Examples

EXAMPLES OF IMPLEMENTING THE COMMONS APPROACH: Best Practices and Success Stories

Here   are some examples of Commons Processes underway that are working to   formalize peoples shared rights and responsibilitie as stakeholders for   various commons. 

+ Local commons projects underway:

- Community Bill of Rights (USA) - The model Community Bill of Rights   template is derived from ongoing national and global work by the   Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund (CELDF) such as Ecuador   adding Rights for Nature to its Constitution, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania   stripping drilling corporations of corporate constitutional “rights,”   such as corporate “personhood” and Spokane’s Community Bill of Rights   initiative

-   Designed Deliberative Democracy (USA, China) - A group of citizens are   scientifically selected to reflect the general population. They are   polled once on the major decisions they'll be facing. Then they are   given a briefing on those issues, prepared by experts with conflicting   views. Then they meet in small groups and come up with questions for  the  experts — issues they want further clarified. Then they meet  together  in plenary session to listen to the experts' response and have  a more  general discussion. The process of small meetings and plenary  is  repeated once more. A final poll is taken, and the budget priorities  of  the assembly are made known and adopted by the local government.  It  takes three days to do this. (Fishkin, Stanford Univ)

- Participatory Budgeting (Brasil) - Participatory budgeting   is a process of democratic deliberation and decision-making, and a  type  of participatory democracy, in which citizens decide how to  allocate  part of a municipal or public budget. Participatory budgeting  allows  people to identify, discuss, and prioritize public spending  projects,  and gives them power to make decisions about how money is  spent. Since  its emergence in 1989 in Porto Alegre, participatory  budgeting has  spread to hundreds of Latin American cities, and dozens  of cities in  Europe, Asia, Africa, and North America. More than 1,200  municipalities  are estimated to have initiated participatory budgeting  to improve  services such as water, sewer, health, energy, food security  and  eduation

-   Food Commons/ Food Sovereingty (Brasil) - The third largest City in   Brasil, Belo Horizonte, became the first city in the world to eliminate   hunger.  In 1993, with a metro population of over 5 million, BH started  a  series of innovations based on its citizens having the "right to  food".  These include, for example, creating farmers' markets in the  town to  enable direct sales, and regularly surveying current market  prices and  posting the results across the city, and providing large  cafeterias in  each district providing healthy local meals at low  subsidized cost. The  city's process of participatory budgeting was  linked with these  innovations, as a result of which the infant  mortality rate was reduced  by 50% in a decade. There is also evidence  that these programs have  helped support a higher quality of life for  the local farmers partnering  with the city, and that this may also be  having positive effects on  biodiversity in the Atlantic Rainforest  around the city. The city's  development of these policies garnered the  first "Future Policy Award"  in 2009.

-   Community Managed Forests (Mexico, Guatemala, Indonesia and India) -   The destruction of forests is responsible for almost one-fifth of all   greenhouse gas emissions; that's more than all global transportation   combined. Part of the challenge in addressing this issue is that these   spaces are often seen as pristine, empty places devoid of people and   commerce. In reality, the world's forests are not only home to hundreds   of millions of people, but they also are a key source of these  people's  livelihoods. For these individuals (many of whom are  indigenous, tribal  peoples), forests are a source of food, energy,  medicine, housing and  income. The Mexican model has shown that giving  communities the ability  to own and manage the forests where they live  provides perhaps the  greatest incentive imaginable to protect and  preserve the forests.  Mexico's experience in promoting environmental  protection and economic  development by expanding community rights to  forests is a model that  other countries can and must follow.  Good  examples of community managed  forests also exist in Gutemala,  Indonesia, India and other paces, but a  danger is that unless they have  full support from government, they are  in danger of being wiped out by  deals between government and business  interests.  Community forests  groups are encouraged to network and  cooperate, join forces with other  civil society groups to make their  plight known and attain recognition  from government to secure their  future (CIFOR)

-   Community Managed Water Systems (Bolivia, Palestine, Italy, Spain) -   Spain and Italy have had success for centuries with community managed   water and irrigation systems.  These traditional systems have proven to   be remarkably variable and efficient in their functional design, and   well supported by local and regional governance structures (need   citation from Robin Temple). This level of stability and sustainability   exemplifies the merits of commons design principles for subsidiarity  in  decison-making, local control, exclusion of unentitled parties, and   legal recognition and support from higher level authorites when  needed.  Bolivia, Palestine and other developing countries are working  to develop  such systems after failed policies with strictly private  and/or  government run systems. Considering the July 2010 United  Nations  Resolution recognizing the access to clean water and sanitation  as a  human right,  "The Charter of Solidarity for the Access to Water"  is a  good step towards seeing water as a common good, where all  legitimate  stakeholders can particpate in deliberative democratic  processes for  design, improvement and management of water and  sanitation services.

