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New book: Digital Humanism: A Philosophy for 21st Century Digital Society (Christian Fuchs)
by Christian Fuchs 21 Sep '22

21 Sep '22

Fuchs, Christian. 2022. Digital Humanism. A Philosophy for 21st Century Digital Society. SocietyNow Series. Bingley: Emerald. More information and sample reading: https://fuchsc.uti.at/books/digital-humanism/ Our contemporary global digital society is not always a good place to live. Authoritarianism, hatred, false news, post-truth culture, the COVID-19 anti-vaccination movement, COVID-19 conspiracy theories, and political polarisation are organised via the Internet. The public sphere is highly polarised. Today, many humans tend to think of other humans mainly in terms of friends and enemies. Robots and Artificial Intelligence-based automation have created new challenges for the world of work. Decades of neoliberalism have increased inequalities. The COVID-19 pandemic has shown the vulnerability of humanity to viruses and health crises. Humanity and society are in a major crisis and digitalisation mediates this crisis. /Digital Humanism/ explores how Humanism can help us to critically understand how digital technologies shape society and humanity, providing an introduction to Humanism in the digital age. Fuchs introduces the approach of Digital Humanism and outlines foundations of a Radical Digital Humanism, analysing what decolonisation of academia and the study of the digital, media and communication means; what the roles are of robots, automation, and Artificial Intelligence in digital capitalism, and how the communication of death and dying has been mediated by digital technologies, capitalist necropower, and digital capitalism. In order to save humanity and society, we need Radical Digital Humanism now. “Digital Humanism is the book we have been waiting for. … Digital Humanism refuses to transform humans into machines and to think of machines as humans. This is why this book is such an important and timely intervention" Eva Illouz, Director of Studies at EHESS, Paris/ //Table of Contents /Chapter 1. Introduction Chapter 2. What is Humanism? Chapter 3. What is Digital Humanism? Chapter 4. Decolonising Academia: A Radical Humanist Perspective Chapter 5. Robots and Artificial Intelligence (AI) in Digital Capitalism Chapter 6. Policy Discourses on Robots and Artificial Intelligence (AI) in the EU, the USA, and China Chapter 7. Necropower, Death, and Digital Communication in Covid-19 Capitalism Chapter 8. Conclusion

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Fwd: Ending Discrimination Through Unity: The 2022 Counterweight Conference
by Michel Bauwens 18 Sep '22

