the ommon good economy21ax0w3am0j23cz0qd1q1n3u-wpengine.netdna-ssl.com/... · there is a clear...

EuroScientist - European science conversation by the community, for the community

www.euroscientist.com

25/11/2015

Read this post online: http://www.euroscientist.com/common-good-economy

EuroScience | 1, Quai Lezay-Marnésia | F-67000 Strasbourg | France

Tel +33 3 8824 1150 | Fax +33 3 8824 7556 | [email protected] | www.euroscience.org

The Common Good Economy

A EuroScientist Special Issue – November 2015

http://www.euroscientist.com/



25/11/2015




Table of Content

Table of Content ........................................................................................................................................................... 2

Introduction ....................................................................................................................................................... 3

Welcome to this Special Issue of EuroScientist on: Common Good Economy! ............................................................ 3

Editorial ............................................................................................................................................................. 4

Reinventing science’s social contract in the 21st century ............................................................................................. 4

Science’s role ..................................................................................................................................................... 7

Climate diplomacy in full steam ahead of COP21 ......................................................................................................... 7

Science’s role ................................................................................................................................................... 12

John Ioannidis: how science can be put to the common good use ............................................................................ 12

Reinventing economies .................................................................................................................................... 15

The Linux approach to human and ecosystem well being .......................................................................................... 15


Economy for the common good: an economic model for the future ......................................................................... 18


The importance of a common pool mentality ............................................................................................................ 21

Visions for the future ....................................................................................................................................... 24

A new beginning to tackle the global emergency ....................................................................................................... 24

Visions for the future ....................................................................................................................................... 28

The role of science in fostering a common good economy ........................................................................................ 28




25/11/2015




Introduction

Welcome to this Special Issue of EuroScientist on: Common

Good Economy!

This issue shares the perspectives from scientists and economics, as well as various actors involved in resolving societal challenges and changing the current economic order from a top-down hierarchy to a more distributed and horizontal governance, to favour localisation and greater equity between all involved.

We have gathered an impressive collection of contributions from South Africa to California and from Spain to Ireland. No doubt, the variety of views exposed and the common underlying messages will give EuroScientist readers food for thought.

There is a clear emerging trend, at the age of networked living: we are all citizens of the world, as Bono, the U2 front man, pointed out at his first concert in Dublin on 23rd November 2015. Today, rock stars are not the only ones who can express themselves and be heard. We all have a role to play and chip in to define what we expect from the world of tomorrow.

Please, do us the favour to redistribute these articles widely within your own networks, so that we can get the debate started on how we wish to shape the future, our future.

The EuroScientist team.

Photo Credit: Etienne Valois (CC BY-SA 2.0)


https://www.flickr.com/photos/etienne_valois/20050013258/



25/11/2015




Editorial

Reinventing science’s social contract in the 21st century

By Sabine Louët

Stakes are high in the social and solidarity economy to help foster common good solution

After the Second World War, Western countries promoted a social contract between science and society. Then, huge public funds made available for scientific research were expected, in the long run, to lead to industrial development, economic growth and a general improvement of living standards. At the time, there was a clear and unique goal. This contract appears to have proven effective. No better proof is the omnipresence in our daily lives of technological applications stemming from research, such as computers, high speed trains or advanced medical analysis equipment.

Yet, this model has been questioned for a few years.




25/11/2015




We have reached an era where the notion of Common Good is no longer the main focus. Granted, research is increasingly complex and expensive. Granted, the scandal of contaminated blood in the 80s' in France and the nuclear catastrophe at Fukushima in Japan in 2011 have led to a loss of faith in science. Granted, public funding often does not make research a priority, as decision-makers fail to see its importance in the overall competition for budgets.

Until now, our society had accepted the rise to power of an economic model, which does not aim at serving society as a whole. Rather, power was exercised to fulfill to the short term vision of a minority combined with a lowest costs pursuit. What we now need is to reinvent a social contract for science fit for the 21st century!

We have little choice in the matter if we hope to tackle today's major social challenges. Indeed, we need to find solutions to wide-ranging issues including climate change and food security as well as migrations and energy. But these problems cannot be solved without the help of all the sciences, including the fields of natural, social and human sciences.

At the dawn of the open science era, the internet revolution and the explosion of social media have already helped in leveling the playing field. More than ever, these technologies make it possible for everybody to access, understand and share the data generated by scientists. This, in turn, can help restore the trust between citizens and science. In parallel, greater expectations from citizens concerning the level of communication and accountability from scientists, will affect aspects of research such as ethics, integrity and transparency.

But we need to go further than that.

Everywhere in the world, revisiting the social contract between science and society is becoming urgent; it is time to adapt such a contract to the realities of the 21st century. One attempt to progress the issue is the introduction of the concept of RRI, Responsible Research and Innovation, by the European Commission in the Horizon 2020 funding program. It aims to facilitate the participation of stakeholders--including that of society--in research and innovation choices. The idea is to help them appropriate, influence and contribute to the process.

This approach is not about controlling or repressing the inspiration and creativity that drives research. Science can only suffer from being shackled in bureaucratic chains, justified by the need to meet short term objectives and fulfill mandatory evaluations. Nevertheless, this new contract is about providing scientists the means of sustaining the necessary intellectual effort to meet the challenge that they choose to tackle.

To ease this transition towards greater integration with society's needs, all involved in the scientific process have the possibility to self-organise via networks. This, in turn, would render the protagonists involved in the scientific process less dependent on a “top-down” hierarchy. Instead, they would be able to establish research priorities based on a “bottom-up” decision-making scenario. This is precisely where opportunities open up for an increased involvement of stakeholders--and, among those, citizens in particular.




25/11/2015




There is little doubt that science will only be able to meet the expectations of society by rebuilding ties with the spirit of the Common Good. With this in mind, we are calling to members of the social and solidarity economy (SSE) sphere. We hope that the possibilities afforded by science will become a central element in their reflections. This engagement would also help scientists apply their knowledge in a more sustainable manner, with the aim of reaching equally sustainable solutions to the hurdles they aim to overcome.

The future of scientific research--and ipso facto of mankind--more than ever requires a long term vision at the service of society, set in a context that will benefit society in a solidary manner and demonstrating a deep respect for the environment.

