and reflective way of living our planet? *REBEL CITIES* proposes participatory design processes based on the collective memory and the individual engagement of citizens. *LA VILLE REBELLE * *rassemble les textes théoriques d‘architectes qui, aux quatre coins du monde, partagent une conviction : le paradigme du fonctionnalisme, qui accompagna au XXe siècle l‘aménagement autoritaire de l‘espace et l‘exploitation sans limites des ressources, est aujourd’hui épuisé. Cette association du progrès au productivisme a gravement déséquilibré la répartition des ressources urbaines et naturelles sur la planète.* *LA VILLE REBELLE* *interroge : comment penser aujourd’hui une façon plus émancipatrice et réfléchie d’habiter le monde ?* *LA VILLE REBELLE * *propose des démarches de projet participatives, fondées sur la mémoire collective et l‘engagement des citoyens.* This newsletter provides periodical information on the LOCUS Fund activities. We also invite you to read about selected topics of our development, cultural and scientific activities on www.locus-foundation.org If you would like to unsubscribe from this newsletter, please click here: unsubscribe newsletter <newsletter(a)locus-foundation.org>. Sender: LOCUS I 38 Rue Copernic I F - 75116 Paris www.locus-foundation.org I newsletter(a)locus-foundation.org -- Check out the Commons Transition Plan here at: http://commonstransition.org P2P Foundation: http://p2pfoundation.net - http://blog.p2pfoundation.net <http://lists.ourproject.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/p2p-foundation>Updates: http://twitter.com/mbauwens; http://www.facebook.com/mbauwens #82 on the (En)Rich list: http://enrichlist.org/the-complete-list/

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Fwd: [NetworkedLabour] cracking capitalism vs. the state option
by Michel Bauwens 21 Oct '15