18 Sep '22

very important conference about the frontiers about the re-emerging inclusionary anti-racism: ---------- Forwarded message --------- From: Steven J. Lawrence from Ground Experience < groundexperience(a)substack.com> Date: Sun, Sep 18, 2022 at 7:16 AM Subject: Ending Discrimination Through Unity: The 2022 Counterweight Conference To: <michelsub2004(a)gmail.com> The Counterweight Conference's contribution to the depolarization movement and my role as conference speaker, recruiter, advisor, and academic affiliate ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ Open in browser <https://substack.com/app-link/post?publication_id=266471&post_id=73773475&u…> Ending Discrimination Through Unity: The 2022 Counterweight Conference <https://substack.com/redirect/2/eyJlIjoiaHR0cHM6Ly9ncm91bmRleHBlcmllbmNlLnN…>The Counterweight Conference's contribution to the depolarization movement and my role as conference speaker, recruiter, advisor, and academic affiliate <https://substack.com/redirect/bbdccbd1-392d-466d-856d-ee462e00e9b0?r=3zjg0> Steven J. Lawrence <https://substack.com/redirect/bbdccbd1-392d-466d-856d-ee462e00e9b0?r=3zjg0> Sep 18 <https://substack.com/app-link/post?publication_id=266471&post_id=73773475&u…> <https://substack.com/app-link/post?publication_id=266471&post_id=73773475&u…> <https://substack.com/redirect/2/eyJlIjoiaHR0cHM6Ly9ncm91bmRleHBlcmllbmNlLnN…> ▷ Listen <https://substack.com/app-link/post?publication_id=266471&post_id=73773475&u…> SAVE <https://substack.com/redirect/2/eyJlIjoiaHR0cHM6Ly9ncm91bmRleHBlcmllbmNlLnN…> On Saturday, September 24 at 10am, Eastern Standard Time, a recording of a talk I gave will be broadcast live during the third day of the Counterweight Conference for Liberal Approaches to Diversity and Inclusion <https://substack.com/redirect/671dc066-5e5b-4354-8553-c7e690f93180?r=3zjg0> followed by a live Q&A with me and the audience. My talk is titled, “Shaping a Workplace Culture: The Fundamentals,” and explores one of the most fundamental attributes of all in a leader who wishes to be authentically influential: the need to acknowledge when they are wrong. To sign up for my specific talk, please click here <https://substack.com/redirect/bc660815-a59a-47f2-b92c-6cf62e0e2139?r=3zjg0>*. <https://substack.com/redirect/bc660815-a59a-47f2-b92c-6cf62e0e2139?r=3zjg0>* All talks are free for everyone during the conference and for 24 hours after the conference. There are other options for those who wish to access the talks after the conference has ended. The conference links I’ve provided above will let people know what the options are and how to proceed. Ground Experience is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Upgrade to paid <https://substack.com/redirect/2/eyJlIjoiaHR0cHM6Ly9ncm91bmRleHBlcmllbmNlLnN…> <https://substack.com/redirect/2eca67bc-8a3e-4d82-adad-8f884c1e534b?r=3zjg0> *Why was I invited to give a talk at the conference?* I’ve known the founder of Counterweight, Helen Pluckrose <https://substack.com/redirect/8f2c1f45-e94e-4a77-bd24-38c233ee3d16?r=3zjg0>, for about seven years now. I was an early supporter of her scholarship and her advocacy for freedom of speech, conscience, thought, and expression from the beginning and especially of her moral courage and unwavering commitment to liberal humanism and the importance of what she calls “evidence-based epistemology <https://substack.com/redirect/58ab65c4-525a-4189-889c-d95a9cd5d341?r=3zjg0>”. As I mentioned in the introduction to “Beyond Cynicism” <https://substack.com/redirect/6bba7af5-a5f4-4c93-8407-525c52c45d8f?r=3zjg0>, Helen Pluckrose asked me to join Counterweight at the beginning of its founding as one of its Academic Affiliates <https://substack.com/redirect/b96a82c8-1731-4dbe-aa9a-56e08c6498fa?r=3zjg0>, alongside others she had asked to join, including Iona Italia <https://substack.com/redirect/de198318-1e33-4e2e-bc11-d1043a077db8?r=3zjg0>, Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, Steven Pinker, Ayaan Hirsi Ali <https://substack.com/redirect/16de3967-d672-43b4-b33c-093045076c85?r=3zjg0>, Erec Smith <https://substack.com/redirect/d1d73b4b-498a-458d-8f65-141c929072b8?r=3zjg0>, Eric Kaufmann, Jonathan Church, Lee Jussim <https://substack.com/redirect/94b959d6-8053-4b8b-b15e-b0988958cae6?r=3zjg0>, Ayishat Akanb <https://substack.com/redirect/972b658d-2ed2-4c1b-bf16-a93cebaff7e8?r=3zjg0>i, Thomas Chatterton Williams <https://substack.com/redirect/996be673-be02-4493-a5fb-0d3656abc204?r=3zjg0>, John McWhorter <https://substack.com/redirect/f7cec234-3801-4b57-8e27-e6eba7761fce?r=3zjg0>, Glenn Loury <https://substack.com/redirect/58c55e6f-8649-4c36-874d-c9a2e4705234?r=3zjg0>, Peter Boghossian, Jennifer Friend <https://substack.com/redirect/f5a84a38-43bd-436e-b9f5-4db696f8ce67?r=3zjg0>, and several others. As an Academic Affiliate, during the first year, I was handed a small caseload in which I advised people who came to Counterweight looking for advice on how to handle difficult situations in their workplaces or communities after extreme identity-based ideologies were formally installed throughout their organizations causing division and open hostility. Throughout this work, my advice has mostly involved providing information about the ideologies themselves and helping the “client” find the right wording to advocate for symmetrical conversations in their workplaces where people can learn to “speaking across” so that they don’t feel they have to “speak out”. But this was hard work, and the organization was getting a lot of distressing messages from people across the English-speaking world, so some of Counterweight’s staff had to take a step back and figure out how to proceed in a universe that was fast becoming ideologically entrenched with almost no end in sight. Helen herself advised me on a Zoom call in the winter of 2021 to step back from my own advocacy for more humane approaches to inclusion in the workplace, saying “I’m afraid, Steven, that America is lost for now.” And she was right. If the detailed description of some of the beliefs and practices laid out in Erec Smith’s Free Black Thought’s Substack piece Six Unsettling Features of DEI in K-12 <https://substack.com/redirect/a5621f67-3bf6-4c44-aa0d-b07f92e9efc9?r=3zjg0> doesn’t offer a chilling enough glimpse into where we are finding ourselves in the current cultural zeitgeist, then hopefully we might be persuaded by the writings of Frances Lee, a self-identified transgender nonbinary Asian “intersectional activist” and cultural studies doctoral candidate, who describes the atmosphere of fear and worry that has emerged in recent years in activist spaces (and activist workplaces) that focus on diversity and inclusion in dehumanizing ways. In “No Justice Without Love: Why Activism Must Be More Generous” <https://substack.com/redirect/d885e184-b62d-45bf-9e27-c826dfea8b86?r=3zjg0>, they write: “After publishing an essay <https://substack.com/redirect/453fa6cd-1e95-4d6d-8546-a5b8ac9f578e?r=3zjg0> in YES! Magazine about this anxiety I received countless letters from readers around the world expressing similar stories. Many of them identified as *former* activists and leftists, having been pushed out of activist spaces for ‘not being radical enough’ or ‘being too privileged.’ Some readers relayed that they wept with relief to read that they weren’t the only ones feeling utterly ostracized… Readers who identified as having privilege expressed feeling turned off by the ways they had to perform unquestioning allyship to marginalized people and respond to the guilt by shrinking themselves into nothingness.” This is something I witnessed as a caseworker for Counterweight and also as a member of a private Heterodox Academy email group for “cancelled'“ professors who have made the smallest of errors that only ran afoul not of any objectively moral code, but of an extreme ideology’s most recently designed orthodoxy. Some of these professors are quite well-known, and more than a few of their cases are in court, with some having settled financially with their institutions for some pretty outrageous acts in the name of high ideals. I have been writing about this topic for a few years now in various places, and most recently on the Ground Experience Substack page in the “All We Are” <https://substack.com/redirect/6bba7af5-a5f4-4c93-8407-525c52c45d8f?r=3zjg0> series of essays. In many ways, what has been emerging in these movements runs counter to the principles I’ve outlined in my website, Support Your Mission <https://substack.com/redirect/075621d5-3482-4062-81df-8ef104fde5ea?r=3zjg0>, which explores what I call the Three Supports for Community and Organizational Development <https://substack.com/redirect/a0e4de99-5707-49e1-ba41-cbfcf46db8d9?r=3zjg0>, which includes building agency <https://substack.com/redirect/fc9ead16-d413-41a0-903f-9dc9acfaac1f?r=3zjg0> in those closest to the action, designing a mission-based environment <https://substack.com/redirect/d3d26f17-c439-4f87-ab58-ab07bbc680e0?r=3zjg0>, and nurturing a culture of inquiry and open exchange <https://substack.com/redirect/ac8eadca-c1de-4168-a9ee-deea6a1e0125?r=3zjg0>. The great majority of DEI trainings today foster a more authoritarian approach which emphasizes ideological conformity and close-minded opposition to all questioning. For a more immersive experience of how these types of atmospheres can manifest in an organization and why it is absolutely crucial for us to find alternative approaches to diversity and inclusion that are more compassionate and empirically based (rather than ideologically based), I highly recommend Benjamin A. Boyce’s documentary series on the 2017 meltdown of Evergreen State College. <https://substack.com/redirect/d885e184-b62d-45bf-9e27-c826dfea8b86?r=3zjg0>*Counterweight Shifts to Depolarization as Central Mission* Fortunately, many of us are learning to adjust to the times and are continuing to evolve in our perspectives and in advocacy. After nurturing the mission for two years and desiring a break from public life, Pluckrose stepped down from Counterweight in 2021, and handed the reigns to a new team of energetic social entrepreneurs <https://substack.com/redirect/30bc2a25-bdb6-43ff-8f2a-ba331d81ae91?r=3zjg0>, Laura Walker-Beaven, Jennifer Friend, and Harriet Terrill. Since this transition, the organization’s mission <https://substack.com/redirect/45084327-5747-4b00-ba99-928acc2c20af?r=3zjg0> has evolved even further, and Counterweight’s main focus now is to discover and promote ways to reduce the political polarization that has been growing in our society, including our political parties, social media spaces, workplaces, and local communities. In the mission statement, Counterweight identifies “political polarization” as “the meta-problem” we must all work collectively to resolve—a mission similar to Braver Angels <https://substack.com/redirect/f314cd3b-598a-48cb-b85b-72c2bf499215?r=3zjg0>, the Foundation Against Intolerance and Racism <https://substack.com/redirect/566b6759-12c0-42da-a9e2-80c081681d8d?r=3zjg0> (F.A.I.R.), the Protopia Lab <https://substack.com/redirect/6386aafc-d62c-40d9-879e-7989a8cb92c1?r=3zjg0>, and others. “Division between different political and ideological factions is making it almost impossible for us to agree not only on the solutions to these problems but on the nature of the problems themselves. In fact, it has even become difficult for us to agree on the nature of reality. This is why at Counterweight, we believe political polarisation is the meta-problem we must resolve so we can protect liberal democracy and ensure we have the capability to address all of the other threats we face.” Although I don’t explicitly address political polarization in my talk at the Counterweight Conference, I do talk about an important “fundamental” that I believe can contribute to depolarization on any scale: humility and “the willingness to be wrong” in front of others. In the talk, I made the choice to speak plainly in a less academic way, noting that I wanted to leave the more complex ideas and higher-level conceptualizing to the other presenters, as many of their ideas are a direct influence on my own, and I wanted them to speak for themselves. In fact two of the presenters I personally recruited for the conference have had a direct influence on my own thinking around racial depolarization: George Yancey and Christine Louis Dit Sully. This summer, I had just read both of their recent books, Yancey’s “Beyond Racial Division” <https://substack.com/redirect/989ac01a-8dd4-4f6d-99f6-2b08075cfa62?r=3zjg0> and Dit Sully’s “Transcending Racial Divisions” <https://substack.com/redirect/bcdf9bb3-7720-4d36-b09d-7002132bcf2d?r=3zjg0>. I found both of their books very useful for different reasons. Yancey’s book offers a much-needed “middle path” that doesn’t reject the very real challenges faced by people of color in Western societies (which Yancey calls the colorblind approach) or over-indulge in hatred, hostility, and identity-based separateness (which is deftly called ideological antiracism). And Dit Sully’s book offers a well-researched intricate journey into the history of racialism, race theories and their damaging impact on societies in the past and present. In fact, I was so inspired by these writings that I recruited both of them to present at the Counterweight Conference. To my great delight, the conferences organizers accepted their late entries into the conference lineup, and at the time of this writing they both informed me that they have completed the recording of their talks. <https://substack.com/redirect/6e19de45-853e-4f6e-b2cf-7e359f8c78dd?r=3zjg0> *How the Depolarization Movement Is Influencing My Work at a Minority Serving Institution* The writings of George Yancey, Christine Louis Dit Sully, and the writings of others at the conference, including Erec Smith, Angel Eduardo, Ian Rowe, Roland Fryer, Greg Thomas have provided much-needed inspiration for me in my work at a college that serves mostly underserved populations. As the chair of the Faculty Development Committee at the Benjamin Franklin Cummings Institute of Technology <https://substack.com/redirect/04edb3f6-5129-4e82-b50e-fd9b6519db6f?r=3zjg0>, I’ve been charged with the responsibility to help organize trainings around diversity and inclusion, and workshops around teaching strategies that can increase access to learning for students with disabilities. Additionally, I have been working with a specialist in trauma on a series of workshops on the creation of trauma-informed environments. So, inclusion and empathy for human beings is on the very top of my list of priorities in my professional life. Thus, a conference like this one could not have been better timed. It’s quite fascinating to be teaching and leading committees at a college that was founded by Benjamin Franklin. Franklin, one of the most famous Founding Fathers and one of only six people who signed both the Declaration of Independence and the United States Constitution bequeathed a sizable sum of his inheritance to the City of Boston to create a technology institute for working tradesmen. With matching funds from Andrew Carnegie and the implementation of a sophisticated investment scheme that Franklin imposed upon the endowment, the Benjamin Franklin Institute of Technology was founded in 1908. It’s important to acknowledge that at the time he created this endowment, Franklin stipulated that it was white workers who would be the beneficiaries of his estate. And now, nearly a century and a quarter after its founding, this very same institute is not only led by the first Black woman president in its history <https://substack.com/redirect/f9522c4e-1eb8-463f-9e08-9a75ed24e5f3?r=3zjg0> but serves more than 74 per cent students of color—and is officially designated by the U.S. Office of Civil Rights as a Minority Serving Institution (MSI) <https://substack.com/redirect/395758c7-d527-4a32-be2d-6b0829f2a123?r=3zjg0> . In a sense, we have an opportunity at the college to honor both the traditionally celebrated way-showers from our country’s history (in this case the legacy of Benjamin Franklin, a person of European-American origin) and to forge a path forward <https://substack.com/redirect/ff7ab850-a44f-4f8a-a050-e49a4ece2584?r=3zjg0> for Black and brown workers and industry pioneers in the multiple and greatly-diversifying fields of technology that Franklin himself could not have dreamed of. Thus, we have an opportunity at the college to honor both past and future legacies by experimenting with high-resolution, productive, fair, and even healing approaches to increasing the diversity of the workforce and building an inclusive environment on the scale of the college, the city it serves, and even entire fields of technology. And that’s what the Counterweight Conference was created for. *Details About the Counterweight Conference* The