What I love in the process is that this is already an emergence platform: I announced that we would endeavor to bring "edge thinkers and doers into the process for advancement of platform design in the fields of learning and action research, social change, governance, institutions, participatory politics, collective action, sustainability, business, collaboration, design and systems thinking, linguistics, semantic web." Well this is manifesting as we speak!

Paul Hawken describes the challenge of sustainability and activist movements that he sees converging into an unnamed and shapeless 'movement' in his book Blessed Unrest:

" ... as yet there has been no coming together of organizations in a united front that can counter the massive scale and power of the global corporations and lobbyists that protect the status quo.
...The as yet undelivered promise of this movement is a network of organizations that offer solutions to disantangle what appear to be insoluble dilemmas: poverty, global climate change, terrorism, ecological degradation, polarization of income, loss of culture, and many more. The world seems to be looking for the big solution, which is itself part of the problem, since the most effective solutions are both local and systemic. Although the groups in the movement are autonomous, the coming together of different organizations to address an array of issues can effectively become a systemic approach. Although the movement may appear inchoate or naively ambitious, its underlying structure and communication techniques can, at times, create a collective social response that can challenge any institution in the world."
 

What we are trying to do here, rather than to organize a movement, is to provide a 'space', a dynamic and some tools, the conditions to inspire, empower and enable these organizations and all the individuals and entities who aspire to a thrivable future, to come together to learn and dialogue, to evaluate actions and possibilities, to address these issues and become stewards of the commons in synergy. Each of us from the place we are at, at our own pace, and following our own principles and purposes...

If I had a 'mission statement' to write, as of today it would be:

"Engaging people and entities that are concerned with issues and the welfare of the commons into issues or commons-based governance and accountability networks, thus creating an environment for on-going conversations, learning and repeated interactions so that resources can be pooled, and informed systemic and leveraged action can emerge at all levels required, from the local to the global level, from the grassroots to the institutional level. This is done through a pull and evaluation mechanism and the integration of open source tools to inspire, empower and enable all the forces for good to converge meaningfully and effectively"

An idea whose time has come

I am quite confident this is an idea whose time has come. David Price is currently working with the Planet Under Pressure 2012 conference taking place right now in London to weave the main arguments and policy options discussed at the conference into a coherent, dynamic knowledge map that can be explored by a global public audience in the build up to the UN Rio +20 conference and beyond. He just confirmed to me that the need for networked governance models was one of the key themes of the conference.