21 Oct '15

Dear Stacco, could you republish this stimulating interview on the p2p blog ? thanks a lot!! Michel ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Orsan <orsan1234(a)gmail.com> Date: Wed, Oct 21, 2015 at 6:29 PM Subject: [NetworkedLabour] cracking capitalism vs. the state option To: networkedlabour(a)lists.contrast.org *With left parties on the rise in Spain and Greece, John Holloway reflects on his influential 2002 thesis: can we change the world without taking power?* *Interview by Amador Fernández-Savater. Translated by Richard Mac Duinnsleibhe and edited by Arianne Sved **of Guerrilla Translation <http://guerrillatranslation.com/>*. In 2002, John Holloway published a landmark book: *Change the World without Taking Power* <http://www.plutobooks.com/display.asp?K=9780745329185>. Inspired by the ‘*¡Ya basta!*’ of the Zapatistas, by the movement that emerged in Argentina in 2001/’02, and by the anti-globalization movement, Holloway sets out a hypothesis: it is not the idea of revolution or transformation of the world that has been refuted as a result of the disaster of authoritarian communism, but rather the idea of revolution as the *taking of power*, and of the party as the political tool par excellence. Holloway discerns another concept of social change at work in these movements, and generally in every practice—however visible or invisible it may be—where a logic different from that of profit is followed: the logic of cracking capitalism. That is, to create, within the very society that is being rejected, spaces, moments, or areas of activity in which a different world is prefigured. Rebellions in motion. From this perspective, the idea of organization is no longer equivalent to that of the party, but rather entails the question of how the different cracks that unravel the fabric of capitalism can recognize each other and connect. But after Argentina’s “*que se vayan todos*” came the Kirchner government, and after Spain’s “*no nos representan*” appeared Podemos. We met with John Holloway in the city of Puebla, Mexico, to ask him if, after everything that has happened in the past decade, from the progressive governments of Latin America to Podemos and Syriza in Europe, along with the problems for self-organized practices to exist and multiply, he still thinks that it is possible to “change the world without taking power.” ::::::::::::::::::::::: *Firstly, John, we would like to ask you where the hegemonic idea of revolution in the 20th century comes from, what it is based on. That is, the idea of social change through the taking of power.* I think the central element is labor, understood as wage labor. In other words, alienated or abstract labor. Wage labor has been, and still is, the bedrock of the trade union movement, of the social democratic parties that were its political wing, and also of the communist movements. This concept defined the revolutionary theory of the labor movement: the struggle of wage labor against capital. But its struggle was limited because wage labor is the complement of capital, not its negation. *I don’t understand the relation between this idea of labor and that of revolution through the taking of state power.* One way of understanding the connection would be as follows: if you start off from the definition of labor as wage or alienated labor, you start off from the idea of the workers as victims and objects of the system of domination. And a movement that struggles to improve the living standards of workers (considered as victims and objects) immediately refers to the state. Why? Because the state, due to its very separation from society, is the ideal institution if one seeks to achieve benefits for people. This is the traditional thinking of the labor movement and that of the left governments that currently exist in Latin America. *But this tradition isn’t the only approach to a politics of emancipation…* Of course not. In the last twenty or thirty years we find a great many movements that claim something else: it is possible to emancipate human activity from alienated labor by opening up cracks where one is able to do things differently, to do something that seems useful, necessary, and worthwhile to us; an activity that is not subordinated to the logic of profit. These cracks can be spatial (places where other social relations are generated), temporal (“Here, in this event, for the time that we are together, we are going to do things differently. We are going to open windows onto another world.”), or related to particular activities or resources (for example, cooperatives or activities that pursue a non-market logic with regard to water, software, education, etc.). The world, and each one of us, is full of these cracks. The rejection of alienated and alienating labor entails, at the same time, a critique of the institutional and organizational structures, and the mindset that springs from it. This is how we can explain the rejection of trade unions, parties, and the state that we observe in so many contemporary movements, from the Zapatistas to the Greek or Spanish *indignados*. *But it isn’t a question of the opposition between an old and a new politics, I think. Because what we see in the movements born of the economic crisis is that those two things come to the fore at the same time: cracks such as protests in city squares, and new parties such as Syriza or Podemos.* I think it’s a reflection of the fact that our experience under capitalism is contradictory. We are victims and yet we are not. We seek to improve our living standards as workers, and also to go beyond that, to live differently. In one respect we are, in effect, people who have to sell their labor power in order to survive. But in another, each one of us has dreams, behaviors and projects that don’t fit into the capitalist definition of labor. The difficulty, then as now, lies in envisioning the relation between those two types of movements. How can that relation avoid reproducing the old sectarianism? How can it be a fruitful relation without denying the fundamental differences between the two perspectives? *Argentina in 2001 and 2002, the indignados in Greece and Spain more recently. At a certain point, bottom-up movements stall, they enter a crisis or an impasse, or they vanish. Would you say that the politics of cracks has intrinsic limits in terms of enduring and expanding?