conference is an international virtual gathering of educators, scholars, thought leaders, public policy advocates, social workers, and human rights activists who are working to forge a new, more productive path for building a fair and inclusive society, which includes pathways for building fair and inclusive workplaces. In the press release announcing the event, the organizers of the conference describe the surrounding circumstances that have made such a conference necessary: “In the past few years, companies and employees have felt increasing pressure to engage with D&I initiative. Some programmes offer useful insights into how we can create more inclusive workplaces. Too often, though, the ways in which people approach D&I come from ideological foundations that are divisive and sectarian in nature. In addition to this, companies continue to spend large sums of money on D&I trainings that simply aren't effective <https://substack.com/redirect/18703925-5001-47c1-933c-e748b3063e76?r=3zjg0>. At Counterweight, we think that D&I is important, but we worry that these ideological and identitarian approaches flatten us as individuals, stripping us of our complexity and nuance. So, we started asking a lot of questions… In light of these developments, they further ask: - *What would a liberal approach to D&I look like? * - *How can we tackle discrimination and racism through a unifying lens? Do these approaches already exist? * - *Is there a more unifying way to tackle discrimination and racism than the divisive tactics of many mainstream D&I programmes?* These are very good questions. As I have already explored in my essay on the dangers of divisive and ideology-based diversity and inclusion trainings <https://substack.com/redirect/764c6e5e-078a-4679-ae05-b700062de048?r=3zjg0>, there are many negative consequences for the bottom line of the organization’s mission and for the relationships that we count on to deliver the services that the organization was set up for. This is true for just about every type of organization, whether it is for-profit or non-profit, which is why we need to find alternative models. The alternative models presented by the many speakers at the conference all fall under the larger umbrella of what Counterweight is calling “liberal democracy”. It’s important to note that Counterweight is a British non-profit, and so some of the terminology (and spelling!) will be British in flavor. It’s for this reason that I mentioned during my interview with Lauren Walker-Beaven that she might want to add a brief description of the word “liberal” which has a different meaning for Americans and perhaps other English-speaking countries. Here is what they came up with for the conference description page <https://substack.com/redirect/671dc066-5e5b-4354-8553-c7e690f93180?r=3zjg0> : We use the term 'liberal' to refer to all that is aligned with liberalism, rather than the newer US-meaning of the term connoting left-wing politics. Counterweight is a non-partisan organisation that believes that the binaries of left and right wing politics do little to help the polarised, sectarian world we now find ourselves in. We believe that universal liberal values such as tolerance, critical thinking, individualism and freedom are key to eliminating discrimination and racism. Find out more about Counterweight's mission and values here <https://substack.com/redirect/a1576de4-298c-4bc8-a65f-81bba3bdeda6?r=3zjg0> ! These are values I can get behind, and I’m honored to have been invited. If any readers are interested in seeing my talk, please click on *this link <https://substack.com/redirect/bc660815-a59a-47f2-b92c-6cf62e0e2139?r=3zjg0>*. The talk is taking place at 3pm Eastern Daylight Time (EDT). Hope to see you all there. *More Information about the Conference* Below is some more information about the conference. <https://substack.com/redirect/0d5cfada-f044-4af7-8aa9-ee6ecc52e7f2?r=3zjg0> *CONFERENCE PRESENTERS:* Jennifer Richmond, Laura Walker-Beaven, Harriet, Terril, Ian Rowe, Eric Kaufmann, Winkfield Twyman, Amiel Handelsman, Will Reusch, Mike Bowen, Wenyuan Wu, Joe Nalvan, Beth Feeley, Mike Yates, Jake Mackey & Mike Major, Isobel Marston & James E. Petts, Angel Eduardo, Ellie Avishai, Val Thomas, Erec S Smith, Rio Veradonir, Brandi Shufutinsky, Sheena Mason, Dina McMillan, Greg Thomas <https://substack.com/redirect/8e392e1b-b8cb-4586-b646-58c4917ac3f0?r=3zjg0>, Jonathan Church & Kai Whiting, Zara Qureshi, Ye Zhang Pogue, Zander Geig, Mike Yates, Christine Louis, Dit Sully, Mark Palmer, George Yancey, Lyell Asher, Steven J. Lawrence, Amna Khalid & Jeff Snyder, Simon Fanshawe, Jason Littlefield, and Roland Fryer. PRIMARY SPONSORS: Free Black Thought, National Association of Scholars, Foundation Against Intolerance and Racism, Institute for Liberal Values, Jewish Institute for Liberal Values *Counterweight Conference Press Release**Tackling discrimination through unity:**The Counterweight Conference on Liberal Approaches to Diversity and Inclusion* cw.heysummit.com <https://substack.com/redirect/287c89b8-4462-41fd-a31e-b6694c9c404c?r=3zjg0> >From the 22nd-25th September, Counterweight will be hosting the online Counterweight Conference on Liberal Approaches to Diversity and Inclusion, featuring pre-recorded talks from over 40 experts. In the past few years, companies and employees have felt increasing pressure to engage with D&I initiative. Some programmes offer useful insights into how we can create more inclusive workplaces. Too often, though, the ways in which people approach D&I come from ideological foundations that are divisive and sectarian in nature. In addition to this, companies continue to spend large sums of money on D&I trainings that simply aren't effective <https://substack.com/redirect/18703925-5001-47c1-933c-e748b3063e76?r=3zjg0>. At Counterweight, we think that D&I is important, but we worry that these ideological and identitarian approaches flatten us as individuals, stripping us of our complexity and nuance. So, we started asking a lot of questions… What would a liberal approach to D&I look like? How can we tackle discrimination and racism through a unifying lens? Do these approaches already exist? Is there a more unifying way to tackle discrimination and racism than the divisive tactics of many mainstream D&I programmes? Throughout the conference, we'll hear from experts in the field of D&I who can answer some of these questions. We hope that you'll come away with an understanding of how important D&I is and how we can approach it in a way that values unity, critical thinking and liberalism. We believe that D&I is for everyone: individuals, small businesses, community groups, NGOs or big companies alike. For this reason, we will be making the event available for free (for a limited period of time). All-access passes to the event are available for £50. Get your tickets here: https://cw.heysummit.com Ground Experience is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Upgrade to paid <https://substack.com/redirect/2/eyJlIjoiaHR0cHM6Ly9ncm91bmRleHBlcmllbmNlLnN…> Like <https://substack.com/app-link/post?publication_id=266471&post_id=73773475&u…> [image: Comment]Comment <https://substack.com/app-link/post?publication_id=266471&post_id=73773475&u…> [image: Share]Share <https://substack.com/redirect/2/eyJlIjoiaHR0cHM6Ly9ncm91bmRleHBlcmllbmNlLnN…> You’re a free subscriber to Ground Experience <https://substack.com/redirect/bd041bc2-db94-45a1-a309-6f2fe25ff017?r=3zjg0>. For the full experience, become a paid subscriber. <https://substack.com/redirect/2/eyJlIjoiaHR0cHM6Ly9ncm91bmRleHBlcmllbmNlLnN…> Subscribe <https://substack.com/redirect/2/eyJlIjoiaHR0cHM6Ly9ncm91bmRleHBlcmllbmNlLnN…> © 2022 Steven J. Lawrence 548 Market Street PMB 72296, San Francisco, CA 94104 Unsubscribe <https://substack.com/redirect/2/eyJlIjoiaHR0cHM6Ly9ncm91bmRleHBlcmllbmNlLnN…> [image: Get the app] <https://substack.com/redirect/f234a5b5-d13f-41e2-a20a-670a4877ba8a?r=3zjg0>[image: Start writing] <https://substack.com/redirect/cdfddfb3-ddca-49b0-a6e2-7d85d6a7adfd?r=3zjg0> -- P2P Foundation: http://wiki.p2pfoundation.net <http://p2pfoundation.net> - http://blog.p2pfoundation.net Discuss: http://lists.ourproject.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/p2p-foundation Updates: ; http://twitter.com/mbauwens; http://www.facebook.com/mbauwens Curation of news on p2p/commons developments: https://www.facebook.com/groups/p2p.open/