-   Transition Towns (UK) - Also known as Transition Network or Transition   Movement, TT is a grassroots network of communities that are working  to  build resilience in response to peak oil, climate destruction, and   economic instability. Transition Towns are founded in part upon the   principles of Permaculture, based originally on Bill Mollison’s seminal Permaculture, a Designers Manual,1988.   An essential aspect of transition in many places, is that the outer   work of transition needs to be matched by inner transition. That is, in   order to move down the energy descent pathways effectively, we need to   rebuild our relations with our selves, with each other and with the   "natural" worlds.  Small working groups and group collaborations with   government, business and other communities and organizations is the   halmark of Transition success.

+ Regional commons projects underway:

-   WANA Forum Charter (West Asia, North Africa) - Building on the Forum’s   objectives in advancing social cohesion, improving the region’s  ability  to recover and reconstruct in the aftermath of conflict,  advocating  sustainable environmental and green economy solutions, as  well as its  desire to mitigate against a history of imported political  and economic  ideologies, the WANA Social Charter lays out the vision  for regional  cooperation. Their Social Charter describes directives to Achieve equal opportunity as a means to help people realise their basic human needs; Foster citizenship and good governance; Create opportunities for prosperity and sustainable development; Commit   to the pursuit of knowledge and wisdom in the education of future   generations and investment in the region’s human capital; Promote processes of inclusion that harness our diversity more effectively; Respect our human and natural environments as stewards of the Earth. The   WANA Social Charter aims for collaboratively co-managing common-pool   resources to secure livelihoods, working for the development,   implementation and management of himas* in the region, in accordance   with national laws and international treaties. *Himas are protected  area  systems involving the sustainable use and sharing of natural  resources  by and for local communities. 

-   Great Lakes Commons Trust (Canada and USA) - "Our Great Lakes Commons:  A  People’s Plan to Protect the Great Lakes Forever" is intended to  serve  as a call to understanding and a call to action on an exciting  new  proposal to designate the Great Lakes and its tributary waters as  a  lived Commons, to be shared, protected, carefully managed and enjoyed  by  all who live around them. The Great Lakes Basin Commons would be   protected by a legal and political framework based on a further   development of the Public Trust Doctrine.  Participatory input on a   Great Lakes Charter is underway in communities and tribal bodies   surrounding the Lakes to work towrds new forms of co-governance and   co-management for these shared commons and reverse the damage,  depletion  and misuse of these waters that is placing the great Lakes  Basin and  it's residents at risk.  The goal is to create a Great Lakes  Commons  Trust that is accountable to local comunities.  A GLCT will  monitor and  manage the lakes sustainably, placing the health and  well-being of the  ecosystem and human communities first, improving and  restoring the  lake's biological systems and guarding against abuses and  enclosures of  this shared resource.

- Alaska Permanent Fund (USA)   - Everyone in Alaska earns non-labor income —  dividends to equity   owners of Alaska's shared oil common wealth. The Alaska Permanent Fund   uses revenue from state oil leases to invest in stocks, bonds and   similar assets, and from those investments pays equal dividends to  every  resident. Since 1980, these dividends have ranged from $1,000 to  $2,000  per year per person, including children (meaning that they’ve  reached  up to $8,000 per year for households of four). It’s therefore  no  accident that, compared to other states in the USA, Alaska has the  third  highest median income and the second highest income equality.  Similar  funds for the the best management of natural gas, timber,  broadcast  spectrum and other social and natural resources, arguably the  collective  wealth of the people, are being proposed in other states.   Some  citizens in Alaska want a portion of the Alaska Permanent Fund,  worth  $38 Billion in 2011, to be invested locally for renewable energy   projects to prepare for when the oil runs out or becomes too   ecologically damaging to use.  The point being that the citizens must   debate how best to use their common wealth to serve current and future   generations.

