Speakers - New Economy Network Australia

NENA Events / NENA Conferences / 2018 Conference / Speakers

Guest speakers include:

Adjunct Associate Professor Mary Graham, University of Queensland and Kombumerri person
Eric Holt-Gimenez, Executive Director, Food First
Charles Levkoe, Lakehead University, Ontario
Dr Samuel Alexander, University of Melbourne
David Holmgren,
Jose Ramos, Action Foresight
Nick Rose, Sustain Australia
Dr Michelle Maloney, Australian Earth Laws Alliance
Darren Sharp, Social Surplus
Dr Amanda Cahill, Next Economy
Tim Hollo, Green Institute
Professor Bronwen Morgan, UNSW
Haydn Washington, CASSE NSW

Session speakers

Click on speakers' names or scroll down to view speaker abstracts and biographies.

Samuel Alexander, University of Melbourne
Paul Atkins (PhD), Australian Catholic University
Robert Barwick, Citizens Electoral Council
Irena Bee
Juliet Bennett, Department of Peace and Conflict Studies, University of Sydney
Alison Bird, BrisLETS, OzCES
Deborah Bogenhuber, Food Next Door project – Mildura
Pete Brammer, Redgum Cleaning Cooperative
Dr Penny Burns, Chair, Talking Infrastructure
Jorge Cantellano, EdibleScapes
Rachel Carey
Samantha Castro (Facilitator), Friends of the Earth Australia
Sabrina Chakori, Brisbane Tool Library
Jason Chaplin, Redgum Cleaning Cooperative
Rohan Clarke (Treasurer), incubator.coop
Eleanor Coffey, Redgum Cleaning Cooperative
Jonathan Cornford, Manna Gum
Karun Cowper, Friends of the Earth Australia
Kevin Cox, WLPC
Katherine Cunningham
Nilmini De Silva, Director, PolisPlan
Barry Disch, Public Banking Institute
Mike Dowson
Sharon Ede, Audacities (www.audacities.co)
Erin Fitz-Henry
Karl Fitzgerald, Prosper Australia
Michelle Fisher, Sharing Shed Melbourne
Scotty Foster, Co-operatives, Commons and Communities Canberra (Co-Canberra); Radio Behind the Lines on Community Radio 2XX 98.3FM
Professor Marcus Foth, Urban Informatics, QUT Design Lab, QUT Design Lab, Brisbane, Australia
Morag Gamble, Permaculture Education Institute
Juli Gassner, Dreamweave
Adjunct Associate Professor Mary Graham, University of Queensland and Kombumerri Person
Yasmin Grigaliunas, World's Biggest Garage Sale
Sidsel Grimstad, University of Newcastle
Fiona Haines
Dr Stephen Healy, Institute for Culture & Society, Western Sydney University
Natasha Heenan, University of Sydney
Dr Sara Heitlinger, University of Newcastle, UK
Jarra Hicks, Community Power Agency
David Holmgren, Holmgren Design
Eric Holt Gimenez, Food First
Sarah P. Houseman, PhD candidate, La Trobe University
Alanna Irving, Open Collective
Rhys Jaconley, Flourishing On Purpose
Phil Jones, NSW Chapter of the Centre for the Advancement of the Steady State Economy; SJ Around the Bay
Rachael Kelly, FNQCES, Brisbane Sharing Map
Thomas Kern, The Accountability Institute
Dr Robin Krabbe, Live Well Tasmania
Elsie L'Huillier, Commoners Coop
Jennifer Lacy-Nichols, Right to Food Coalition/University of Melbourne
Wynston Lee, University of Sydney
Charles Levkoe, Lakehead University
Steven Liaros, Director, PolisPlan
Joe Malloy, Rumble
Michelle Maloney, AELA/NENA
Ian McBurney
Dr Helen Mcgregor, Director and Consultant, Redefining Agriculture Pty Ltd
Associate Professor Nick McGuigan, Monash Business School
Pauline McGuirk, University of Wollongong
Dr Katharine McKinnon, La Trobe University
Antony McMullen (Secretary), incubator.coop
Dr Joanne McNeill, Institute for Culture & Society, Western Sydney University
Ben Minerds, Free Software Melbourne
Oliver Mispelhorn, Master's Candidate: The University of Sydney
Rebecca Moore, Share Sydney collective
Professor Bronwen Morgan, UNSW Law
Dr Patricia Morgan, Facilitator Inner Dimensions of the New Economy working group, UNSW, Nan Tien Institute
Dr Patricia Morgan, Share Sydney collective
Dan Musil, EarthWorker Cooperative & Western Sydney University
John Niyera, Food Next Door project – Mildura
Tom Nockolds, Pingala
Christine Parker
Koji Payne
Vanessa Petrie, CEO Beyond Zero Emissions Cooperatives
Anouk Pinchetti, Blockchain Centre Melbourne
Dr Anne Poelina
Monique Potts, UTS
Alex Prideaux, Redgum Cleaning Cooperative
Aviva Reed
Aleesha Rodriguez, Digital Media Research Centre, Queensland University of Technology
Nick Rose (Facilitator), Sustain The Australian Food Network
Sally Ruljancich, colinandsallys.com.au
Angela Rutter
Ella Ryan, Redgum Cleaning Cooperative
Inka Santala, Share Sydney collective; University of Wollongong
Vivienne Sercombe, Project Manager, Youth Enterprise Hub | INLLEN
Darren Sharp, Curtin University; Social Surplus
Emily Sims, Prosper Australia
Anika Stobart, Earth Advocates
Carolyn Suggate
John Thakara
Andrew Thelander
Robbie Thorpe
James Tonson, Rescope Project
Jose Luis Vivero-Pol
Duncan Wallace, Business Council of Co-operatives and Mutuals
Scott Wallace
Andrew Ward (MD), incubator.coop
Dr Haydn Washington, CASSE NSW, PANGEA Research Centre UNSW
Matthew Washington, CASSE NSW
Ross Williams
Llewellyn Williams-Brooks
Eva Willmann de Donlea, 1Earth Institute Inc.
Angharad Wynne-Jones

