‘Dark municipalism’ – the dangers of local politics
Even as anti-authoritarian, anti-racist movements all over the world are working to take power where they live, self-described localist movements have also won elections with racist, and frankly fascist, platforms. New right movements like the Lega Nord have even adopted the more typically leftist, anti-authoritarian…
How radical municipalism can go beyond the local
The rise of loneliness worldwide, the centrality of real estate speculation for global economic growth, and the breakdown of many large-scale factories that helped to bring workers together mean that we have to rethink the ways we demand change. We can build community and force…
What’s it like for a social movement to take control of a city?
We can chart a new path forward by grounding that vision in the lessons learned from past struggles and an understanding of how hierarchy is the shared root of oppression. But this can all feel a bit intangible without clear examples. To get an idea of what…
How to build a new world in the shell of the old
If we want real change, should we draw up a sketch of a just society and then simply march towards it? We think it’s better to look around and find the seeds of a better future—perhaps dormant—in the present, and nurture them into a viable…
How to navigate the disorientation of a seismic world
Even as revolutionary new technologies appear—with the potential to free our lives from drudgery and connect us to one another in ways we had never imagined possible—our undemocratic economy has deployed them as tools of disruption. Dreams of a post-scarcity technological future darken into one…
What makes an empty building in Naples a “common good”?
Naples was the first Italian city to establish a “Department of the Commons” and the first to change the municipal statute by inserting the “commons” as one of the interests to be protected and recognised as a fundamental right. This italian city is just one…
Taking back Naples
In the absence of mass struggles, the radical left in Italy has declined as an electoral force across most of the country, even despite the PD’s abandonment of social democracy in favor of a US-style corporate liberalism. However, there is another side to the Italian…
Flatpack democracy: the new English political revolt
While Scotland has blazed a new trail, much of England seems to have stuck to politics as usual. In fact, under the media radar, a growing number of self-styled independents are trying to kick out the big parties and take over the parts of government…
Why we still love the Zapatistas
For Mexico, Latin America and the international left, what emerged from the Chiapan mist along with the Zapatistas was the specter of revolution with a capital R—something the Mexican autocracy of the ruling Partido Revolucionario Institucional, the PRI, believed it had killed a long time…