Gilles Mirambeau, Virologist, UPMC Sorbonne (Paris) & IDIBAPS (Barcelone), Member of EuroScientist editorial board

Sabine Louët, Editor EuroScientist

Luc Van Dyck, Senior Policy consultant, EuroScience

Illustration credit: KJBevan via Shutterstock.


http://www.rencontres-montblanc.coop/en/page/save-date-26-28-november-2015-7-edition-mont-blanc-meetings

http://www.rencontres-montblanc.coop/en/page/save-date-26-28-november-2015-7-edition-mont-blanc-meetings

http://www.cop21.gouv.fr/en/

http://image.shutterstock.com/display_pic_with_logo/556855/556855,1275634795,1/stock-photo-business-through-technology-isolated-on-black-54502978.jpg



25/11/2015




Science’s role

Climate diplomacy in full steam ahead of COP21

By Maria Delaney

Despite the key role science has to play in discussions, politicians make the ultimate decisions

The mechanics of science diplomacy have been in full steam mode in preparation for the United Nations (UN) conference on climate change, the 21st Conference of Parties (COP21). It aims to achieve a legally binding and universal agreement on climate change to try and limit global warming. Starting in Paris on 30th November 2015, COP21 is a perfect opportunity to examine the role of science diplomacy in influencing international policy making.


http://www.cop21.gouv.fr/



25/11/2015




Although there are many hours of discussion ahead, a lot of effort has already been invested in influencing talks prior to the event. The ultimate decisions are out of the scientists' hands. However, experts believe that all of this moving and shaking is influencing the way politicians and policy makers make choices for the Common Good; namely, in this case, to protect us from the possible devastating effect of climate change.

Science-flavoured diplomacy

What does science diplomacy actually mean? Peter Dogse, co-chair of the UNESCO task force on COP21 and Climate Change, based in Paris, France, defines it as "the science that looks at solving problems, which concerns international relations and common sustainability endeavours." He cites the particle physics laboratory CERN, the International Hydrological Programme (IHP) and the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission (IOC) as just some examples of science diplomacy in action.

Science diplomacy will also matter during COP21 negotiations towards a new global climate change agreement. Specifically, the parties involved have to decide on actions that will contribute to limiting global temperature rise to 2°C by 2100. The pressure is on, as current Kyoto Protocol commitments on greenhouse gas emissions run out in 2020.

When it comes to climate change negotiations, “science has driven this whole process since the beginning," says Alden Meyer, director of strategy and policy for the Cambridge, Massachussetts-headquartered Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) in the USA. He has been at almost all COPs since their inception in the 1990s. He believes the publication of the first Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) resulted in UN-led climate negotiations, and subsequently, the Rio Treaty.

Evidence-based discussions in action

So how does science diplomacy actually work? Much of the work in advance of COP21 is public awareness. "The main focus now is to consolidate what is known and to present it in an understandable way," points out Dogse. The work done prior to COP21, ensures that the public and policy makers are aware of "where we are heading and what we can do about it," adds Dogse. He believes that science provides a baseline of the problems but also the solutions. Policy makers and politicians rely on this knowledge as they put together their individual objectives and, subsequently, during negotiations.

A lot of effort has gone into preparing for COP21 negotiations, ahead of the event. This is a process where prior discussions have been held during many scientific meetings. These included the 3rd UN World Conference on Disaster Risk Reduction held in Sendai Japan, in March 2015 and the conference Our Common Future under Climate Change, in July 2015, in Paris.

In parallel, other meetings that were not geared to climate science also contributed to the debate. For example, science policy events, such as the 2015 World Science Forum, held in Budapest in November, also made a declaration supporting the "use of scientific evidence in policy making."


http://www.unesco.org/new/en/natural-sciences/environment/ecological-sciences/man-and-biosphere-programme/about-mab/mab-secretariat/

http://home.cern/

http://water.usgs.gov/nrp/IHP/

http://www.ioc-unesco.org/

http://www.unep.org/newscentre/default.aspx?DocumentID=26854&ArticleID=35542

http://www.unep.org/newscentre/default.aspx?DocumentID=26854&ArticleID=35542

http://unfccc.int/focus/mitigation/pre_2020_ambition/items/8165.php

http://www.ucsusa.org/about/staff/staff/alden-meyer.html#.Viir5_mrRQA

http://www.ucsusa.org/

http://www.ipcc.ch/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inter-American_Treaty_of_Reciprocal_Assistance

http://www.wcdrr.org/

http://www.wcdrr.org/

http://www.commonfuture-paris2015.org/

http://www.commonfuture-paris2015.org/

http://www.sciforum.hu/declaration/index.html



25/11/2015




Prior to that, a call for "decisive action to limit future global emissions” came from a declaration initially signed by 36 Nobel laureate at the 65th Lindau Nobel Laureates Meeting, in July 2015. Since July, many more have signed the declaration, according to Brian Schmidt, Nobel laureate in physics and astronomer at the Australian National University, in Canberra, who coordinated the declaration.

Many key documents have also been published in the run up to COP21 and 140 countries submitted their proposed contributions to the event to date. For example, Agenda 2030, outlining the latest UN sustainable development goals, was launched at the last UN General Assembly, in New York, USA, in September 2015.

But the main report cited by most experts in advance of the meeting is the IPCC fifth assessment. Dogse emphasises that it is "through IPCC assessments that science policy makers have woken up to the stark reality that they have to do something jointly."

Behind the scenes

Science diplomacy has moved now past the basics of climate science, into topics such as the economic impact of inaction, according to Dave Reay, professor of carbon management at the University of Edinburgh, UK. Politicians and policy makers now “get the importance of climate change as a risk and an opportunity for their nations, businesses, and stakeholders,” he adds.

The debate around climate change inaction has led some scientists to blame democracy and the political order in the Western world, according to Nico Stehr, founding director of the European Centre for Sustainability Research at Zeppelin University in Friedrichshafen, Germany. He recently warned against changing the current political order in an opinion piece published in Nature.

So how effective has science diplomacy been at previous COPs? There clearly is frustration that we are not doing more and not doing it faster, according to UCS Meyer. He adds that this is not a new dynamic and has “been in this process every step of the way since the Rio Treaty".