* I wouldn’t call them limits, but rather problems. Ten years ago, when I published *Change the World without Taking Power*, the achievements and the power of movements from below were more apparent, whereas now we are more conscious of the problems. The movements you mention are enormously important beacons of hope, but capital continues to exist and it’s getting worse and worse; it progressively entails more misery and destruction. We cannot confine ourselves to singing the praises of movements. That’s not enough. *Could one response then be the option that focuses on the state?* It’s understandable why people want to go in that direction, very understandable. These have been years of ferocious struggles, but capital’s aggression remains unchanged. I sincerely hope that Podemos and Syriza do win the elections, because that would change the current kaleidoscope of social struggles. But I maintain all of my objections with regard to the state option. Any government of this kind entails channeling aspirations and struggles into institutional conduits that, by necessity, force one to seek a conciliation between the anger that these movements express and the reproduction of capital. Because the existence of any government involves promoting the reproduction of capital (by attracting foreign investment, or through some other means), there is no way around it. This inevitably means taking part in the aggression that is capital. It’s what has already happened in Bolivia and Venezuela, and it will also be the problem in Greece or Spain. *Could it be a matter of complementing the movements from below with a movement oriented towards government institutions?* That’s the obvious answer that keeps coming up. But the problem with obvious answers is that they suppress contradictions. Things can’t be reconciled so easily. From above, it may be possible to improve people’s living conditions, but I don’t think one can break with capitalism and generate a different reality. And I sincerely believe that we’re in a situation where there are no long-term solutions for the whole of humanity within capitalism. I’m not discrediting the state option because I myself don’t have an answer to offer, but I don’t think it’s the solution. *Where are you looking for the answer?* Whilst not considering parties of the left as enemies, since for me this is certainly not the case, I would say that the answer has to be thought of in terms of deepening the cracks. If we’re not going to accept the annihilation of humanity, which, to me, seems to be on capitalism’s agenda as a real possibility, then the only alternative is to think that our movements are the birth of another world. We have to keep building cracks and finding ways of recognizing them, strengthening them, expanding them, connecting them; seeking the confluence or, preferably, the commoning of the cracks. If we think in terms of state and elections, we are straying away from that, because Podemos or Syriza can improve things, but they cannot create another world outside the logic of capital. And that’s what this is all about, I think. *Finally, John, how do you see the relation between the two perspectives we’ve been talking about?* We need to keep a constant and respectful debate going without suppressing the differences and the contradictions. I think the basis for a dialogue could be this: no one has the solution. For the moment, we have to recognize that we’re not strong enough to abolish capitalism. By strong, I am referring here to building ways of living that don’t depend on wage labor. To be able to say “I don’t really care whether I have a job or not, because if I don’t have one, I can dedicate my life to other things that interest me and that give me enough sustenance to live decently.” That’s not the case right now. Perhaps we have to build that before we can say “go to hell, capital.” In that sense, let’s bear in mind that a precondition for the French Revolution was that, at a certain point, the social network of bourgeois relations no longer needed the aristocracy in order to exist. Likewise, we must work to reach a point where we can say “we don’t care if global capital isn’t investing in Spain, because we’ve built a mutual support network that’s strong enough to enable us to live with dignity.” Right now the rage against banks is spreading throughout the world. However, I don’t think banks are the problem, but rather the existence of money as a social relation. How should we think about rage against money? I believe this necessarily entails building non-monetized, non-commodified social relations. And there are a great many people dedicated to this effort, whether out of desire, conviction or necessity, even though they may not appear in the newspapers. They’re building other forms of community, of sociality, of thinking about technology and human capabilities in order to create a new life. *John Holloway **is Professor of Sociology at the Institute of Humanities and Social Sciences of the Autonomous University of Puebla in Mexico. His latest book is Crack Capitalism <http://www.plutobooks.com/display.asp?K=9780745330082&> (Pluto Press, 2010)*. _______________________________________________ NetworkedLabour mailing list NetworkedLabour(a)lists.contrast.org http://lists.contrast.org/mailman/listinfo/networkedlabour -- Check out the Commons Transition Plan here at: http://commonstransition.org P2P Foundation: http://p2pfoundation.net - http://blog.p2pfoundation.net <http://lists.ourproject.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/p2p-foundation>Updates: http://twitter.com/mbauwens; http://www.facebook.com/mbauwens #82 on the (En)Rich list: http://enrichlist.org/the-complete-list/

