Slides accompanying the paper presented at the DRS2016 conference at the University of Brighton. Here you can access the paper: https://www.academia.edu/26281896/Commons_and_community_economies_entry_points_to_design_for_eco-social_justice

1. Commons & community economies:
entry points to design for eco-social justice?
Fabio Franz, PhD Candidate,
Sheffield School of Architecture
Bianca Elzenbaumer, Research Fellow,
Leeds College of Art
bravenewalps@gmail.com
brave-new-alps.com | @bravenewalps
DRS2016—UniversityofBrighton—29June2016

2. What points of orientation can the
framework of the commons and that of
community economies offer designers
working towards progressive eco-social
change?

3. Commons and commoning as a material
and social/practical dimension that
empowers people to cultivate other values
and ways of relating to each other
(and to nature) than the ones embodied
and reproduced by capital.1
1 See De Angelis, M. (2007). The Beginning of History: Value Struggles and Global
Capital. London: Pluto Press.

4. ... as a means to the creation of an
egalitarian and cooperative society.2
2 Federici, S., & Caffentzis, G. (2014). Commons against and beyond capitalism.
Community Development Journal, 49(S1), i92–i105.

5. C
O
M
M
U
N
I
T
Y
R
E
S
O
U
R
C
E
S
C
O
M
M
O
N
I
N
G
COMMONS
THE

6. A web of direct
relations among
subject whose
repetitive
engagement and
feedback processes
around common
interests allow
them, through
conflict and/or
cooperation, to
define the norms of
their interaction.
C
O
M
M
U
N
I
T
Y
R
E
S
O
U
R
C
E
S
C
O
M
M
O
N
I
N
G
COMMONS
THE

7. A web of direct
relations among
subject whose
repetitive
engagement and
feedback processes
around common
interests allow
them, through
conflict and/or
cooperation, to
define the norms of
their interaction.
Those practices of
constant democratic
and horizontal
negotiation between
the members of
a community
around the terms
of access to (but
also production,
preservation,
distribution and
circulation of) the
resources it holds
in common.
C
O
M
M
U
N
I
T
Y
R
E
S
O
U
R
C
E
S
C
O
M
M
O
N
I
N
G
COMMONS
THE

8. There can be
NO COMMONS
WITHOUT COMMUNITY6
,
NO COMMONS
WITHOUT COMMONING7
and
NO COMMUNITY
WITHOUT COMMONING.
6 Federici, S., & Caffentzis, G. (2014). Commons against and beyond capitalism.
Community Development Journal, 49(S1), i92–i105.
7 De Angelis, M. (2010b). The Production of Commons and the “Explosion” of
the Middle Class. Antipode, 42(4), 954–977.

9. In a critical posthumanist approach, we
understand ‘community’ as constituted by
humans and more-than-human others.

10. How to go beyond an instrumental vision
of nature where on one hand there are
human communities and on the other hand
there are resources for humans to use?

11. What kind of power relations between
different actors do our design proposals
for commoning strengthen, weaken or
transform?

12. What kind of power relations between
different actors do our design proposals
for commoning strengthen, weaken or
transform?
What does it mean to design for just
relations between humans and
more-than-human assemblages?

13. What kind of power relations between
different actors do our design proposals
for commoning strengthen, weaken or
transform?
What does it mean to design for just
relations between humans and
more-than-human assemblages?
How to ‘common with the more-than-human?’

14. Could community economies represent
practical vectors to be mobilised in
dealing with these questions?

15. WAGE
LABOUR
BETWEEN FRIENDS
IN NEIGHBOURHOODS
PRODUCER CO-OPERATIVES
INFORMAL LENDING
ON THE STREETS
NON-CAPITALIST FIRM
WITHIN FAMILIES
MOONLIGHTING
UNDER THE TABLE
NOT FOR MARKET
SELF-EMPLOYMENT
IN SCHOOLS
ILLEGAL
SLAVE LABOUR
THE RETIRED
NOT MONETISED
VOLUNTEER
UNPAID
BARTER
CONSUMER COOPERATIVES
GIFTS
PRODUCE FOR
A MARKET IN A
CAPITALIST FIRM

16. WAGE
LABOUR
BETWEEN FRIENDS
IN NEIGHBOURHOODS
PRODUCER CO-OPERATIVES
INFORMAL LENDING
ON THE STREETS
NON-CAPITALIST FIRM
WITHIN FAMILIES
MOONLIGHTING
UNDER THE TABLE
NOT FOR MARKET
SELF-EMPLOYMENT
IN SCHOOLS
ILLEGAL
SLAVE LABOUR
THE RETIRED
NOT MONETISED
VOLUNTEER
UNPAID
BARTER
CONSUMER COOPERATIVES
GIFTS
PRODUCE FOR
A MARKET IN A
CAPITALIST FIRM

17. Community economies imply that
social interdependency (an economic
being-in-common) as well as ecological
interdependency (a being-in-common with
all of earth’s others) is acknowledged and
respected.8
8 Miller, Ethan. “Community Economy: Ontology, Ethics, and Politics for
Radically-Democratic Economic Organizing.” Community Economies, 2013.

18. When designing with community
economies in mind we negotiate: what is
necessary to personal, social and ecological
survival;

19. When designing with community
economies in mind we negotiate: what is
necessary to personal, social and ecological
survival; how surplus is appropriated and
distributed;

20. When designing with community
economies in mind we negotiate: what is
necessary to personal, social and ecological
survival; how surplus is appropriated and
distributed; whether and how surplus is to
be produced and consumed;

21. When designing with community
economies in mind we negotiate: what is
necessary to personal, social and ecological
survival; how surplus is appropriated and
distributed; whether and how surplus is to
be produced and consumed; how a commons
is produced and sustained.9
9 www.communityeconomies.org

22. We understand the creation of commons
and their enclosure as an ongoing process.

23. We understand the creation of commons
and their enclosure as an ongoing process.
If we as designers want to contribute to
create, defend or preserve commons,
what is our role and responsibility?

24. COLONISED
FRONTIER
space of
enclosure
COLONISABLE

25. COLONISED
FRONTIER
space of
enclosure
COLONISABLE

26. Thank you