+ Global commons projects underway:

- Earth Climate Commons Trust
- A diverse group of citizens, acting on behalf of the whole human family and all life on Earth, are   working to establish an independent Earth Climate Commons Trust  (ECCT).  Acting on independent climate science, this global trust would  set an  annually reducing cap on the total amount of fossil fuels that  can be  introduced into the global economy and issues permits up to the  amount  of the cap, available for purchase by fuel companies for full  market  value. The proceeds of sale are paid to or applied for the  benefit of  all adult citizens in the world in equal shares, via a  network of  national and local citizen's climate trusts. Nation-state  governments  collaborate with the Trust by banning the introduction of  the fuels into  their territory without an ECCT permit. So long as not  all state  governments have agreed to collaborate, the ECCT limits the  total number  of permits issued in the same proportion as the use of  fossil fuels in  the countries participating bears to total global use.   Delivery mechanisms of the programme:   the cap will be directly effective to achieve the required reductions   in emissions.  A network of national and local citizen's climate trusts   will manage the distribution of the proceeds of sale of permits. A   global climate commons charter to guide the use of these moneys,   including the investment for rapid transition to renewable energy   sources, will be developed by an inclusive process with a view to its   adoption by the United Nations (FEASTA).  


- Reclaiming Money Creation as a Commons
-   The debt-based monetary system that creates unsustainable growth   patterns can be eliminated, and nationally, a systematic and verifiable   credit value for money can be determined to allow the creation of  viable  local economies and stable international trade on an equitable  playing  field.  This would require the development of an international   sustainability index administered by a Global Monetary Trust, and   partnered with National Monetary Trusts around the world, to verify   national sustainability rates and track the resilience of our global   biosphere.  

The   international sustainability index would be comprised of a basket of   comparable natural and social resource viability and investment   indicators (for example: air and water quality indicators, forest  cover,  desertification rates, greenhouse gas emissions, education and   healthcare indicators and investment rates, sustainable infrastructure   development and maintenance etc.).  Equity between countries at various   levels of development would be designed into the system as the   sustainability index measurements would look at the current situation  in  each state as a neutral starting point.  From there, both the   investment rates of each nation's monetary trust into systems and   practices that benefit the health and well-being of human and natural   communities and   actual measurements to assess whether resource indicators are stable,   improving or degrading, would determine whether the value of the credit   of a country would rise or fall.  Business, government and citizen   interests would then be aligned with improving quality of life for   communities and the maintenance of the natural systems that are needed   to support national and international stability. (Global Commons Trust)


- Opportunities for additonal Global Commons Trusts - 

A   commons trust is a legal entity responsible for protecting a shared   asset that is inherited from past generations, or is presently being   created, on behalf of current and future generations. Because it is   common property — held in trust and not owned by anyone — the commons   are insulated from any claims by private individuals, business,   government or other trusts.  Commons exist on local, national, regional   and global scales and can be operate by collaborating trusts on across   scales.  Here we consider some ideas for global scale tusts as the   global commons can generate use or rental fees to finance multilateral   programs and institutions.  Such fees may be assessed on many   transborder commons, including...

•        foreign exchange transactions
•        international trade
•        international airline tickets
•        maritime freight transport
•        ocean fishing
•        sea-bed mining
•        offshore oil and gas
•        international oil trading
•        satellite parking spaces
•        electromagnetic spectrum use
•        internet
•        information flows
•        military spending and arms exports
•        toxic wastes
•        energy consumption  

Such   global trusts would monitor the use of each commons, collect the fees   and place this money in Social Cohesion Funds for those locations in  the  world that have been challenged by disaster, resource exploitation,  war  etc.   Resource Restorations Funds could also be created to bring  to  bear the best scientific practices, technologies and management   techniques to reclaim and restore various local, regional and global   commons, perhaps in-part thru providing employment for those whose   ecosystems have been severely degraded.  This can help to prepare local   people to regain healthy commons, thus transitioning them into the   sustainable co-management, co-production and protection via   co-goverenance of such commons. To assure transparent management   oversight of such trusts, an option might be to monitor and report on   such trusts via the Trusteeship Council at the UN. (Global Commons   Trust, School of Commoning, Commons Action for the United Nations)

Examples for finance commons

  • Commons       management caps the stock and rents the flow -- ensuring that       commons    are not diminished -- and prices are set through true    costs    to  commons   resources. Commons managment provides a basis    of    authentic  value in   sustainable resources, therefore enabling    a    non-debt monetary  sytem   based on measurable and consistent    factors. (mbs)
  • Commons-based     money as credit would be tied to sustainability indices that   measure     health and well-being of human and natural communities,       bioregionally.    As sustainability increases in a bioregion, so   then     would the credit    value increase, and vice-versa.  A   global     sustainability average can    thus be assessed.  This will   align     goverment, business and community    decision-making across   scales   with   the best interests of society and    natural systems.(Here        we   can connect with the Earth Condominium People who are using    the     global   footprint a s a metric and Eric Rothenberg's URSULA    Project.) 8mbs)
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION

  • Ten Guidelines for the Commons
  • To be re-edited? Or provide links to resources on the commons where these principles are further detailed? 
  •  
  • We are Co-creators with Nature and Society
  • By Creating our Shared Environment, we Participate in our own Culture
  • Thru Creative Cooperation, Resource Users become Producers of their own Resources
  • Cooperation between Users and Producers is the Practice of Stewardship
  • The Social and Political Expression of Stewardship is Trusteeship
  • Trusteeship of the Commons Transforms Traditional Ownership Structures
  • Co-produced and Co-governed Commons Generate New Sources of Value
  • Commons Value is the basis of a Debt-Free/ interest-free Monetary System
  • A Commons-Based Society results from Collective Intentions for Sustainability 
  • The Economics of the Commons is Replenishment. 

  • In   designing commons models of co-governance and co-production for         sustainable management of various resources, stakeholders can consider these guidelines in 1.) developing their operational parameters (deliberative charter processes, http://globalcommonstrust.org/?page_id=20) and 2.) formal legal procedures for commons institutions such as commons trusts (http://globalcommonstrust.org/?page_id=15), commons cooperatives, or other formal democratic commons associations.  See also  Jack   Harich's Steward Corporation and  Commons Property Rights solution    -     shared a while ago in our systems  thinking group conversation http://www.thwink.org/sustain/solutions/SubproblemD.htm)



Elinor Ostrom
  • I  like the new version by Mbs in the section below, that ties this into the action plan

  • Elinor   Ostrom won the Nobel Prize in Economics in 2009 showing that the      tragedy is of the “unmanaged” or unsuccessfully managed commons. 

  • Here are Ostrom's 8 Design Principles for Sustainably Managing Commons:
  • Ostrom      would say that commons management can work when a). communities    manage   commons, b.) when communities manage commons with government,    and c.)   when communities manage commons with government and private    business   interests.  The key is that when commons are successful,   many  if not  all  of these design principles are in effect...
  1. Clearly defined boundaries (effective exclusion of unentitled parties);
  1. Rules regarding the use and provision of common resources are adapted to local conditions;
  1. Collective-choice arrangements allow most resource stakeholders to participate in decision-making processes;
  1. Effective monitoring by monitors who are part of or accountable to the stakeholders;
  1. here is a scale of graduated sanctions for resource stakeholders who violate community rules;
  1. The self-determination of the community is recognized by higher-level authorities;
  1. In     the case of larger common-pool resources: organization in the form    of   multiple layers of nested enterprises, with small local CPRs at   the    base level.
  1. <<Missing one?>>