However, “we're in a much better place to deal with the problems” compared to where the world was in advance of the COP15 in 2009 in Copenhagen, says Nobel laureate Schmidt. He adds that this is partly because the effects of climate change have become much starker in the last five years.

Witnessing such effects has done a lot to convince politicians on the need to act. UNESCO's Dogse feels that this reality and science diplomacy work hand-in-hand as "it is through science that we can say that effects seen can be attributed to climate change. Without science, it would perhaps just be interpreted as freak, but natural conditions, not meriting reductions in greenhouse gas emissions."


http://www.lindau-nobel.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/Mainau-Declaration-2015-EN.pdf

http://www.lindau-nobel.org/

https://www.mso.anu.edu.au/~brian/

http://www4.unfccc.int/submissions/INDC/Submission%20Pages/submissions.aspx

https://sustainabledevelopment.un.org/post2015/transformingourworld

http://www.un.org/ga/search/view_doc.asp?symbol=A/RES/70/1&Lang=E

https://www.ipcc.ch/report/ar5/

http://www.geos.ed.ac.uk/homes/dreay

https://www.zu.de/lehrstuehle/kulturwissenschaften/index.php

http://www.nature.com/news/climate-policy-democracy-is-not-an-inconvenience-1.18393



25/11/2015




Politics versus science

However, Schmidt recognises that “it’s not just a bunch of scientists making the decisions, it is politicians”. The astronomer wants them to use the scientific evidence to make the best possible decision.

Still, some believe that science should not get inter-twined with politics in such as way. “[The Lindau declaration] is a political statement”, says professor Daniel Sarewitz, co-director of the Consortium for Science, Policy & Outcomes (CSPO) at Arizona State University, USA. He adds: “everybody wants to yield authority to support the political perspective that they think is the one that should win the day.” But he thinks that there should be a boundary between science and politics.

He feels that climate change is fundamentally a political, not a scientific issue. “There are infinite options available to nations and societies in thinking how to address climate change," Sarewitz points out, adding: "The only way to adjudicate between those options is through politics.”

The trouble is evidence may not be enough to influence politicians and wider society. “Scientists tend to overestimate the power of their knowledge”, according to sustainability researcher Stehr. He adds: “it takes more than making pronouncements about expected changes in the climate in order to convince citizens and governments to act.”

Some agree that it is difficult to translate science into action. “The negotiations are not carried out by scientists,” but by public servants with a brief from their country of what they are willing to negotiate, according to John Sweeney, professor emeritus in geography at the National University of Ireland, in Maynooth.

Because of this, Sweeney believes that “national self-interest is still going to rule the roost in Paris and we won't see an agreement that's sufficiently strong from a scientific point of view as a consequence”.

Chances of success

The success of science diplomacy in devising effective solutions could also depend on how available evidence is used in practice. For instance, in tailoring the evidence to the specific users instead of relying on knowledge in a one size-fits-all scenario. For climate science to be translated into effective policy, there tends to be “an ongoing relationship between those creating the knowledge and those using it that allows them to understand each other,” notes CSPO's Sarewitz.

Integrating knowledge about climate change into day-to-day decision making is key, according to Dutch expert Arthur Petersen, professor of science, technology and public policy at University College London, UK, who has been involved in all of the IPCC reports. He also was scientific adviser on environment and infrastructure policy for the Dutch Government for 13 years.

Based on his extensive experience, Petersen feels that “the IPCC is a good source of knowledge for the overarching goals but it is not tailored to specific users” and this is a “huge gap.” For instance, in the Netherlands, IPCC findings are translated into national models and scenarios. It is “legally mandated that


http://cspo.org/people/sarewitz-daniel/

http://cspo.org/

http://cspo.org/

https://www.maynoothuniversity.ie/geography/our-people/john-sweeney

https://www.ucl.ac.uk/steapp/people/petersen



25/11/2015




you use the scenarios of the Dutch Met Office in all kinds of decision making regarding the protection of our delta,” says Petersen.

The IPCC recommendations are “insufficiently connected to people who really have to make the decisions on the ground,” he adds. Petersen says that's “where the challenge now lies for science diplomacy around climate change”

Mixed expectations

For now, perhaps scientists need to manage their expectations. This is important before and during climate talks, according to UNESCO's Dogse. Sustainable researcher Stehr expects Paris will be a failure, primarily, “because it's very difficult, if not impossible, to gain consensus of so many nations”.

However, Dogse thinks that for COP21 "there are expectations but they are more manageable" than in previous talks. He is "pretty optimistic" but warns that it is important to keep in mind that this is an ongoing process, one which first started by "science and diplomacy working together."

Maria Delaney

Photo credit: Love the wind via Shutterstock


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delta_Works

http://twitter.com/mhdelaney

http://thumb1.shutterstock.com/display_pic_with_logo/2756824/307374434/stock-photo-hand-and-tree-in-lightbulb-on-earth-background-all-concept-beauty-freedom-peace-spirituality-307374434.jpg



25/11/2015




Science’s role

John Ioannidis: how science can be put to the common good

use

By Sabine Louët

Drivers of research may need to be tweaked to ensure better contribution to society

John Ioannidis is professor of medicine, health research and policy, and statistics at Stanford University where he holds the C.F. Rehnborg chair in disease prevention and directs the Stanford Prevention Research Center (SPRC). Prior to moving to Stanford in 2010, he was professor at the University Of Ioannina School Of Medicine in Greece.


https://med.stanford.edu/profiles/john-ioannidis

http://prevention.stanford.edu/



25/11/2015




He is best known for his work on biases that pervade research and on how to improve research methods and practices. He is the co-founder and co-director of the Meta-Research Innovation Center at Stanford (METRICS) which focuses on advancing research excellence and avoiding the common situation where most of the published research are false. In this interview with EuroScientist he reflects on possible new drivers for research to help scientists do research for the common good in the future.

Do research drivers need to be revised to enable research to be more effective?

Clearly, there is plenty of room for improvement. Most systems focus on productivity and generation of 'significant' findings.