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Fwd: P2P & INOVAÇÃO - Gratitude to the authors
by Michel Bauwens 21 Oct '15

21 Oct '15

---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Revista P2P & Inovação IBICT <p2peinovacao(a)gmail.com> Date: Wed, Oct 21, 2015 at 8:20 PM Subject: P2P & INOVAÇÃO - Gratitude to the authors To: michel(a)p2pfoundation.net Dear Michel Bauwens, The third number of P2P & INOVAÇÃO is already available in: http://revista.ibict.br/ciinf/index.php/p2pinovacao We express our gratitude for your important article. We hope to count with your futures contributions to think the ways of contemporary collaborative productions. Sincerely, Editors -- Check out the Commons Transition Plan here at: http://commonstransition.org P2P Foundation: http://p2pfoundation.net - http://blog.p2pfoundation.net <http://lists.ourproject.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/p2p-foundation>Updates: http://twitter.com/mbauwens; http://www.facebook.com/mbauwens #82 on the (En)Rich list: http://enrichlist.org/the-complete-list/

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Fwd: Free Verge virtual event: See the future of sustainability 10/27 - 29
by Michel Bauwens 21 Oct '15

21 Oct '15

---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: N E <ne_atl(a)onebox.com> Date: Tue, Oct 20, 2015 at 11:01 AM Subject: RE: Free Verge virtual event: See the future of sustainability 10/27 - 29 To: Patricia Diamond <diamondtrisha(a)hotmail.com> Thanks, Trisha. Am passing along to others as well, in case not already seen. - Nurul Patricia Diamond <diamondtrisha(a)hotmail.com> wrote: Sign up - see the bottom you can watch later if you aren't able to join the webinar. [image: Emoji] *Trisha Diamond* ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 20 Oct 2015 11:59:58 -0500 From: hugh(a)greenbiz.com To: diamondtrisha(a)hotmail.com Subject: Free virtual event: See the future of sustainability now [image: GreenBiz Group Inc.] <http://go.greenbiz.com/V5JI000SOb0Y000NT4sZZV0> <http://go.greenbiz.com/kN0GT0V00OZ00JSs5b0X40Y> Register Today <http://go.greenbiz.com/kN0GT0V00OZ00JSs5b0X40Y> VERGE 2015 Virtual *Oct 27-29, 2015 8:30 am - 12:30 pm PDT * Join Joel Makower, along with Twitter co-founder Ev Williams, Tom Steyer, Van Jones, and dozens more for our biggest VERGE Virtual event <http://www.greenbiz.com/events/verge/san-jose/2015/virtual-event> of 2015. This free event will explore how interconnected technologies for energy, buildings and transportation enable radical efficiencies and huge opportunities. During this free event, you'll see: - Illuminating keynotes on the future of sustainability - In-depth case-studies covering *Grid 2.0*, *intelligent supply chains*, *food & ag tech*, *next-gen buildings*, *connected transportation*, *sustainable water systems *and *smart cities*. - Practical sessions to help you understand *critical trends*, and walk away with actionable information. *Even if you can't attend, sign up anyway to get full access to the archive presentation following the event. <http://www.greenbiz.com/events/verge/san-jose/2015/virtual-event>* Learn more <http://go.greenbiz.com/kN0GT0V00OZ00JSs5b0X40Y> about this upcoming virtual event on GreenBiz.com Connect With Us: [image: Twitter] <http://go.greenbiz.com/n0NZ00K00sVT0YJ05b00SP4> [image: LinkedIn] <http://go.greenbiz.com/jsLJ0b0TN00450ZVYS10P00> [image: Facebook] <http://go.greenbiz.com/p0400N0bMY0s02VJST0Z5P0> Send to a Friend <http://go.greenbiz.com/v/x0N0000O0Yb0TVJ0HS4Z5Ys> | Unsubscribe <http://info.greenbiz.com/UnsubscribePage.html?mkt_unsubscribe=1&mkt_tok=3Rk…> GreenBiz Group Inc., 350 Frank Ogawa Plaza Suite 800, Oakland, CA 94612 USA -- Check out the Commons Transition Plan here at: http://commonstransition.org P2P Foundation: http://p2pfoundation.net - http://blog.p2pfoundation.net <http://lists.ourproject.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/p2p-foundation>Updates: http://twitter.com/mbauwens; http://www.facebook.com/mbauwens #82 on the (En)Rich list: http://enrichlist.org/the-complete-list/

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