DAVID BOLLIER

For the past two years or more, I’ve been working on a major research and writing project to try to recover from the mists of history the bits and pieces of what might be called “commons law” (not to be confused with common law). Commons law consists of those social practices, cultural traditions and specific bodies of formal law that recognize the rights of commoners to manage their own resources. Most of these governance traditions deal with natural resources such as farmland, forests, fisheries, water and wild game. Commons law has existed in many forms, and in many cultures, over millennia.

Leave it to the Dutch, who throw away only 3 percent of their municipal waste into landfills, to come up with a socially appealing innovation that does even more to reduce waste: the neighborhood Repair Cafe!  As described in today’s NYT, volunteers with a talent for fixing things come together several times a month to repair anyone’s broken household items for free.

As if recovering from the binge of market triumphalism that crested in 2008, the Zeitgeist is now unleashing a steady stream of new works on cooperation. The rediscovery of this aspect of our humanity is long overdue and incredibly important, given the deformities of thinking that economics has inflicted on public consciousness. So I was excited to learn that the distinguished sociologist Richard Sennett had written a new book about cooperation, Together: The Rituals Pleasures and Politics of Cooperation.

Let me start by giving a brief speculation about why people from so many backgrounds are embracing the commons. First of all, it is a way for people to assert the integrity of their existing communities, or to try to reclaim that integrity. The commons also provides a way to assert a moral relationship to certain resources and people that are endangered by market forces. It’s a way of saying, “That _________ (water, air, software code, cultural tradition) belongs to me. It is part of my life and identity.”

The Occupy movement is beginning to discover the commons, and the result could be a rich and productive collaboration. This was the lesson that I took from a three-day conference, “Making Worlds: A Forum on the Commons,” hosted by Occupy Wall Street in Brooklyn this past weekend. Rarely have I seen so many ordinary people from diverse backgrounds embrace the commons idea with such ease and enthusiasm.

There is a realization that it is no longer enough to denounce globalization or rail against capitalism. Realistic alternatives must be set forth. For many, it would appear that the commons can provide a useful framework and vocabulary for starting a very different conversation – one that at once addresses politics, economics, culture and our individual aspirations and energies.

The recent political struggles between Hollywood and networked culture underscore a profoundly disruptive fact: exclusive ownership rights are no longer as valuable as they once were. What really matters is the flow. Increasingly, knowledge and other intangible things are more valuable when they can circulate -- when they can be freely copied, shared and modified via open platforms.

While a great many commons seek to develop alternatives to conventional businesses – and even to bypass markets altogether – the struggle to democratize capital should not be lost in the shuffle. Popular ownership of capital assets and business enterprises is still a great strategy for building the commons and advancing the public good. Fortunately, there's a growing enthusiasm for this approach.

If only the rest of the world could emulate the Government of Rajasthan in India in adopting public policies to promote the commons! As the Times of India reports "Rajasthan has become the first state in the country to have drafted a policy underlining the importance and the need to preserve and secure common land (commons) in rural areas." There may be other such government policies around the world, but they are few and far between.  The Rajasthan policies are a real breakthrough.

If there is a common challenge in creating a commons in diverse contexts – indigenous culture, permaculture, cyberspace – it is about how to build enduring trust. Trust is needed as a prerequisite for mutual commitments, experimentation and innovation beyond those enabled by markets. Trust is needed whether it is an open source software commons or a water commons.