Publications become tokens that buy grants and both of them buy faculty promotions. Less sophisticated universities and research institutions are happy even with just generating more papers, regardless of their impact. This ends up generating tons of low quality waste. More sophisticated universities also focus on claiming widely publicised discoveries, but most of them are not really as important as touted and often they are totally false and impossible to replicate.

I think that productivity and discovery-seeking is not necessarily a bad driver of research per se. But it needs to be coupled with emphasis on high-quality and rigorous methods.

Other aspects that are currently undervalued and need to become more important as drivers include replication/reproducibility, a sharing culture, and focusing on the translational potential of research--at least for applied research--as I have outlined in a Viewpoint article in JAMA in 2014.

As part of the research reorganisation, do you believe that policies related to grant allocation need to be revised too? If so, how?

I always marvel about how grant allocation strategies were developed. They are different across countries, funding agencies and institutions, but their common denominator is that they have no scientific evidence to support how they work.

We don’t really know what the best way is to review science. Peer review is important and I trust is useful, but it is unlikely that we are exploiting its full potential. Some empirical studies suggest that most current peer review practices allow for large components of randomness, may allow major errors to pass through, and are negative towards out-of-the-box, truly innovative ideas.

This does not mean that I would immediately replace the way things are done with other processes simply because they seem better. Science needs to be scientifically studied. This applies also to policies of grant allocation. This should be done ideally with rigorous, comparative, experimental studies.

Should the drivers of research be made better aligned with serving society's needs? If so, do you believe that we need to reward those who do? If so, how?

In principle, absolutely, research needs to serve society’s needs. However, the devil is in the details.


http://metrics.stanford.edu/

http://journals.plos.org/plosmedicine/article?id=10.1371/journal.pmed.0020124

http://jama.jamanetwork.com/article.aspx?articleid=1877218&resultClick=3



25/11/2015




Society is best served when scientific research is well-funded. And when the best and brightest are attracted to work in science as well as when research is done with rigorous methods that safeguard getting the most credible results possible. It is also best served when conflicts of interest are minimised.

Research that directly addresses a problem of major importance for society should have priority when it comes to investigations that have clear deliverables. However, there is a large share of research where there are no clear deliverables and it is impossible to tell ahead of time where, how, when, and if societal benefit will be reaped. This type of blue skies research is also important.

Therefore, society is best served in principle when we do the best research we can do and in the most rigorous way. And we need to reward those who perform such research, regardless of whether they can immediately develop deliverables or not. How to best do this should be the focus of scientific studies rather than philosophical, administrative or political agendas.

What kind of new social contract do we need between scientists and citizens?

Scientists have a contract to seek the truth, no matter what. Given my medical background, I would also add that scientists also have an imperative to do good and do no harm - broadly defined beyond just health. Beyond that, scientists should have no primordial obligation by default to other social structures, be it governments, political parties, social lobbies, industry, corporations, NGOs, or other.

Scientists can help citizens by providing accurate information in making the best decisions and avoid being misled. The ideal goal would be to end up in a society where all citizens are also scientists to some extent--that is, they have a fair, balanced view of how much we know; and, more importantly, how much we don’t know.

Do you anticipate potential issues in giving a greater say to society's representatives in grant allocation policies or other form of participation from people outside research concerning future research directions?

I am very much in favour of involving society’s representatives in grant allocation practices, especially for grants that do have deliverables and aim to have a practical application that will affect people’s lives. However, we need more empirical evidence to understand how to do this and how to avoid the introduction of even more biases. For example, in a study we did in PCORI, we found that involvement of patient stakeholders resulted in changing extensively which grants were selected for funding. Half of the grants prioritised by scientists were discarded and replaced by grants selected by patients plus scientists.

But this does not guarantee that the outcomes will necessarily be better or that society’s representatives cannot be biased. Indeed, industry-related conflicts may well manipulate the views of patients and citizens and society preferences; perhaps even more easily than they can manipulate well-trained scientists.

Interview by Sabine Louët, Editor EuroScientist.

Photo Credit: John Ioannidis.


http://annals.org/article.aspx?articleid=1887029



25/11/2015




Reinventing economies

The Linux approach to human and ecosystem well being

By Lorenzo Fioramonti

Democracies are in dire need of an upgrade to deal with social complexity

Current versions of democracy are a bit like the DOS operating system in the 1980s. In the best cases, they may hold the promise of a more user-friendly Windows beaconing on the horizon. But forget about a participatory, interactive Linux system. Our democracies have bugs, lack user-friendly features and under-perform. Above all, they are in need of major upgrades.




25/11/2015




Top-down is passé

Governments are unable to address continuously evolving challenging conditions, while the economic system reinforces imbalances, proving completely inadequate to innovate. This is the very system deciding what products and services to deliver, by whom, when, using what resources, producing what kind of waste and for whose benefit.

The failure is so severe that within this century human civilisation and the ecosystems are at risk of substantial degradation, if not collapse. Scientists have warned that the sixth mass extinction---the fifth killed the dinosaurs---may have already started.

Political and economic systems are failing us because they are structured vertically--through top-down hierarchies. Not only does this make them unaccountable, but it makes them inefficient at dealing with social complexity. Vertical structures are also unstable and susceptible to cascading failures; top-level dysfunctions can easily propagate through the system in a domino effect. Think of the 2008 financial collapse, for example.

Nature's way

Fortunately, nature shows us a way forward. Take, for example, the human immune system. It is an intelligent decision-making system, replete with sensors and signal processing mechanisms. Decisions are typically made at the local level, with meso- and meta-level coordination occurring via a limited number of shared, distant interactions.

This type of complex systems exist throughout biology and ecology. All of them have been fine tuned by eons of evolution to a point of optimum stability and function. Anthropomorphically speaking, “act local, think global” is a recurring theme among biological complex systems. In terms of decision-making, these systems are deeply democratic and consensus-oriented. Decisions benefit both the parts and the whole. Important: decision-making is collaborative, cooperative, and inclusive--essentially all cells send signals to their environment and receive signals back too.

