Resources by Topic: Economic Justice

Local Bites is a podcast that tracks ideas and initiatives that resist corporate power, renew place-based economies, and preserve human and ecological well-being. Our goal is to feature the voices of activists and visionaries from all around the world who are driving creative grassroots initiatives that demonstrate the power of 'going local'.

Key resources from NEON on sysytems and power, leadership, campaigns and more for campaigners, activists, and organizers.

In this episode, we continue our exploration of the exciting and contentious idea of Universal Basic Income.

Featuring:

— Juliana Bidadanure (Stanford)
— Doug Henwood (Jacobin)
— Rutger Bregman
— Kathi Weeks
— Erik Olin Wright
— Richard Wolff
— Matt Bruenig
— Martin Kirk
— Manda Scott
— Sofa Gradin

The Movement for Black Lives released last year a comprehensive platform, including an economic plank that discusses various opportunities for the economic development of black communities. This Transform Finance Investor Network webinar is led by Cathy Albisa, Director of NESRI, and Rashad Jamal Buni of the Black Youth Project.

We're living in a time of economic babble, where politicians and economists throw out words like "reform," "privatize," and "austerity" to prop up corrupt capitalist opportunists. So says our guest this week, economist Michael Hudson, author of J is for Junk Economics.

Throw out what you think you know about economics. This week, self-described "renegade economist" Kate Raworth of Oxford University, explains how to think like a reality based economist, and two eco-feminists, one from South Africa, the other Mauritius, share a chat under a tree about Marx, feminism and life on the planet.

Under the Trump regime, we'll certainly have to be on the defense to protect the communities most likely to be attacked -- but we'll also have to build powerful, alternative models where POC, Muslim, undocumented, disabled, and queer folks have leadership.

What role did economic cooperation play in the civil rights movement? As it turns out, a huge one. Dr. Jessica Gordon Nembhard co-founded the U.S. Federation of Worker Co-ops & helped that organization build lasting ties with prominent civil rights and cooperative organizations.

This document is the syllabus for the Center for Family Life's 6-session introductory "Planners" training on worker cooperative development for other community-based organizations.

This book describes how we humans live by stories and the stories that now govern our society set us on a path to certain self-destruction. It demonstrates the depth and significance of the contrast between the story by which we currently live and the nature and implications of the story now emerging.

Policies for Shareable Cities is the first policy handbook of its kind. It includes over 30 recommended policies for how cities should regulate the true sharing economy in the areas of food, work, housing, and transportation.

National and NYC based resources on the solidarity economy containing reports, audio recordings and podcasts, books, articles, films, how to guides, and relevant national and local groups.

North Dakota is the only state that has established a publicly owned bank: the Bank of North Dakota. This article looks at the benefits that a public bank has brought to the state.

A growing body of research is proving something that many people already know: locally owned businesses create communities that are more prosperous, connected, and generally better off across a wide range of metrics. This is a roundup of the findings that are putting numbers to the harms of bigness and the benefits of local ownership.

Amazon has quietly positioned itself at the center of a growing share of our daily activities and transactions, extending its tentacles across our economy, and with it, our lives. In this report, ILSR pulls back the curtain on the company, and find that it's at the center of increasing inequality and diminishing opportunity.

LocalCatch.org is a community-of-practice from across North America that are committed to providing local, healthful, low-impact seafood via community supported fisheries and direct marketing arrangements in order to support healthy fisheries and the communities that depend on them. This map helps connect consumers to these seafood providers.

At the Northwest Atlantic Marine Alliance, we believe that Who Fishes Matters. We've outlined 7 principles to keep in mind when buying seafood to benefit local fisherman, local marine ecosystems, and local economies.

Vision Smoketown is meant to evoke conversations with residents, policy makers, investors, business leaders and others about how changes in Louisville will impact the Smoketown neighborhood in the next 10, 20 or 30 years. More importantly, Vision Smoketown provides an opportunity for existing residents to have a positive influence in shaping the future of their neighborhood. This report focuses on Smoketown, a historically Black community in Louisville, KY, but may be useful to other communities looking to have greater influence in shaping the future of their neighborhood.

