[cc-community] Green at the iSummit or "Commons and Social Change"
Giorgos Cheliotis
giorgos at smu.edu.sg
Wed Apr 2 04:02:41 EDT 2008
I think it's clear that there is great interest in stretching the agenda
of the summit a bit beyond its traditional boundaries, although there
are also valid concerns about stretching it too much. Dedicating an
entire track to "green" issues would lead many to ask why the summit is
stretching so much into a specific area that only partly overlaps with
typical isummit themes.
Allow me to propose an alternative: why not consider for this year's
summit or for next year a "Commons and Social Change" track, i.e. a
track on how free culture and the digital commons movement can instigate
social change or influence as well as learn from broader sociopolitical
movements?
"Green" issues would belong to such a track, but I think we should make
space for a broader set of links between social issues, movements for
change and the summit.
These links are already apparent in the works and words of some of the
leaders of the movement. For example, I believe Lessig is moving from
"Change Copyright" to "Change Congress" for a reason: there is a direct
connection between the two and some of the same underlying motivations.
Also, when Benkler talks about Networks and the Sharing Economy, he is
advocating a new model of organization of production, and this also goes
well beyond the main themes of the summit. When Boyle talks about
Cultural Environmentalism, he is borrowing some of the language of
environmentalists to advocate a broader culture of preservation of
resources of common value, and this could be any type of resources,
again going beyond both the isummit agenda and the green agenda.
Such topics, which are of interest to many of us, if not all of us,
deserve a platform, a space to be heard, discussed and possibly turned
into actionable items. Dedicating a track to these themes might be very
beneficial.
Giorgos
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