Nature's complex systems have already inspired a host of innovations designed to address the shortcomings of existing political and economic models. Structures of any scale, ranging from local groups, cities, organisations, and some progressive government agencies have already begun to experiment with complexity-oriented solutions. These include participatory budgeting, local and crypto-currency systems, public banking, buy-local and invest-local programmes and peer-to-peer lending. Others pursue initiatives such as smart cities and villages, open-source development, open-design, open-data, farmers markets and small organic farms, cooperative and socially responsible business models as well as crowdfunding.


http://www.theguardian.com/environment/radical-conservation/2015/oct/20/the-four-horsemen-of-the-sixth-mass-extinction



25/11/2015




Horizontal governance

We need to move beyond our vertical governance structures, which force us into obsolete and wasteful economies of scale, output-oriented growth and trickle-down development. Instead, we need to build a highly integrated horizontal economic system. This approach would be driven by localised forms of participation and championed by small businesses.

International indicators, such as the recently launched UN Inclusive Wealth Index, confirm that human capital is the most valuable resource for development in the 21st century. Efficiency in the horizontal economy is therefore about adapting to local needs, valuing people and building networks of small scale economic activities in as many fields as possible.

The horizontal economy will blend boundaries between producers and consumers ('prosumers'). They will be driven by integrated production solutions, smart transport and distribution system, new approaches to the care economy (healthcare, education, etc.), community development and resources fostering--as opposed to resources extraction. A variety of activities in personal services industry can also be added to the list.

We now have technologies, which support economic integration through horizontal scaling. That way, local initiatives can still interact regionally and globally. For example, the diffusion of local and complementary currencies--most of which are digital--spans from small to medium-size European towns to rural villages in Africa.

Further recent developments in new technologies may very well provide the type of opportunities for the localisation of highly integrated industrial systems. That's the case with 3D printing or energy production through small-grids powered by renewable resources. Technology experts, such as Jeremy Rifkin and Chris Anderson, believe that this is likely to constitute a new industrial revolution structured on lateral power.

This approach is best summed up by Joe Kraus, one of the leaders of the dot.com boom of the late 1990s. In his views, the availability of new manufacturing technologies makes the shift from the vertical to the horizontal economy easier than ever. This is because they help diversify production and multiple markets for local producers. “The 20th century was about dozens of markets of millions of consumers," he was once quoted by a BBC magazine, "The 21st century is about millions of markets of dozens of consumers.”

In the end, what the horizontal economy aims to pursue is a system of distributed governance, reinvigorating citizens’ inputs into both political and economic processes. In a sense, it is the Linux approach to human and ecosystem well being.

Lorenzo Fioramonti

Lorenzo is professor of political economy at the University of Pretoria, South Africa. He is also the director of the Centre for the Study of Governance Innovation.

Photo credit: nopporn via Shutterstock


http://inclusivewealthindex.org/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Local_currency

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Complementary_currency

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jeremy-rifkin/the-third-industrial-revo_b_981168.html

http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13414678-makers?

http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13414678-makers?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joe_Kraus

http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-23990211

https://twitter.com/lofioramonti

http://governanceinnovation.org/lorenzo-fioramonti/

http://image.shutterstock.com/display_pic_with_logo/710830/97936574/stock-photo-businessman-holding-social-network-97936574.jpg



25/11/2015





Economy for the common good: an economic model for the

future

By Christian Felber

Classical economic science has to widen its narrow money-bound horizon to fulfill human fundamental values

According to a poll by the Bertelsmann Foundation in the summer of 2010, which was repeated in 2012, 80 to 90% of Germans and Austrians desire a “new economic order.” The time is ripe for a new "Great Transformation," as described by Karl Polanyi in a book published in 1944. The idea is to re-embed the economy into the social context, a set of constitutional base values and the ecological foundations of life. For this quantum leap to happen, classical economic science has to widen its narrow money-bound horizon to become a holistic science.


http://www.zeit.de/wirtschaft/2012-08/umfrage-deutschland-wirtschaftsordnung

http://inctpped.ie.ufrj.br/spiderweb/pdf_4/Great_Transformation.pdf

http://inctpped.ie.ufrj.br/spiderweb/pdf_4/Great_Transformation.pdf



25/11/2015




Path to Common Good

The majority of the people already agreed. According to another representative poll, 67% of the Germans wish a Gross National Happiness to replace the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in measuring a nation's success.

The move would only put the economy in coherence with existing democratic constitutions. Indeed, the Bavarian Constitution, for example, states: “The whole economic activity serves the common good.” The German founding law, the Grundgesetz, says: “Property obliges. It's use shall always serve the welfare of all.”

The Economy for the Common Good (ECG) is a 5-years-young alternative economic model. There, economic actors--namely, businesses, investors, consumers, public procurers--strive for the common good. And not for financial gain or GDP growth.

Rewarding ethical achievements

The core of this idea is simple: economic success is currently measured using monetary indicators such as GDP, financial profit or the return on investment--which, in fact, are the means of the economy, not their end. Today, success is not measured in terms of human needs, quality of life and fulfillment of fundamental values--which in fact are the goals of the economy.

To fundamentally rectify this distorted practice, we need to introduce a “Common Good Product”, “Common Good Balance Sheets” and a “Common Good Creditworthiness Assessment” (CGCA) . For instance, loans will only be granted in the ECG if the ethical assessment is positive.

Political measures will be discussed according to their contribution to the Common Good Product. Good balance sheet results of companies shall be rewarded with lower taxes, tariffs, better loan conditions and priority in public procurement. Thanks to these legal incentives, ethical products and services would become cheaper to consumers than less ethical ones. As a consequence, only responsible businesses can survive whereas non-ethical business would have to change or exit markets.

The strongest advantage of the ECG is that it is not limited to a theoretical model. The international movement 'Economy for the Common Good' started in October 2010, based on the initiative of a dozen companies in Austria. Since then, almost 2,000 businesses from 50 nations have joined the movement: from Sekem in Egypt to the Sparda Bank Munich; from Sonnentor in Austria to CanCet in Catalunya, from VAUDE in South Germany to a Camphill Community in the USA. About 250 of them have already implemented the common good balance sheet and submit it to an external audit.


http://www.umweltbundesamt.de/en/publikationen/umweltbewusstsein-in-deutschland-2014

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basic_Law_for_the_Federal_Republic_of_Germany

https://www.ecogood.org/en

https://www.ecogood.org/en/common-good-balance-sheet



25/11/2015




Better insights required

Scientific research is now needed on how all types of companies and organisations can implement such an ethical balance sheet, including large stock market companies. Currently, the universities of Flensburg and Kiel are working with three corporations listed at the Frankfurt Stock Exchange on the applicability of the Common Good Balance Sheet in big companies.

