Uncommonly Good Post on the Commons

Wow: this is the best single post I have ever read on the commons (and I've read a few):

The commons as a common paradigm for social movements and beyond (version 1.0)

We can only promote the commons as a new narrative for the 21st century if they are identified as a common denominator by different social movements and schools of thought. In my point of view, enforcing the commons would be not only possible, but strategically intelligent. Here are 15 reasons why...

I'm tempted to quote the whole thing, but it's long and doing so is unnecessary, since you can simply follow the link above. But it really touches on just about every reason why the commons as an idea is important. However, I can't resist give an indication of its riches by quoting two sections that should strike a chord with people in the world of free software:

The commons strengthens an important core belief about human beings and behaviour. We are not only, not even mainly the „homo oeconomicus“ they made us believe we are. We are much more than selfish creatures looking for our own interest. We need and enjoy being embedded into a social web. “The commons are the web of life”, says Vandana Shiva. We enjoy to contribute, care and share. The commons strengthens the confidence in the creative potential of people and in the idea of inter-relationality, which means: “I need the others and the others need me.” They honour our freedom to contribute and share. This is a different kind of freedom than the market is based on. The more we contribute, more things we have access to. But note: it is not simply „access to everything for free“.

And:

The commons is an alternative mode of production. The problems we are confronted with are not problems of resource-availability. They are problems that arise from the current mode of production. Fortunately, in some areas, we are witnessing a shift from the capitalist mode of production (based on property, command, value exchange via money, resources and labour exploitation, dependent on growth and striving for profit) into a commons mode of production (based on possession, contribution, sharing, self interest and initiative, where the GDP is a negligible indicator and the aim is a „good life“ < bem viver). Many “Common Based Peer Production” projects are developing successfully. This is especially true for the production of knowledge (Wikipedia, Free Software, Open Design). But there is a thrilling discussion going on about how principles of commons based peer production can be transferred to the production of what we eat, wear and move with, at least to a certain extent. I believe that this is possible. Firstly because knowledge makes up the lion’s share of each kind of production. All goods are latent knowledge products. There is no car production or eggproduction without a concept and a design behind (which make the lion’s share of its „market value“). Secondly because there are many kinds of commons sectors (care economy, solidarity economy) which have not been commodified yet and where commons values and rules are deeply rooted. Those sectors are evidence that every day many of the things we need to live are produced outside the market.

Do read the whole thing if you can: it's really worth it.

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What's Wrong with this Picture?

Ignoring the parodistic language, that is:

Essentially, with the Internet, capitalism gifts the masses with a false commons where people can work, off the clock, creating information and relationships that the ruling class can enclose, appropriate, commodify, and sell back to us at a later date. It’s a way of letting the process of primitive accumulation work as a perpetual, and because of the stagnation of the economies in the advanced capitalist countries, vital, supplement to the mechanism of exploitation, and one that should be seen alongside the other forms of primitive accumulation that are occurring right now and are, for sure, much more important: the direct seizure of Iraqi resources, the copyrighting and commodifying of the material of our bodies, and most obviously, the accumulation by dispossession that is occurring in Africa, in China, in Latin America, as capitalism pushes to its limits and attempts to expunge from the earth any trace of commonly-held land.

What's wrong with it? Well, centrally, it looks at things purely in monetary terms: that everything has a price, and that everything has to be paid for. In many ways, the central insight of commons-based activities is that there are things of worth beyond money, things that capitalism really can't capture (luckily).

Or as Michel Bauwens puts it in his own reply in the same post:

The last thing we want and need to do is the be so mentally colonized by the logic of market exchange that all we can and want to ask is just for a bigger piece of the pie. The key question is: how can we both preserve the social achievements of participation and peer production, and make a living at the same time. Out of the answers to this question will come the new social forms.

On the Categorisation of Peer Production

Kant would have loved this one.

Here's a remarkable wiki from the P2P Foundation that seeks to explore and categorise the efflorescence of peer production that's going on these days. It's remarkable for its range, and for the fact that it includes just about every key word and concept used in this blog - with the exception of "open genomics" - complete with links to further wiki pages on topics like the Genome Commons. Amazing. (Via On The Commons.)