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Handbook for rebellion
2nd October 2019An Extinction Rebellion Handbook, recently released by Penguin, is a collection of 32 short essays that aims of pushing the message – and the confidence to take action – even further. An accessible text appropriate for introducing the average reader to both the scale of...

A democratic devolution underway in Barcelona: Barcelona en Comú
1st May 2015This paper seeks to outline the changes that enabled the citizen platform Barcelona en Comú (Catalan for “Barcelona in Common”) to win the elections in Barcelona in 2015, a victory that signaled a rupture in the status quo of Spanish politics. Although the citizen platform...

How woke is the left?
7th September 2018Is the left today “woke,” i.e. is it self-consciously learning from the limits of the path it has been on to design a new systemic architecture based on alternative, networked institutions to challenge the status quo? New institutions are needed because in the past farms,...

The battle for the commons in neoliberal Colombia
23rd July 2019The local struggle to protect the Rio Blanco ecological reserve epitomizes the resistance against the destructive impact of decades of neoliberal development. Photo: Néstor Morales

Democratic confederalism
1st January 2011Political prisoner and theorist who helped cofound the Kurdish Workers’ Party (PKK), Abdullah Öcalan, takes a closer look at the historical background of the paradigma between nation-state. With a view to issues of ethnicity and nationhood like the Kurdish question, which have their roots deep...

The EU’s obstacle course for municipalism
28th October 2018Progressive municipalist city governments in Europe have introduced important policies to promote citizen participation, public ownership of services, expanded affordable housing, and many more. But their radical democratic programmes face obstacles from both EU and national neoliberal legislation. Photo: Pixabay

How EU rules are getting in the way of progressive public policy – and how cities are fighting back
12th March 2020Over recent years there’s been a surge in European cities that, via public tendering, are using their spending power far more pro-actively and strategically to promote social justice and environmental goals. Leading this trend are city governments that define themselves as municipalist and are committed...

How does a single issue civic movement transform into a political entity?
31st July 2019An interview with Dobrica Veselnovic, co-founder of Ne Da(vi)mo Beograd during the Our Common City conference held in Budapest (February 22 & 23, 2019). Part one: Part two:

The promise of radical municipalism today
25th May 2020Our cities are being hollowed out. Real estate developers carve up downtown areas for profit, displacing the poor to the urban periphery. One by one, public spaces are disappearing; cafés and libraries are closing down, and parks are increasingly patrolled by private security. Metropolitan sprawl...

‘A rebirth of municipal socialism’ in Birmingham? The Council’s policy of ‘local wealth building’ through new municipal services and local procurement
30th September 2018With amazing creativity in the toughest of times, in 2018 in the UK, they were seeing the first shoots of the renaissance of local government for the many, not the few—the rebirth of municipal socialisme. With the objective to seize every opportunity to develop and...

Direct democracy and the passion for political participation
19th November 2019Yavor Tarinski is an independent researcher and activist whose publications and talks center on the possibilities of direct democracy and commoning practices as an alternative to the current social imaginary. In this interview with Eve Olney he discusses some of the ideas regarding where direct...

Jakarta poor still fighting for tap water
12th October 2019To fight the water privatization that is taking place in Jakarta, the organization Amrta Institute for Water Literacy is helping make water accessible to all the inhabitants of Jakarta. The organization Amrta Institute for Water Literacy was shortlisted for the Transformative Cities People’s Choice Award...