In addition, further investigation could uncover how to improve the existing ECG instrument--currently a raw diamond--to transform it into a fully holistic instrument encompassing all values such as human dignity, solidarity, justice, sustainability, transparency, and democracy--as well as becoming effective and susceptible to be evaluated externally.

What is more, research could also help figure out which would be the most effective legal consequences to make ethical businesses viable. The incentives could range from priority in public procurement over taxes and tariffs to different loan conditions and being listed or not in "regional common good stock markets".

Finally, further technological support could help bring the common good balance result on all products and services--on a scale ranging from 1,600 to 1,000 common good points. Already an implementation project has started within the ECG movement.

Bottom-up approach

At the political level, the movement seeks to bring about changes to current legislation via democratic bottom-up processes. On the one hand, the ECG movement has drafted a proposal for a new economic order composed by 20 core elements which is described in my book 'Change Everything. Creating an Economy for the Common Good', published in June 2015. Money shall become a public good, cooperation shall be enhanced, "counter-petition" de-incentivated; a variety of types of property shall coexist; and trade shall become a means, not a goal.

The movement also demands a democratic and participatory process. There, all core elements of this new economic order will be discussed in economic conventions. Ultimately, the goal would be to draft a new economic constitution. The final vote on all cornerstones--between several alternatives in each--will remain with the sovereign citizens.

Christian Felber

Christian works as an independent author of best-sellers about the economy. As a writer based in Vienna, he regularly contributes to Austrian newspapers. He has a background in psychology, sociology and political Sciences and has been a lecturer at the Vienna University of Economics and Business since 2008. He is a co-founder of Attac Austria and initiator of the projects "Bank for the Common Good" and "Economy for the Common Good". In his spare time, he enjoys being a contemporary dancer and contact improviser.

Photo credit: Uschi Oswald


http://www.zedbooks.co.uk/node/20840

https://www.ecogood.org/en/download/file/fid/557

http://www.christian-felber.at/cv/christian-felber-profile.pdf

http://www.wu.ac.at/

http://www.uschioswald.at/



25/11/2015





The importance of a common pool mentality

By Haydn Shaughnessy

Common resources are best managed by the people who most benefit from them

In last year’s November sales, the Chinese technology platform Alibaba handled peak traffic of 80,000 orders per second. This is an incredible feat, matched, if not exceeded, by another occasion when a denial of service attack rained over 450 Gigabytes per second of traffic on its site; Alibaba repelled it. Not surprisingly a company with these capabilities is one of the richest in the world.

The stark fact is though, that the Alibaba platform is mostly made up of open source components or what can be better referred to as common pool resources. For those who don’t follow open source innovation, it is worth clarifying two points. First, open source is created outside the enterprise by a nominally open and self-regulated community of developers. Second, there is nothing unusual about a large enterprise relying on these open communities for their computing software. Open source now drives most of the basic innovation in IT, even in hardware.


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denial-of-service_attack

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denial-of-service_attack



25/11/2015




In the broader endeavour to innovate more quickly we have also seen 'open' initiatives in design and engineering. And we have seen attempts to create open access publishing for science as well as open biology through citizen laboratories.

Governance

What is missing from these initiatives outside IT, is a sense of how the common pool should be run. Open source software has norms and values that help produce good code. Despite having norms and values, a number of companies still fail to do good open source because they struggle to align with a new set of values. As an example, the failed attempt by Nokia in 2009 to create a bureaucratic version of open source--opening up 20 million lines of its Symbian operating system--is a large part of the reason why Nokia no longer exists.

Yet open source software has offered a model of how to innovate and do business differently. Executing open programmes, though, is tough.

The global economy is becoming more dependent on common pool resources; and not just on the creative commons of non-copyrighted information. These include the basic infrastructure of the world wide web, the maverick or Black Swan protocols around the virtual currency Bitcoin. Such initiatives are stimulating new thinking on an Internet of Finance, and the inevitable growth of non-institutional bio-science, engineering as well as product design through customer participation.

Managing the Common Pool

As the economy becomes more dependent on common pool activity, it is also becoming more polarised between people who work in the common pool ecosystem--often for low rewards--and the platforms (such as Apple, Google, Uber) that can exploit common intellectual assets to create astounding rewards (Apple recently posted the largest profits in corporate history). Solving this dilemma could be the key to a true open innovation ecosystem.

Still, there is a difference between 'open' and 'common.' The Nobel prize-winning economist Elinor Ostrom spent a good deal of her time investigating how common pool resources are best managed. By a common pool, she meant entities like lakes and the communities that form around them. Or policing and how the activities of a police force are best controlled to avoid corruption and waste.

She found that almost without exception, common resources are best managed by the people who are most affected by them. She also found that above the local level, arrangements are more effective when they are polycentric; that is when they avoid one monolithic governance structure. Think, for example, of European fisheries policy and stock depletion. This gives a sense of how a centralised policy can wreck a resource pool.


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_design

http://www.euroscientist.com/open-access-sails-on-despite-stormy-waters/

http://www.euroscientist.com/towards-increasing-citizens-contribution-to-research/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creative_Commons

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creative_Commons

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/apple/11959016/Apple-reports-biggest-annual-profit-in-history.html

http://www.euroscientist.com/open-innovation-special-issue/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elinor_Ostrom



25/11/2015




Without common pool resources, Alibaba would never have been able to process 80,000 orders per second. With common pool resources, many scientific challenges could be solved. For example, General Electric has bet on such an approach with its cancer diagnostics and industrial data initiatives. In both cases, it has opened up data to the science community to create new solutions.

The missing ingredient is how these common pools can be maximised so that innovation becomes an enriching activity for all of us. The missing ingredient, in other words, is polycentric management, a form of science and innovation where more of us who are affected can manage the resources.