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Fwd: Invitation lecture Michel Bauwens - 'The role of the commons in the decline and rebirth of societies'
by Michel Bauwens 02 Sep '22

02 Sep '22

Dear all, After 2.5 years at home, studying macrohistory to deepen my understanding of the commons, it seems interest is re-igniting now that the pandemic fears and the effects of its related public policies have largely subsided. I am off for 3 trips this fall, the first one this September will bring me to Sweden (upsala) belgium (ghent, brussels) and France (Finistere,Paris), the 2nd one in Lisbon and Barcelona and the 3rd is under construction but will certainly stop in Antwerp, Belgium. Below is an invitation for 19 september in Ghent, see the pdf for the description, You can register here: https://forms.office.com/pages/responsepage.aspx?id=3hyB1-_sbEmPkaF4YkG5nCf… Summary: THE ROLE OF THE COMMONS IN THE DECLINE AND REBIRTH OF SOCIETIES HOW PEER TO PEER COOPERATION CAN CONTRIBUTE TO SUSTAINABILITY TRANSITIONS CENTRE FOR SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT Lecture by Michel Bauwens – Ghent – Monday 19th of September 2022 – 15:00-17:00 ABSTRACT Most people would look at the history of human civilization as an evolving relation between market and state forms, and modern political struggles have essentially been a battle for supremacy between these two institutional powers. But there is a third, forgotten institution that has played a vital role in revitalizing and regenerating societies in decline and environmental overshoot: the institution of the commons. After centuries of decline, since the last decennium of the previous millennium, the commons have made a comeback. First through the emergence of digital open source communities, then through a tenfold increase in the number of urban commons since the crisis of 2008, and more recently, through the emergence of 'cosmo-local' productive communities which combine a relocalisation of physical production with global coordination of knowledge. If the current world situation can be read as a struggle between the market- dominated model of western capitalism, and the state-dominated model of the Eurasian axis, then the cosmo-local can be seen as a commons-centric alternative, based on the creation of new global commons institutions that are linked with a smart localization of production for human need. In this lecture, we will also look at the history of how human modes of consciousness have reacted to geo- climactic challenges, and what kind of educational institutions we could re-imagine to accompany such deep changes in human perception and action.

