Universal healthcare, a green economy, affordable and sustainable housing, and much more: for many people, the Green New Deal sounds too good to be true at a time when trust in politicians has been eroded by too many empty promises. Aaron Vansintjan argues that the...

One of the main goals of the “municipalities of change”, elected in 2015 in Spain, was to tackle the debt problem. Drawing on the experience of civil society, they sought to develop approaches such as “citizen audits”, but found themselves facing the power of finance....

In the second part of the New Municipalism series, Ross talks to Barcelona-based scholar-activist Laura Roth. She talks about the Spanish experience, particularly in relation to Barcelona en Comú, the movement party, which has been in minority government since 2014. Laura talked about a range...

The growing momentum of local democratic initiatives seizing institutional power at a city level has great potential to address national and transnational political problems. In 2017 Barcelona hosted the Fearless Cities Summit, an international gathering which took important first steps in linking the new experiments...

Today the forces of Municipalism and Culture are interdependent and merged to create a profound and sustainable shift in policy and politics and, most critically, in lived experience for the many and not the few in the journey towards a new democracy. This short paper...

In September 2013, 51% of the electorate voted to “re-municipalise” the local electricity and district heating networks, as proposed by grassroots initiative “Our Hamburg Our Grid”. And while the energy debate has only played a minor role in this year’s election campaign, it has increased...

Stir to Action has worked in partnership with the Centre for Urban Research on Austerity at De Montfort University in Leicester to produce a new video resource for the municipalist movement. The video was inspired by CURA’s Municipal Socialism in the 21st Century event in...

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...

Portland’s city council has set a new bar for North American housing reform by legalizing up to four homes on almost any residential lot. It’s the most pro-housing reform to low-density zones in US history. Portland’s new rules will also offer a “deeper affordability” option:...

Even before the novel coronavirus, COVID-19, was declared a pandemic, prominent women mayors in the United States enacted proactive and innovative policies to prevent local outbreaks and soften the social and economic repercussions. Several Black women mayors, in particular, have led the way in local...

The cities of Barcelona, Freetown, Mexico, London, Los Angeles and Tokyo have co-founded a network focused on gender equity, with mayors warning that the Covid-19 pandemic risks widening inequalities. Through ‘CHANGE’ (City Hub and Network for Gender Equity), the cities will share best practices, policies...

Fatih Macoglu, from the Communist Party of Turkey (TKP), took over as mayor of the central district of Tunceli this month after victory in March 31 local elections, which saw President Tayyip Erdogan’s ruling Islamist-rooted AK Party lose control of the capital Ankara and Turkey’s...