Haydn Shaughnessy

Haydn is a writer and co-founder of The Disruption House, a think tank for disruptive economics, and the author of Shift: A User’s Guide to the New Economy

Photo credit: Tonis Pan via Shutterstock


https://twitter.com/haydn1701

http://www.thedisruptionhouse.com/

http://haydnshaughnessy.com/shift/

http://www.shutterstock.com/pic.mhtml?id=41497474&src=lb-40173827



25/11/2015




Visions for the future

A new beginning to tackle the global emergency

By Frederico Mayor Zaragoza

Education to give citizens the tools to self-determination, while science and innovation points to possible solutions

In 2000, the UNESCO Earth Charter opened with this lucid preamble: "We stand at a critical moment in Earth's history, a time when humanity must choose its future. As the world becomes increasingly interdependent and fragile, the future at once holds great peril and great promise." It then continued: "To move forward we must recognise that in the midst of a magnificent diversity of cultures and life forms we are one human family and one Earth community with a common destiny. We must join together to bring forth a sustainable global society founded on respect for nature, universal human rights, economic justice, and a culture of peace…”.


http://www.earthcharterinaction.org/



25/11/2015




The charter concluded: “As never before in history, common destiny beckons us to seek a new beginning." Fifteen years later, we face the deterioration of ecological conditions and the widening of social inequality. We are also confronted with the marginalisation of ethical standards and of the democratic multilateralism that is absolutely essential to operate the much needed radical changes of direction.

Shift in values

Clearly, neoliberalism has replaced the United Nations (UN) system by an ineffective plutocratic groups, such as the G-6, G-7, G-8, G-20. We are now confronted with potentially irreversible processes, potentially leading us to a point of no return. It is therefore essential that the scientific, academic, artistic and intellectual communities, all together, mobilise humanity.

As humanity now consists of world citizens, they all have to urgently implement the pressing radical changes required to preserve the conditions that make Earth habitable. This is now possible because, unlike previously, people can increasingly express themselves and be aware of the latest developments on a global scale, thanks to digital technology. Indeed, until a few years ago, people were born, lived and died within a few square kilometres. They were confined intellectually and physically. They were invisible, frightened, obedient and silent beings.

Above all, what is happening now is that women--who are the "cornerstone" of the "new era," in the words of President Mandela--have started to occupy the role that they deserved in the decision-making process. This is happening by virtue of the faculties that women themselves inherently posses, which makes them so distinctive.

Knowledge-based solution

The trouble is that markets--where greed fuels the quest for large short-term profits--have displaced the moral and political foundations of an endogenous, sustainable and human development. It is therefore urgent to transition from an economy of speculation, production delocalisation and war, to an economy of social and human development, based on knowledge.

Enters science, necessary to prevent or alleviate human suffering, to provide everyone with a dignified life, to meet on a global scale the main priorities established by the UN, in the form of the Sustainable Development Goals; these consist of providing food for all; access to drinking water; quality health services; care for the environment; education and peace. It is unacceptable--regardless of the perspective--that more than 20,000 people die of hunger every day while military expenses amount to €3,000 million.

Humanity can no longer look the other way, distracted and rendered gregarious by the huge power of the media.


https://sustainabledevelopment.un.org/partnerships

https://sustainabledevelopment.un.org/partnerships



25/11/2015




Responsibility

Instead, humanity must act "freely and responsibly"--and this could be facilitated by education, according to the first article of the Constitution of UNESCO. The objective is to achieve freedom to act under one's own reflections as well as the full realisation of the distinctive qualities of the human species: to think, to imagine, to anticipate, to innovate, to create!

The four "avenues" that lead to education which make us "free and responsible" are: learning to be, learning to know, learning to do and learning to live together. These were stated in the report Education in the XXI Century, which I commissioned in 1992 as Director General of UNESCO to the then President of the European Commission, Jacques Delors. I would add that 'learning to be entrepreneurial' is also key. This is because risk without knowledge is dangerous, but knowledge without risk is useless. Daring to know--Sapere Aude, as stated in the Oxford County emblem itself--matters, but, at the same time, knowing to dare is also crucial.

Each human being able to create, to design his or her own future and to contribute to our common destiny, represents hope. President John Fitzgerald Kennedy, in a speech in June 1963, indicated that to achieve what may not seem achievable today, it is necessary to believe that there is no challenge beyond the reach of the creative capacity of the human species.

This is precisely where the investment in research, development and innovation becomes relevant. It will make it possible for people to express themselves without restrictions, to propose and to protest, to participate in and strengthen the democratic process, so fragile today. It will also facilitate the transition from a top-down hierarchical culture--including domination, violence and war--to a culture of encounter, conciliation, alliance and peace.

Historic moment

We are at a turning point in history, where words have more weight than brute force. Since the beginning of time, the dominant male power has been abiding by the motto: Si vis pacem, para bellum--if you want peace, prepare for war. Today, however, we could instead follow: Si vis pacem, para Verbum--if you want peace, sharpen up your words. This approach gives the power back to everyone, instead of confining it in the hands of a few, to decide what tomorrow will hold.

Faced with potentially irreversible processes, we must act responsibly, without delay. There are already enough warning signs.

Now, it is time to apply remedies before it is too late. In the Joint Declaration to tackle the social and ecological emergency, published in September 2015, together with my co-signatories, we recommended urgently convening a special session of the UN General Assembly to address issues, which could soon reach points of no return. These include extreme poverty and migratory flows; environmental degradation; nuclear threat and terror. All countries need to be united against these global challenges.


http://en.unesco.org/themes/education-21st-century

http://en.unesco.org/themes/education-21st-century

https://declaracionconjunta.wordpress.com/



25/11/2015




It is absolutely imperative that, now that we can finally express ourselves, we do not remain silent, let alone be accomplices of such challenges. A felony by silence. It is now up to the younger generation to raise their voice. And, in a great outcry, to make proposals for radical transitions and fundamental changes, which cannot be postponed.

El por-venir está por-hacer--the future has yet to happen. It is necessary to invent the future, to push forward the great mobilisation that will make it possible to adopt, in time, the corrective measures, which knowledge tells us, are urgently advised.

Many of the impossibilities of today can become bright beacons of the realities of tomorrow. The current generation must speak out and make proposals to find solutions. At stake, is the fate of their descendants. We should act now to avoid being judged in the words of Albert Camus: "I contempt them because, they are able to do so much, yet they dare so little.”