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Re-igniting the p2p revolution (\0xDynamite)
by Michel Bauwens 02 Sep '22

02 Sep '22

Thanks for the update. The list may be dead, but p2p and commons initiatives are still growing. In terms of technical alternatives, there seems quite a bit available and many people have left mainstream social media, think of Urbit for the libertarians, Mastodon, etc ... Urban commons have grown tenfold from 2006 to 2016, and the organizations I work more closely with, are all growing at a brisk pace, I think what has derailed some of the momentum is the polarisation in the political and social movements, with various tribes going their own way, using their own politically filtered platforms, with technical centralization replaced by distributed moral censorship for the ideas of the competing tribes. Michel O > > Today's Topics: > > 1. Re-igniting the p2p revolution (\0xDynamite) > > > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- > > Message: 1 > Date: Wed, 31 Aug 2022 18:47:32 -0700 > From: "\\0xDynamite" <dreamingforward(a)gmail.com> > To: P2P Foundation mailing list <p2p-foundation(a)lists.ourproject.org> > Subject: [P2P-F] Re-igniting the p2p revolution > Message-ID: > < > CAMjeLr9RJZrhqQKaCBCTxfAtkazmdFFfCmti0GSuAm5eQ4TRVQ(a)mail.gmail.com> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset="UTF-8" > > This list is dead. Either people didn't fully understand the > potential of p2p networks or the need for it got magically sublimated > into everyday capitalism. Nah. > > But what happened to the revolution? Where are the nerds and > cyberpunks who wished to change the world? Have they assimilated with > their billion-dollar IPO jobs and climbing the new curve of > exponential growth? > > The Internet under the standard client-server model has turned > everyone, one again, into consumers. The curve of GDP has gotten > higher with its new access to these elite tools. But it's a sinking > ship. Everyone knows this, deep down. > > An adult's cellular network generally becomes hierarchical with some > sort of strict immune system code at the top, holding dominant beliefs > about the world forming a sort of religious order which is called > their "ego". People come to identify with this and protect it. > > A child's cellular network acts more like a p2p network -- each is > equal in a mind that has no religion. The attitude is "whatever > works" and, internally, "whoever can do the job". Everyone else will > protect themselves -- you don't need hierarchies of security, > political correctness, or whatever new religion the world is > demanding. > > Be like the child. > > Mark Janssen > > PS. http://github.com/thePastor/Singularity > > > > > ------------------------------ > > Subject: Digest Footer > > _______________________________________________ > P2P-Foundation mailing list > P2P-Foundation(a)lists.ourproject.org > https://lists.ourproject.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/p2p-foundation > > > ------------------------------ > > End of P2P-Foundation Digest, Vol 136, Issue 1 > ********************************************** > -- P2P Foundation: http://wiki.p2pfoundation.net <http://p2pfoundation.net> - http://blog.p2pfoundation.net Discuss: http://lists.ourproject.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/p2p-foundation Updates: ; http://twitter.com/mbauwens; http://www.facebook.com/mbauwens Curation of news on p2p/commons developments: https://www.facebook.com/groups/p2p.open/

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Re-igniting the p2p revolution
by \0xDynamite 01 Sep '22

01 Sep '22

This list is dead. Either people didn't fully understand the potential of p2p networks or the need for it got magically sublimated into everyday capitalism. Nah. But what happened to the revolution? Where are the nerds and cyberpunks who wished to change the world? Have they assimilated with their billion-dollar IPO jobs and climbing the new curve of exponential growth? The Internet under the standard client-server model has turned everyone, one again, into consumers. The curve of GDP has gotten higher with its new access to these elite tools. But it's a sinking ship. Everyone knows this, deep down. An adult's cellular network generally becomes hierarchical with some sort of strict immune system code at the top, holding dominant beliefs about the world forming a sort of religious order which is called their "ego". People come to identify with this and protect it. A child's cellular network acts more like a p2p network -- each is equal in a mind that has no religion. The attitude is "whatever works" and, internally, "whoever can do the job". Everyone else will protect themselves -- you don't need hierarchies of security, political correctness, or whatever new religion the world is demanding. Be like the child. Mark Janssen PS. http://github.com/thePastor/Singularity

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La «monnaie volontaire», un outil pour restaurer le bien commun - Le Soir
by Dante Monson 29 Mar '22

29 Mar '22

#MMT Note: my understanding is that it would not be that different than monetary macroeconomics in a war economy, and basically the approach of central banks in many asian countries including Japan till the early 90ies https://www.lesoir.be/431923/article/2022-03-23/la-monnaie-volontaire-un-ou… Excerpted : Restaurer le bien commun D’une certaine manière, les mesures non conventionnelles mises en œuvre par les banques centrales ces dernières années pour répondre à la crise financière puis sanitaire ont ouvert la voie à cette « monnaie volontaire », à ceci près qu’elles l’ont été pour sauver le monde d’hier, celui d’un capitalisme financier écologiquement et socialement mortifère. Il reste donc à tourner le pouvoir monétaire des banques centrales vers le monde de demain et la restauration du bien commun. Pour ce faire, la banque centrale devrait être autorisée, moyennant force contrôles démocratiques et respect de conditions économiques, à financer la volonté politique par des dons monétaires ou des prêts perpétuels sans intérêt. C’est là ce que nous appelons « la monnaie volontaire », une émission monétaire de la banque centrale, n’exigeant de son bénéficiaire ni remboursement ni titre à vendre mais uniquement l’accomplissement de l’action ainsi financée. Elle serait ainsi mise au service du bien commun, octroyant des moyens budgétaires complémentaires aux autorités publiques pour leur permettre de réaliser leur volonté politique et, le cas échéant, afin de favoriser la résilience des territoires, les dons de monnaie volontaire pourraient être convertis et libérés en monnaie régionale. La monnaie volontaire rendrait possible des plans ambitieux de réindustrialisation, de réorientation énergétique, de restauration des services publics, que les États n’engageront pas s’ils doivent pour cela continuer de s’endetter sur les marchés financiers.

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just fyi, where I am at in march 2022, four years after the blacklisting by identitarians
by Michel Bauwens 16 Mar '22

16 Mar '22

Just a little note of 'where I am at' and 'where I am going', potentially, and what it means for this forum. (refers to the p2p forum on fb) A brief recall: after 20 years of activism, establishing an observatory, a theory, and a network to observe and understand the current transition, based on the hypothesis we need to move towards a commons-centric societal order, I got cancelled and blacklisted after a conflict with the identity 'left' in August 2018. This was for me, an important crisis moment, as I could not reconcile myself with where the 'left' was evolving to. It was either embracing the neo-racial and segregationist theories, denying their reality, or ignoring their danger. For me, it was a story of identity crisis, since it was a huge part of my own identity, but also stories of personal betrayal etc... I had to take stock ... which pretty much coincided with the emerging COVID crisis. I decided to restudy, first of all, all the intellectual traditions that I had ignored; secondly, going back to a deeper understanding of transitions, while also imperatively having to understand where this degeneration of emancipatory thought (if you can call it thought), came from. As I was engaging with this new quest, helped by the time freed by the blacklisting, and the COVID isolation, I discovered the work of John David Ebert and the thread of civilizational analysis. But I was rather passive in terms of new production, the reason being I had less confidence, since I had a lot more questions than answers. But, last weekend emerged some type of new integration in my framing of the past , present and future of humankind. So I expect to be more active again. But this may have some consequences on my curation. It <is> very time consuming. What I have noticed is the following: 1) the 'liberal' (US meaning) is becoming more and more hostile to pluralism and more and more authoritarian and suppressive towards free and dissident thought, pushing for censorship and even war; 2) while this forum is quite active, the others I maintain are less so; to be precise, there is a lot of sharing going on, perhaps 10 times more than in 2018, but in terms of reaction, no, and I am starting to feel it is a waste of time. The problem is that I have to choose between deep thought, and the more superficial short-term web curation, which takes 4-5 hours of my time every day. But here is also a more strategic issue, we need something new, something that I would call provisionally 'integral commoning'. What I mean is that we can no longer stay within partisan tribalisms, but need to create groups of people willing to thinking freely and creatively across boundaries, looking for what is useful and good in all traditions, from premodern, modern, postmodern to what I would call transmodern. A movement which stresses the need for reasonable social distribution, ecological balance, but at the same time protects civil rights and pluralism, while making no compromise at all with the new racial hierarchism. While the conservative side is now the side protecting civil rights and legal equality, it is still failing to come to grasp with the problems around the increasing inequalities and ecological crises. So we need to build something new. I am only interested in working with people who support civil rights, human equality, while being sensitive to the social and ecological crisis, AND, have a measure of realism about the human condition. We cannot afford to be Rousseau-ists right now, we need to think about power and property, alliances, and recognize the huge failings of the human conditions, including the ones in ourselves. It is also by recognizing our own projections, i.e. seeing evil outside ourselves and scapegoating it, that we can hope to improve the conditions of our interconnected world. So, I'll stop here, but if you see some changes in my curation approach, that is the reason, I will push more forcefully against the degeneration of emancipatory thought, which next to destructive effects of unmanaged capitalist growth, is the real and present danger humanity is facing, since it is destroying the opposition to what is going wrong. -- P2P Foundation: http://wiki.p2pfoundation.net <http://p2pfoundation.net> - http://blog.p2pfoundation.net Discuss: http://lists.ourproject.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/p2p-foundation Updates: ; http://twitter.com/mbauwens; http://www.facebook.com/mbauwens Curation of news on p2p/commons developments: https://www.facebook.com/groups/p2p.open/

