beyond capitalism

Capitalism isn’t just an economic system we live inside. It is a culture that lives inside of us. It influences our psychology, how we design our communities, how we relate to each other, the kind of culture we create, and what’s possible for us to do together. 

Jay Geils talks about the multi-faceted Flora Cooperative and the co-op network Cooperation Milwaukee.

We need to look more directly at how we can stimulate a new structural transformation of civil society. It will be a broad process that explores how we can rebuild democratic power to facilitate mass involvement in civil society and, by extension, our political system. Though there seems to be an instinctual knowledge of this problem, many are unaware of this prehistory of civil society, and understandably find it difficult to see an alternative to the memberless NGO, whose unelected governance, unreliable funding streams, and informal support base is inadequate to the challenges of the present, let alone the disruptions of the future.

Macro-transformation does not happen from individual initiatives acting alone: large shifts become possible when a critical mass of movements for radical resistance and constructive alternatives is able to coalesce through horizontal networks.

Industrias del Orinoco, C.A. (Indorca) is a factory without bosses in the industrial city of Puerto Ordaz in Bolívar state, the home of Venezuela’s basic industries. Indorca workers carried out a heroic three-year struggle to gain control of the factory after the former owner brought it to a halt. Since 2015, when Venezuela’s Ministry of Labor extended a mandate giving the workers control over Indorca, the enterprise has been democratically managed by the women and men who produce here day in and day out.

Can creativity flourish and remain within the control of commoners? Or will businesses inevitably capture creativity and convert it into private property to make money?

Stacco Troncoso gives an overview of the DisCO (Distributed Cooperative) model, which he alternately describes as a brand, an econoimc LARP, and an open source conspiracy to take over the world.

In Ghana, a centuries-old financial system called Susu provides an example of effective bottom-up development that contributes meaningfully to reducing poverty and economic inequality.

This week we are joined by David Cobb, Lydia Lopez, Jyoung Carolyn Park, Kali Akuno, and Petula Hanley to hear about how to use/influence public policy advance individual policies as part of a coherent strategy to democratize the entire economy.

Francisco  Pérez and Sarah Wang of the Center for Economic Democracy discuss the Economics for Emancipation online course.