Commons Josaphat | Located Collective Intelligence and Distributed Governance
Some days ago I had an interesting interview with Andrea Valenti. We talked about p2p urbanism, located collective intelligence and new distributed governance models. The occasion for that absorbing discussion was an emergent citizen platform called Josaphat Commons, in Brussels (Belgium).
I think we are living a very interesting time, around the world we can discover more and more projects trying to get citizens directly involved in local community management. This is really great! What makes me more happy is realize that there is a strong interest on new decentralized governance processes.
With Andrea we talked about that in both theoretical and very pragmatical way. For those who understand italian I publish here the audio:
Commons Josaphat is an independent platform free from political affiliation. It brings together people, local residents and activists, citizens and associations. The possibility to produce and manage our city together connects all players of Josaphat Commons. This group is organized as a less hierarchically as possible. Everyone contributes to advancing this insight with his skills, his desires and capabilities. The actions and projects are carried out by WorkGroups, which meet regularly in general meeting to share their progress and define a strategy.
source: https://commonsjosaphat.wordpress.com
Josaphat is an area of regional importance. This region today has an interest, in the first place, in finding a way out from the deadlock in which we have ended up, and in finding an answer to the economical, social and ecological crises with which we are confronted. Right now it still is 24ha of blank slate. The objective is use that slate to draw a blueprint for the city of tomorrow, without fear and without taboos. So Josaphat People, full of joy, want to work on a city of which the wealth it produces benefits the quality of life of all Brussels’ residents.
The interview was initiate from the “WorkGroup” A16 – andrea et marta – trust and participation.
Andrea and Marta are working on access, ownership, sharing, trust: Wider ‘trust, by the reduction of complexity, discloses possibilities for action which would have remained unattractive and improbable without trust – which would not, in other words, have been pursued. At same time, participation goes alongside with civic sense and responsibilities and a layered but wider trust base access definition will help to realize a common sense of ownership, maintenance and evolution of Josaphat Commons.
Picture by Marta Smaldone
More info: https://commonsjosaphat.wordpress.com/commons-josaphat/#English
First picture source > http://www.ezelstad.be/2014/05/26/de-commons-als-basis-voor-de-stad-van-morgen/