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Watch "Les nouveaux pauvres : quand travailler ne suffit plus | ARTE" on YouTube
by Dante Monson 23 Feb '22

23 Feb '22

https://youtu.be/NEdr5gc4UNU " Victimes du chômage ou condamnés aux petits boulots, un tiers des Européens, actifs et retraités, vivent dans une insécurité économique croissante. Le tableau édifiant d'une société au bord du précipice. " https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emploi_atypique " Un *emploi atypique* est un euphémisme <https://fr.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euph%C3%A9misme> utilisé pour décrire une situation d’emploi précaire <https://fr.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Travail_pr%C3%A9caire>: à temps partiel <https://fr.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Travail_%C3%A0_temps_partiel>, sans possibilité de carrière, temporaire <https://fr.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Int%C3%A9rim_%28travail%29>, autonome à compte propre <https://fr.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Entreprise_individuelle>, ou en cumul d’emplois "

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Fwd: 📄 "Cosmolocalism: Understanding the Transitional Dynamics towards Post-Capitalism" by Alexandros Schismenos
by Michel Bauwens 13 Jan '22

13 Jan '22

---------- Forwarded message --------- From: PDF By Alexandros Schismenos <updates(a)academia-mail.com> Date: Thu, Jan 13, 2022 at 11:00 AM Subject: 📄 "Cosmolocalism: Understanding the Transitional Dynamics towards Post-Capitalism" by Alexandros Schismenos To: <michel(a)p2pfoundation.net> [image: Academia.edu] <https://www.academia.edu/t/DGkU-P5Y3rjH-yZhPR/> ------------------------------ You wrote the paper A Commons-Based Peer To Peer Path to Post-Capitalism : An Interview with <https://www.academia.edu/keypass/UFl5WWV3ZjZFZVFqbDhxZUFlVXFjZWlseExlajJUZj…>. A related paper is available on Academia. Cosmolocalism: Understanding the Transitional Dynamics towards Post-Capitalism <https://www.academia.edu/keypass/SS81cml2VFFLU3JEMm9ZRk1wTUF1eXVhcTNubkpPWX…> [image: Paper Thumbnail] <https://www.academia.edu/keypass/SS81cml2VFFLU3JEMm9ZRk1wTUF1eXVhcTNubkpPWX…> [image: Author Photo] Alexandros Schismenos <https://auth.academia.edu/keypass/SS81cml2VFFLU3JEMm9ZRk1wTUF1eXVhcTNubkpPW…> 2020, Triple-C 62 Views View PDF ▸ <https://www.academia.edu/keypass/SS81cml2VFFLU3JEMm9ZRk1wTUF1eXVhcTNubkpPWX…> Download PDF ⬇ <https://www.academia.edu/keypass/SS81cml2VFFLU3JEMm9ZRk1wTUF1eXVhcTNubkpPWX…> ABSTRACT Over the last decades, the proliferation of ICTs and capitalist markets has created a new social-historical reality for communication, production and societal organisation, while social inequality has deepened. In this context, alternative forms of organisation based on the commons have emerged, challenging the core... read more... <https://www.academia.edu/keypass/SS81cml2VFFLU3JEMm9ZRk1wTUF1eXVhcTNubkpPWX…> Your recent reading history: Artificial General Intelligence and Creative Economy <https://www.academia.edu/keypass/SS81cml2VFFLU3JEMm9ZRk1wTUF1eXVhcTNubkpPWX…> - Konstantinos I Kotis Beyond Modernism and Postmodernism: The Narrative of Re-embodiments, <https://www.academia.edu/keypass/SS81cml2VFFLU3JEMm9ZRk1wTUF1eXVhcTNubkpPWX…> - Arran Gare Paradoxical empowerment of <https://www.academia.edu/keypass/SS81cml2VFFLU3JEMm9ZRk1wTUF1eXVhcTNubkpPWX…> - Serge Proulx Reflections on the Reflexive Universe <https://www.academia.edu/keypass/SS81cml2VFFLU3JEMm9ZRk1wTUF1eXVhcTNubkpPWX…> - Seth Miller The Commodification of the Couch: A Dialectical Analysis of Hospitality Exchange Networks <https://www.academia.edu/keypass/SS81cml2VFFLU3JEMm9ZRk1wTUF1eXVhcTNubkpPWX…> - Simon Schöpf Metapolitics of the Noosphere <https://www.academia.edu/keypass/SS81cml2VFFLU3JEMm9ZRk1wTUF1eXVhcTNubkpPWX…> - Dr. William Irwin Thompson Design for Sustainable Communities – An Integral Perspective <https://www.academia.edu/keypass/SS81cml2VFFLU3JEMm9ZRk1wTUF1eXVhcTNubkpPWX…> - Paul Cohen Conflicts in common(s) ? Radical Democracy and the Governance of the Commons. <https://www.academia.edu/keypass/SS81cml2VFFLU3JEMm9ZRk1wTUF1eXVhcTNubkpPWX…> - Martin Deleixhe Commons Against Capitalism (2015) <https://www.academia.edu/keypass/SS81cml2VFFLU3JEMm9ZRk1wTUF1eXVhcTNubkpPWX…> - Tero Toivanen Who is the author? Sampling/remixing/open source <https://www.academia.edu/keypass/SS81cml2VFFLU3JEMm9ZRk1wTUF1eXVhcTNubkpPWX…> - Lev Manovich Want fewer recommendations like this one? <https://academia.edu/keypass/SS81cml2VFFLU3JEMm9ZRk1wTUF1eXVhcTNubkpPWXV0Zj…> ------------------------------ <https://academia.app.link/install?keypass=SS81cml2VFFLU3JEMm9ZRk1wTUF1eXVhc…> 580 California St., Suite 400, San Francisco, CA, 94104 Unsubscribe <https://academia.edu/keypass/SS81cml2VFFLU3JEMm9ZRk1wTUF1eXVhcTNubkpPWXV0Zj…> Privacy Policy <https://www.academia.edu/t/DGkU-P5Y3rjH-yZhPR/privacy> Terms of Service <https://www.academia.edu/t/DGkU-P5Y3rjH-yZhPR/terms> © 2022 Academia -- 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: Technology and the Future (GTN Discussions)
by Michel Bauwens 04 Jan '22