The Caring Economy Campaign's Fast Fact Sheets are an invaluable resource for making the case for the visibility and value of the work of care in our economic system.

This report's goal is to arm progressive local elected leaders and advocates with a range of effective policies that, if adopted, would make a significant difference in getting on that high road. They will be able to use better democratic organization to add value, reduce waste, and capture and share locally the great benefits of doing both.

In this video, produced by Democracy Collaborative staff working with Softbox Films, Gar Alperovitz sketches the major institutions of a systemic alternative based in plural forms of democratic ownership, oriented around community at various scales—what he has called “The Pluralist Commonwealth.”

Would you gamble away your rent money? How about your kids’ college fund, or the money you put aside for food and clothing? If that seems like a terrible idea, then why do cities, counties, and states gamble away our money by giving it to big Wall Street bankers, who throw it into risky derivatives and interest rate swaps? There’s a better way--and it’s one of our nation’s best-kept secrets. (This article originally appeared as part of New Economy Week 2015)

Today, the need to empower people left out of our investor-owned economy is greater than ever before, and co-ops are once again the engine of change. Electric co-ops, in whole or in part, serve over 90 percent of the poorest U.S. counties, making co-ops key to both energy democracy as well as creating an economy that works for all. (From New Economy Week 2015).

The United States’ partial and uneven recovery from the 2008 financial crisis calls for a new economic platform that would unite the employed and the unemployed, strengthen worker power, and point the way to a more democratic economy for the country as a whole. Two such policy proposals have recently been gaining traction on the left: a universal basic income, on the one hand, and a job guarantee on the other. As part of New Economy Week 2015, Dissent, Jacobin Magazine, and the New Economy Coalition brought together activists, journalists, and scholars to discuss these two proposals.

An overview of The Next System Project and the need for systemic solutions for systemic crisis.

The Next System Project is an ambitious multiyear initiative aimed at thinking boldly about what is required to deal with the systemic challenges the United States faces now and in coming decades. Responding to real hunger for a new way forward, and building on innovative thinking and practical experience with new economic institutions and approaches being developed in communities across the country and around the world, the goal is to put the central idea of system change, and that there can be a “next system,” on the map.

In this Next System Project second official report, project co-chair, and NEC co-founder, James Gustave Speth details the steps that must be taken to change the status quo of the political-economic system.

If our movements are serious about changing the system, what are the strategies that get us from here to there? We know this work is about more than just building projects or winning elections. It’s about governing society for the benefit of all and implementing our visions for the economy at all levels. With that in mind, what do we need to shift in our thinking for our movements to succeed? What are we not doing enough of? What are we doing too much of? What are the opportunities in front of us in this particular historical moment? This CommonBound 2014 closing plenary reflects on these questions with a powerful line-up of community leaders who bring their diverse and broad experiences to the table.

View the recordings of these online discussions, organized by Local Futures, which address key issues in the debate around economic globalization and localization - from food and energy to education, trade, and the role of activists. Guests include Bill McKibben, Charles Eisenstein, Richard Heinberg, Manish Jain, Michael Shuman, and more.

This toolkit is a do-it-yourself tool for those who want to kick-start effective global-to-local action in their community or within an existing group. The toolkit uses the award-winning documentary film The Economics of Happiness as a springboard to discuss the broad impacts of the global economy and localization as a strategy for systemic change.

This shortened version of the award-winning documentary spells out the social, spiritual, and ecological costs of today's global economy. Importantly, the film also highlights the many benefits of a shift towards the local and showcases some of the steps people are already taking worldwide.

From trade to finance, from food to climate, from education to energy, the negative impacts of globalization have affected every part of the world's economies. This report summarizes those impacts, and provides a detailed listing of policy shifts and grassroots initiatives that can move the world towards the local.

This panel features leaders from across NYC sharing stories of communities building powerful bottom-up solutions like worker co-ops, community land trusts, and community development credit unions that model economic democracy, sustainability, and social justice.

A white paper mapping out a just transition strategy for nuclear power plant communities and energy replacement scenarios. Concludes that the reactor's entire electricity output could be replaced by lower-cost, clean energy resources, and that worker and community transition support would be cost-effective.