Federico Mayor

Federico is the chairman of the Culture of Peace Foundation (Fundación Cultura de Paz), Madrid, Spain, and former general director of UNESCO.

Photo credit: rawpixel.com via Shutterstock

EuroScientist is grateful to Amaya Moro Martin for translating this opinion piece from Spanish into English.


http://www.fund-culturadepaz.org/eng/01/cent0101.htm

http://fund-culturadepaz.org/

http://image.shutterstock.com/display_pic_with_logo/2117717/269360621/stock-photo-world-global-cartography-globalization-earth-international-concept-269360621.jpg



25/11/2015




Visions for the future

The role of science in fostering a common good economy

By Thierry Jeantet

Science is to contribute to economy with new solidarity and social values

Does entering the race for growth and progress for its own sake make sense? Nothing could be less certain if we do not question the meaning of such endeavour. Nevertheless, this is what happened for over forty years! As if growth and progress were de facto positive. This misguided notion has been used, to a great extent, to mask a broader reality. That is, the accumulation of capital, profit-making through an acceleration of growth processes, mainly linked to finance. In other words, a growth process geared towards the owners of the means of production. And increasingly, towards their funders and the funders of the funders.

This is a somewhat brutal but fairly accurate assessment of the situation. It would be undue and excessive, of course, to say that the evolution of science, in general, and of technologies, such as biotechnologies, was totally determined--some would say polluted--by increased reliance on financial drivers and on globalisation.




25/11/2015




But the facts are here. And they are well known. In particular, global warming or the concentration of scientific and technological advancements in favour of a relatively restricted group of countries speak for themselves. It is therefore essential to be concerned about the purpose of sciences and economic governance systems.

Ultimately, we should aim to define virtuous paths for progress--be it technical, biological, medical or digital. Another goal is to ensure that progress is consistent with the new Sustainable Development Goals, recently voted by the United Nations member countries. Or rather that progress goes over and beyond these objectives.

If such concern had pre-existed, the Tokyo, Rio, and Copenhagen climate change conferences would have been more ambitious and possibly more effective. We are clearly staying clear of the naive belief that there is a potential socio-economic model that is perfect and unique. Or that "putting the brakes on" would miraculously rebalance negative effects on humans and on the planet.

New vision

Instead, a multi-fold vision of potential new development models is more necessary than ever. The idea is to move the lines, valuing and amplifying previous achievements, in line with the criteria included in the UN human development index. The traditional measures of Gross Domestic Product and stock market indicators have demonstrated their limitations.

This vision has been adopted by the Social Solidarity Economy (SEE) movement. It already encompasses more than one billion cooperative members (excluding members of associations and mutual societies) throughout the world. It is essential than its role grows. This ambitious goal is nevertheless realistic because SEE is present in all continents and in all sectors of the economy.

Without SSE, indeed, there will be no lasting success of the likes of COP21. And there will be no fair and solidarity based implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals. However bold that statement may appear, this is true.

Social and Solidarity Economy

Let's place the Social and Solidarity Economy in its context. It is a model, which contrasts with the previous prevailing model. It is mainly based on the following principles: democratic management--one person, one vote--sustainable property--both private and collective--fair distribution of surpluses, respect of both people and the environment and, of course, solidarity.

To be successful, the SEE project--and not the capital--needs to be placed at the heart of all activities by cooperatives, mutual societies, associations, foundations, participatory and social enterprises, communities, free software or seeds freed of intellectual property rights, etc.


https://sustainabledevelopment.un.org/?menu=1300

http://hdr.undp.org/en/content/human-development-index-hdi

http://www.euroscientist.com/economy-for-the-common-good-an-economic-model-for-the-future

http://www.euroscientist.com/climate-diplomacy-in-full-steam-ahead-of-cop21

http://www.euroscientist.com/the-linux-approach-to-human-and-ecosystem-well-being

http://www.euroscientist.com/the-linux-approach-to-human-and-ecosystem-well-being



25/11/2015




The SEE community recently positioned itself on the international policy scene. Calling for new alliances at the European and international level, the Joint Declaration for Social and Solidarity Economy, was adopted on 28th September 2015 in parallel to the UN General Assembly. Those involved include UN Member States, UN institutions, three global federations of cities and territories, as well as the International Forum of the SSE Entrepreneurs, known as the Mont-Blanc Meetings.

It is now crucial to go beyond this declaration. An effective alliance between the main actors of the social economy and researchers as well as academics has yet to be built. These actors include the International Forum of the Social and Solidarity Entrepreneurs and the supporters of Mont-Blanc Meetings, due to take place between 26 and 28 November 2015 in Chamonix, France. The common goal is to define how best to combine synergies in the realisation of SEE projects with the help of scientific input, and thus pave the way for progress. This should result in joint projects--both collaborative and cooperative--which can really make a difference.

The Scientific Committee of the Mont-Blanc Meetings, which includes economists, lawyers, and sociologists, is now open to welcome other interested parties from the scientific community. The time has come to work in this direction. Several trends show that there is an emerging desire to combine economic, social and scientific fields. It is therefore time for solidarity initiatives to become much more prevalent.

Thierry Jeantet

Thierry is president of the International Forum of the Social and Solidarity Entrepreneurs, of the Mont-Blanc Meetings, the forum of social and solidarity economy leaders, and works for supplementary pension and complementary mutual insurance companies, including as administrator for SGAM Ag2R La Mondiale, vice-president of Mutavie, in France, vice-president of Tuw, in Poland.

Photo credit: Huang Zheng via Shutterstock


http://www.economiasolidaria.org/files/Declaration_Leading_Group_SSE_UNGA_ENG.pdf

http://www.rencontres-montblanc.coop/en

https://twitter.com/thierryjeantet



http://www.ag2rlamondiale.fr/

https://www.mutavie.fr/

https://www.tuw.pl/

http://www.shutterstock.com/pic-253686574/stock-photo-mont-blanc-at-dusk-with-pines-on-the-foreground-in-the-alps-savoie-france.html?src=ppxj5GXizZFq6dIpb_a5Ow-1-0

the ommon good economy21ax0w3am0j23cz0qd1q1n3u-wpengine.netdna-ssl.com/... · there is a clear...

Documents