04 Jan '22

---------- Forwarded message --------- From: Great Transition Network <gtnetwork(a)greattransition.org> Date: Mon, Jan 3, 2022 at 11:28 PM Subject: Technology and the Future (GTN Discussions) To: Great Transition Network <gtnmembers(a)greattransition.org> >From Pierre Calame [p.calame(a)fph.ch] ---------------------------------------------------------- [Moderator's Note: The last day for comments is TODAY: MONDAY, JANUARY 3. Looking forward to your contributions! - JC] I fully agree with the analysis of Michel Bauwens. Blockchain technology applied to specific ledgers is not per se energy-intensive. There is actually a first crucial application of it: the ecological footprint of global supply chains. Such ledgers are essential for creating the accounting system of carbon dioxide equivalent individual quotas, which are the logical consequence of an obligation to fight global warming. You can find the description or the system at: blog.pierre-calame.fr/public/quotas_carbone_EN.pdf . In my opinion, pushing for the international endorsement of such a system should even be a crucial priority for GTI. Yours, Pierre Pierre Calame **************************************************** Le 30/12/2021 à 19:43, Great Transition Network a écrit : >From Michel Bauwens [michelsub2004(a)gmail.com] ------------------------------ Great Transition Initiative: Filling in the Commons Gap Michel Bauwens Whether we believe that technology itself has its own determinism or that it is shaped by material interests, there is always a residue of human agency to transform technological tools in the service of social change. This is what we propose to do here with perhaps the most unlikely candidate: the bitcoin-generated blockchain. Our contention is that the blockchain can be used as an essential tool to construct the next cyber-physical infrastructure that will allow humanity to produce for its own needs, while respecting the material and ecological planetary boundaries, and its interdependency with the web of life. Bitcoin is the recipient of many legitimate critiques by progressives. It was designed with Austrian economics and anarcho-capitalist values in mind, is very energy-intensive in its production, and has a very unequal distribution in terms of income and property, a distribution that is not accidental in view of the ‘oligarchic protocols’ that it has chosen as incentives for its stakeholders. [1] But is it important to distinguish the existence of a global distributed ledger, i.e., an open and interoperable accounting and logistical system that can be used to coordinate production on a global scale, from its first iteration as the ledger of Bitcoin. We now have different post-blockchain distributed ledgers that attest to this, and a number of these ledger projects are operated not according to libertarian values and rules, but by integrating the insights of Elinor Ostrom. [2] The question to answer is the following: what becomes possible once we have such technology at our disposal? My contention is that an interoperable blockchain becomes the vehicle for global mutual coordination of human production within planetary boundaries. A ledger is first and most an accounting tool, recording transactions. This is obviously not trivial: the first accounting systems in Sumer, with temple administrations recording the flow of grain and debts, stand for the origins of the state apparatuses; the double entry accounting system for private competitive units created by a Franciscan monk Luca Pacioli in the Italian city-states stood for the emergence of private forms of capitalism which would eventually become dominant. Blockchain ledgers have currently inaugurated various forms of post-capitalist accounting which seem to be just as non-trivial: • Contributory accounting, which can record, value, and recompense non-commodified forms of contributions to ecosystems and networks, already signify the recognition of value outside the commodity form; it is a crucial tool signifying a transition to contributory regimes of value [3] • Flow accounting, such as the Resource-Events-Agents software, allows every transaction to be recorded as an event in a network, and has abandoned double entry; it is an accounting for externality-aware ecosystems, not externality-ignoring closed entities. • Thermodynamic accounting directly records the flow of matter and energy into an accounting system, such as the systems pioneered by R30.org and the Global Commons Alliance, who use a ‘global thresholds and allocations’ approach to determine the maximum allowed flow in particular contexts. These ledgers are linked to tokens and intelligent current-sees which can allow for expanded and complex value regimes. [4] We now have access to local currencies, which can protect and regulate local economies and domain-specific intelligent monies such as SolarCoin generated by renewable energy or FishCoin which regulates the maximum volumes for the fishing industry. Local-geographic currencies, domain-specific virtual currencies, and transformed nation-state currencies can co-exist in a regime of monetary biodiversity that is both socially aware, ecologically aware, and a global regulatory currency that insures the economy stays within agreed upon ecological limits. With these tools at hand, integrated in a cosmo-global cooperative ledger, it becomes possible to transcend the violent competition between economic coordination systems that plagued the twentieth century. Here is what is envisageable: - The primary layer of human cooperation becomes ‘stigmergy’, the gift of the commons economy that has been operating successfully within the open-source economy for two dozen years by now: open and transparent systems allow participating producers to freely coordinate their work in view of the needs and possibilities of the ecosystem as a whole, without needing central command. Collective agreements then result from negotiated coordination. The agents of this are the contributive communities, and the for-benefit associations that maintain their infrastructure of cooperation. In this particular context, the blockchain economy is best seen as an extension of this movement: it enables the creation of open and global coordination systems, in which a substantial amount of the income is devoted to paying open-source developers. - The secondary layer consists of the generative market exchange mechanisms, post-capitalist market forms that regulate genuine exchange, within planetary limits; this is necessary for the flow of all the resources that need investment and need to be renewed. The agents for this are generative and cooperative market entities that add value to the commons economy. Commons Stack, focusing on commons regulations, and RadicalXchange, focusing on the creation of generative market systems, are among the initiatives dedicated to this. - The third layer is the planning layer. This is where thermodynamic accounting systems come in, by rendering visible the flows of matter and energy in a economic system, and where the ruleset of ‘global thresholds and allocations’, allows for context-specific ‘maximums.’ Of course, to a sceptic, the description so far will sound utopian. What could be the agent of sufficient change that would lead to the adoption of such a global infrastructure? Our answer is that the commoners are the agents of such a change, following cosmo-local models, which we see as the ‘third possible future’ for humankind. [5] The first future is the continuation of multicultural neoliberalism, from now on under the hegemony of the Successor Ideology, as proposed by the World Economic Forum. [6] It is a world run by public-private partnerships and natural asset investment vehicles, with weak national governments, strong transnational capital, and instrumentalized global NGOs. Its political preference is for alliances of the urban cognitive elites, organized under group allocation rules, which can be used to manage the unruly popular classes. The second model is protectionist retreat, which aims for re-strengthening sovereign nation-states. creating solidaristic citizen-based class coalitions internally, and attempts to control global flows of capital and labor to benefit a competitive nation. The danger of the second model is armed confrontation between states aiming for control of scarce resources. The third model is the cosmo-local model: in this model, we aim for a subsidiarity of material production (intelligent relocalization), based on distributed manufacturing models, producing on demand using the maximum amount of biodegradable material. In such a model, local production units are linked to global open design communities, which we call ‘protocol cooperatives.’ The partner state concept stands for a ‘community state’ that enables and empowers individual and collective autonomy at the local scale, guarantees the equality of contributory capacity, using multi-stakeholder commons institutions, following the quintuple helix governance model pioneered for the Italian urban commons. Local alliances of public authorities, the commercial sector, the formal civil society and research organizations support commons-centric public initiatives; they are mirrored, in a fractal way, by similar transnational institutions that support a domain-specific commons institutions, which we call the ‘magisteria of the commons’. We see these networked workers, organized in common third spaces, i.e., revamped makerspaces, as both local agents, rooted in their communities, and as agents that are linked to the global open design communities which are the vehicle of their social and technical knowledge. Barring or awaiting the emergence of political forces which can represent this cosmo-local order, the priority is to network the productive nodes, and to construct the necessary transnational layer which can represent the counterforce to transnational capital. Partner state organizations are a vital link to facilitate the connection of local producers to the global streams of shared knowledge, and the new domain-specific value streams. [7] [1] To see how this differs from a commons-centric design, see the comparison table: Contrasting the Propertarian Blockchain with Commons-Based Ledger Systems, docs.google.com/document/d/1RQXhk83jrRTuWXKzPC6R5pxcbm-hqA-WiRgsfjU9NIs/edi… [2] The Commons Stack project, part of the Crypto Commons Alliance, is exemplary in this regard. See commonsstack.org/ [3] The P2P Value project found that 75% of the 300 studied peer production projects were using, experimenting or researching such accounting conventions and tools, wiki.p2pfoundation.net/P2P_Value [4] The concept is from Arthur Brock, founder of the Holochain post-blockchain ledger, a open and p2p-based interoperable ledger system that doesn’t require a world computer but is based on the free interconnection of autonomous ledgers. [5] Cosmo-local production models are described in a new book by the P2P Foundation, which contains 40 case studies of initiatives combining local material production with globally shared open designs: The Cosmolocal Reader. Ed. José Ramos, Sharon Ede, Michel Bauwens and Gien Wong. P2P Foundation, 2021, clreader.net/ [6] See wesleyyang.substack.com/p/welcome-to-year-zero [7] P2P Accounting for Planetary Survival: Towards a P2P Infrastructure for a Socially Just Circular Society. By Michel Bauwens and Alex Pazaitis. Foreword by Kate Raworth. P2P Foundation, June 2019. (Subtitle: How shared perma-circular supply chains, post-blockchain distributed ledgers, protocol cooperatives, and three new forms of post-capitalist accounting, could very well save the planet.), commonstransition.org/p2p-accounting-for-planetary-survival/ ******************************************************************* December 1, 2021 Dear GTN: Our December discussion—*Technology and the Future*—takes up a critical question: how might emerging technologies shape—and be shaped by—the global transition? Let us approach this knotty question at both concrete and conceptual levels: weighing the implications of *specific technologies *for a GT and establishing an adequate* theoretical framework* for making sense of the interplay between technology and society. *Specific Technologies* An astonishing array of potentially disruptive creations looms on the horizon. *In this pivotal moment, what influence, for better or worse, might vanguard technologies have on the global trajectory <https://greattransition.org/explore/scenarios> ? Which applications are inherently discordant with a Great Transition and should be resisted outright? Which have a legitimate place, in some form, in a Great Transition world and the struggle to get there? * Under prevailing Conventional World conditions, social change movements can resist specific technologies outright, advocate policies to regulate them, or, by ignoring them, cede the field to business-as-usual forces. Not surprisingly, given the diversity of environmental and social advocacy, controversy rages about such technologies as bioengineering, artificial intelligence, and the Internet. To structure our discussion of this sprawling topic, I invite you to focus on the prospects of key technologies in three arenas: *Bioengineering*: Will there be GMOs in a Great Transition? Surely we need to move from industrial agriculture to an agro-ecological model, but can this meet the nutritional needs of a growing population? Skeptics see a role for regulated GMOs, while others passionately disagree. *Artificial intelligence*: Will AI induce painful unemployment in the near term? By reducing socially necessary labor time, might it be the precondition for a post-scarcity society? What would a politically progressive AI strategy look like that balances such concerns? *Digital economy*: Consider blockchains and cryptocurrency, for example. Do they merely foreshadow new financial and environmental burdens, or hold the promise, as some claim, of hastening a post-capitalist economy? Can social movements begin to coopt elements of platform capitalism to grow the infrastructure of platform cooperativism? Please reflect on how different institutional contexts might shape the form each technology assumes and the function it plays, a consideration which segues into the second level of our discussion. *Theoretical Framework* *How should we think about the interplay between technological and social evolution? Does technology drive history? Or the reverse? Or perhaps the logic of discovery defines a channel of possibilities for social evolution that delimits the scope for human agency?* Ask a professional futurologist (or a wonderstruck layman) what our grandchildren’s world will look like, and odds are you’ll hear a story about how disruptive technology inexorably will revolutionize economies and everyday life. For many, *technological determinism*—the idea that technology drives history—is a seductive lure that offers a through-line for explaining social change. We can resist, surrender, or adapt to the robots (and much else), but they are coming! But in downplaying the other side of the equation—the ways history drives technology—technological determinism is reductive and simplistic. The robots and their ilk will not be dropped from the sky by technology gods; they will carry characteristics and functions congruent with the societies that spawn them. By insisting that the internal logic of innovation drives social evolution, technological determinism reverses that paternity. If technology marches to the beat of its own drum, we can love it (technophilia) or hate it (technophobia) but not alter its essence. Both the techno-optimist gushing about cool gadgets and the techno-pessimist indicting the machine let the reigning political economy off the hook. By contrast, the *social construction of technology* school rejects the idea of technology as an autonomous force, instead understanding it as embedded in society and subject to its choices. Social constructionism yields academic and policy insight into the regulation and management of R&D, but its granular focus cannot guide us in the big-picture challenge of shaping the social-technological culture of the future. Moreover, social constructionism’s bias—history drives technology—obscures the objective constraints imposed by the state of technology and the laws of nature. What are the contours of a systemic understanding of the technology-society dialectic? An adequate framework recognizes that technological and social conditions co-evolve at different spatial scales influenced by strengthening global forces. In stable times, the technological variants that prevail and become entrenched are those compatible with dominant interests and institutions. However, at pivotal moments of historical change like the present, techno-social systems can branch in myriad directions as disruptive innovations contribute to the stress on existing structures, helping to trigger and shape what comes next. In our time of transformation, emergent technologies powerfully affect all future trajectories, whether of Conventional Worlds, Barbarization, or Great Transition varieties. The forms they assume and the roles they play are subject to choices yet to be made and struggles yet to be waged. If it is true that the robots will look like us, the prior question remains: what will we look like? Technology scenarios are subplots of the larger story depicted in the alternative narratives of the future. With this as background for your critique and elaboration, I invite your thoughts on *Technology and the Future*, whether focused on specific innovations or on theoretical considerations. The comment period will go through *Monday, January 3*. Succinct remarks are welcome, as are extended reflections (capped at 1,200 words, please). Over to you, Paul Paul Raskin GTI Director ---------------------------------------------------------- To submit a comment for this GTN discussion, click reply or send it to jcohn(a)tellus.org. *Expect a delay between the submission and posting.* You can review the discussion here <https://greattransition.org/gtn-discussions/technology-and-the-future#3535>, where you can also submit your comment by replying to any previously posted comment. -- P2P Foundation: http://wiki.p2pfoundation.net <http://p2pfoundation.net> - http://blog.p2pfoundation.net Discuss: http://lists.ourproject.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/p2p-foundation Updates: ; http://twitter.com/mbauwens; http://www.facebook.com/mbauwens Curation of news on p2p/commons developments: https://www.facebook.com/groups/p2p.open/

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