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We work with public administrations and small and large organisations to devise, develop and execute programmes to convey a transformative vision of the economy, help people and projects change their approach, reflect on whether in the so-called “new platform economy” everything is platformable , explore public and/or community infrastructures and technologies that facilitate the response to people’s needs, promote cooperation between projects in the face of competition and share data collected by the platforms and their analysis, information and knowledge…

Transition programmes aim to support collaborative and cooperativeprojects, help them move away from extractivist models and competition to bring them closer to the solidarity and commons economy, with the 5 Pillar of Sustainability Model as a common thread. The materials (shared here) are still only available in Catalan:

INTRODUCTION

Readings Introduction to the commons
Canvases (What-Who-How)

COMMUNITY

Readings Community Pillar
Canvases DimensionDegreesArticulation

SHARING

Readings Sharing Pillar
Canvases LegacyConnectingOpening

 

CO-GOVERNANCE

Readings Co-governance Pillar
Canvases ValuesLevels of ParticipationLegal FormOpening

MOBILISED RESOURCES

Readings Mobilised Resources Pillar
Canvases Resources to be mobilized Models

 

These projects focus on the commons as opposed to extractivist economies that encourage creating StartUps, which often lack a business model and seek to be sustained through funding rounds, business angels and/or oligopolistic giants, and which are neither economically nor environmentally sustainable, while they put social rights at risk. Therefore, our Transition Programmes do not seek to replicate these models by creating alternatives for the social market, because they are not replicable and trying to do so, usually leads directly to failure. The aim is to find alternative models to meet the challenges identified.

Our Programmes and Support sessions offer flexible itineraries that can be adapted to the needs of each community and environment. Their duration depends on the number of iterations on the 5 pillars of the Commons that are deemed appropriate for each situation, from 3 hours to 3 months (26 sessions). See the case of La Comunificadora.

Resources

Readings

A pack with 6 readings, between 20 and 30 pages, with an introductory dossier and five more dossiers to work on each of the 5 pillars of sustainability of the commons. Each dossier is structured in a short introduction,  key concepts, examples, tools to use, a related bibliography and a list of recommended videos.

Canvases

Canvases, with diagrams or sequential diagrams, invite participants to work on concrete aspects of the co-design process and reflect on the results. Whether printed on paper or plastic, to work on with pencil or stickers on a table, as a wall mural, as a carpet on the floor (by positioning the participants on them), or as digital canvases, they help structure and give clear guidelines for interaction in project development, with the support of a facilitator or with the help of a pre-prepared guide.

Games

Cooperative games are used to learn complex concepts in a fun way, through passion and imagination. It is also a resource to facilitate a shift away from competitive experiences and to experience the creative power of dialogue and cooperation between teams. The game can be useful for introducing a concept and also for its consolidation, or a starting point for further development.

Group sessions – Activation, mapping of experiences and exploration of sectors

Mapping sessions show a snapshot of a space and a moment, facilitates the approach to the reality of a complex and changing territory. It is useful to identify the actors (people, organisations, projects, experiences, …) that may be relevant (for, against, or indifferent), to facilitate a transition to the commons and the current and potential relationships between these actors.

Open to everyone, group sessions aim to identify the needs of a community and see how they can be solved from a commons perspective.

These actions (dissemination, mapping of local needs, knowledge-sharing capsules, mapping of available resources), carried out in 4-hour sessions, can be part of a 1st phase of the Transition Programme (and help prepare the candidate projects) or simply have an exploratory or disruptive character for processes that will develop autonomously.

In one or more thematic sessions (on urban commons, culture, leisure, media, citizen participation, neighbourhoods, knowledge and research, consumption, finance, environment, agroecology, circular economy, rural, natural, feminisms, care and migration, maker manufacturing, networks, internet of things, blockchain, …) they will mainly serve to explore partnerships between existing projects and resources.

If they are executed as the 1st phase of the programme, these sessions will end with an “open mentoring” for, with the help of the mentors of the programme, defining the needs of the community and start the process of training and selecting the teams that will participate in the next phase..

Group dynamics – hands-on workshops, social workshops, prototyping hackathons,…

In the preparation and facilitation of groups within transitional co-design processes, it is necessary to know how to identify the type of environment in which to work together: a meeting, a day, a working session, a hackathon.

Selecting the different types of key agents to fulfil the proposed objective, knowing how to identify and create the appropriate spaces, having enough convening power for actors to set aside time to participate and knowing how to set the pace and intensity of the action.

Someone (a person or team) takes on the role of the facilitator-mediator, helps to unblock situations of confusion or lack of motivation.

An example of this is a prototyping hackathon. A meeting in which people with different profiles and experiences are brought together to devise one or more projects or to make progress in their prototyping. It is hoped that they will leave the meeting with a defined project, some aspects already resolved and some solutions to explore. What has been generated in the meeting is published openly so that it can be reused and these people or others can continue developing the project.