Sustainability and Strategies for the Commons


  • The Current Economy Creates Patterns Devastating to the Commons : The  demand for perpetual economic growth has caused human society to spend  not only the interest but significant portions of natural resource  capital (ie water, forests, atmosphere, fossil fuels). <<Relates to pp Transition to a circular economy and stop growth of power abuse and toxic practices>>
  •  
  • The  power and promise of the commons movement is its ability to bring  balance and cooperation between government, market and commons sectors. Neither  of our existing property regimes — public nor private — have a mandate  to guarantee long-term protection and use of critical commons resources  and thus ensure the common capital of the planet. The dominant purpose  now must be the long-term wellbeing of humanity and the planet as a  whole, in accordance with existing UN agreements and the Earth Charter.   <<Relates to pp A Commons based sector>>
  •  
  • Ungoverned commons:   A constant focus of every intentional commons is to learn from and be  responsive to the many kinds of natural and unintentional commons in our  environment, that are self-organizing, and so not governed by  intentional commons policies.  Just being observant one can notice how  other cultures work, or businesses thrive, or the general way systems  successfully respond to their limits to growth.  It gives you insight  into how to effectively engage with these unintentional commons and  bring them into your commons world.   <<Relates to pp Expand cooperation and learning>>
  • This  is the door to using biomimicry for nature’s material languages. One  might notice the curiously simple commoning method of small family  businesses, for example, and that it’s quite missing from larger  financially managed businesses and investment models. To get their  business going a family sacrifices all they can for growth, but only at  first, and then when it’s no longer so profitable to keep adding to  their own challenges, they sacrifice that instead, to use the profits to  live better, educate their children and more fully join in their  community, just by being ready to make the best use for their profits. <<Relates to pp Use finance to grow commons and Transition to circular economy>>
  • Commons Governance is Co-Governance: Until  the modern era of enclosure, commodification and globalization - the  actual tragedy of the commons - communities had their own rules for  creating and maintaining local resources. Commoners have broad  experience in the supervision and sustenance of systems to ensure  equitable ways of sharing their uses and benefits.  With the help of  progressive government, information and innovation, people across the  world are returning to the transparent stewardship  of their local commons, becoming involved as providers as well as  recipients of resources, goods and services (Co-Governance is closely  tied to Co-Production). <<This + the two following relates to pp A commons based sector and Expand cooperation to wider scales>>
  • Co-Governance involves the principle of subsidiarity: taking  decisions at the lowest possible level of authority, creating new  checks, balances and efficiencies with decision-making activities of the  state, including protecting commons from unfettered market forces.   Producers must have close connection with Resource Users  (Co-Production), for joint decision-making, essential for effective  self-organization, local sustainability and cooperation across borders. 
  •   
  • This has been clarified by the work on Commons Co-Governance processes by Elinor Ostrom who won the Nobel Prize in 2009: Commons processes...
  • 1. ... work towards resolving conflicts, setting rules for who benefits and who is excluded 
  • 2. ... develop synergy for local, regional and global collaboration and sharing
  • 3. ... maintain ongoing assessments of local environments for strategic planning, and
  • 4. ... create a dynamic common identity and thus shared responsibility for a resource
  • Our  imperiled commons require the  creation of new commons structures and  institutions to ensure sustainability, empowering government to fulfill  it's role in serving the will of the people to maintain their commons  for security, prosperity and the  needs of future generations. Commons  rights affirm the sovereignty of human beings over their means of  sustenance and well-being. They empower us with a moral authority and  social legitimacy to make decisions and create agreements on the sharing  of resources that ensure our rights to survival and security. 
  • [see references]

The Changing Image of Man

In 1973, a team of researchers from Stanford university established that cultural transformations needed a strong image to embody change and crystallize imagination and action toward new visions of the world  (http://www.imaginalvisioning.com/changing-images-of-man/):

  • "Images of humankind that are dominant in a culture are of fundamental importance because they underlie the ways in which the society shapes  its institutions, educates its young, and goes about whatever it perceives its business to be. Changes in these images are of   particular   concern at the present time because our industrial society   may be on  the  threshold of a transformation as profound as that  which  came to  Europe  when the Medieval Age gave way to the rise of  science  and the  Industrial  Revolution." 

They established the characteristics of the transition informing image needed to face the challenges ahead in their Changing Image of man survey:
  • provide a holistic sense and perspective on life 
  • entail an ecological ethic  
  • entail a self-realization ethic  
  • be multileveled, multifaceted, and integrative  
  • lead to a balancing and coordinating of satisfactions along many dimensions  
  • be experiential, experimental and open-ended


EXISTING SUSTAINABILITY STRATEGIES AND THE COMMONS

<<This would list the initiatives underway and describe how they relate to the commons and how they could be forwarded by a commons approach. I made a summary paragraph for the short version: 

<
"There are clear opportunities making the commons approach as socio-economic paradigm relevant today. 
 
The  Rio Principles, Human Right conventions, elements of Agenda 21, as well  as Local and National Sustainability Strategies and Processes and the  developing Action Plans on Sustainable Consumption and Production  (developed by whom?) as a means through which to plan and organize,  already embody much of these principles and type processes.
 
Many  of these efforts have achieved less impacts as they would have deserved  mostly for being disconnected. Thinking in terms of commons can provide  the guiding vision and operating principles needed for learning how to  search for the matching parts as the solution, and the system itself  will start putting them all together. 
>

MBS to develop the long version: how all these initiatives tie into the  Commons vision, principles and action plans, insisting in particular on the stakeholders we would like to work with?>>

The commons movement
UN Sustainability Programs, Rio+20 Agenda 21
SDGs, Targets and Indicators
Human rights conventions
National Sustainability programs
National and local tax and education policies


RELATED ARTICLESExplain
Communicating the Commons
Strategic Goals & Levers
Examples
A Commons Sector, alongside the Private and public sectors
Expanding cooperation at multiple levels and scales
Local organization for local needs [P2P, many to many]
Monitoring, reporting & assessing impacts and progress
Transition to a circular regenerative economy
Using finance to 'grow' the commons
Inquiry Model
Lever: Coordinated Regional Emergency Interventions
Stop growth of power abuse and toxic and harmful practices
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