Samuel Alexander

University of Melbourne

Post-Capitalism by Design not Disaster: Creating Common Wealth

Abstract

There are various overlapping 'growth imperatives' built into the structure of capitalism, but the paradigm of growth economics is facing both financial and ecological limits. In one way or another, these limits will induce a transition beyond capitalism in coming years and decades – perhaps the transition is already underway – and the question of our time is how to make this transition by design rather than disaster. In this presentation, Samuel Alexander explores the dynamics of this transition and reflects on the close but often overlooked relationship between culture and political economy. As capitalism ends, how can we create common wealth, and wealth in common?

Biography

Dr Samuel Alexander is a lecturer and researcher at the University of Melbourne, Australia, teaching a course called 'Consumerism and the Growth Economy: Critical Interdisciplinary Perspectives' as part of the Master of Environment. He is also co-director of the Simplicity Institute and a research fellow at the Melbourne Sustainable Society Institute.Alexander's interdisciplinary research focuses on degrowth, permaculture, voluntary simplicity, 'grassroots' theories of transition, and the relationship between culture and political economy. His current research is exploring the aesthetics of degrowth.

His books include Just Enough is Plenty: Thoreau's Alternative Economics (2016); Deface the Currency: The Lost Dialogues of Diogenes (2016); Prosperous Descent: Crisis as Opportunity in an Age of Limits (2015); Sufficiency Economy: Enough, for Everyone, Forever (2015); and Entropia: Life Beyond Industrial Civilisation (2013); he is also editor of Voluntary Simplicity: The Poetic Alternative to Consumer Culture (2009) and co-editor of Simple Living in History: Pioneers of the Deep Future (2014). In 2016 he also released a documentary called A Simpler Way: Crisis as Opportunity, co-produced with Jordan Osmond of Happen Films. Alexander blogs at www.simplicitycollective.com.

Download presentation

Paul Atkins

(PhD) Prosocial Psychology and The Institute for Positive Psychology and Education, Australian Catholic University

Prosocial: A process for building collaboration and perspective taking

Abstract

"Prosocial" is a process for enhancing collaboration and trust in groups based on the Nobel prize winning work of Elinor Ostrom and techniques from the science of behaviour change. This workshop will provide a hands-on introduction to the Prosocial process including practical tools that facilitators can use with their own groups to enhance openness to collaboration, willingness to take the perspective of others, commitment to shared action and relations with other groups. While this workshop can only provide a taste of the method, it will include pointers to resources and further training for those who wish to improve their skills in the approach. The workshop is suitable for anyone working with purposeful, values-driven groups.

Biography

Dr Paul Atkins is a facilitator, coach, researcher and trainer. He has over twenty years experience facilitating 1000s of groups and individuals to improve cooperation and conflict management, is a member of the design team implementing Prosocial in schools, businesses, community and public groups internationally, and Senior Research Fellow with the Institute for Positive Psychology and Education (ACU).
Download link

Robert Barwick

Citizens Electoral Council

Banking Reform and Money Creation

Abstract

In addition to discussion of how money is created and our current private banking system, we will discuss topics such as Glass Steagall/regulations separating commercial from investment banking and a national bank; public banking in the United States and Germany and how they could benefit Australia and the impact of banking on our daily lives and how the power to create money, to create certain quantities of money, to decide who gets the money and to decide for what purpose, effects us all in our daily lives.

Biography

Robert Barwick is the Research Director and National Executive Member of the Citizens Electoral Council, which promotes a national bank as its principal economic policy; an editor of the CEC's weekly Australian Alert Service magazine; and the co-host of the weekly CEC Report show on Channel 31 and YouTube.
Steven Hail is a Modern Monetary Theory Research Scholar at the Binzagr Institute for Sustainable Prosperity and a Lecturer at the University of Adelaide. During the 1990s, he trained staff from many international banks and the Bank of England. He has recently published "Economics for Sustainable Prosperity" with Palgrave Macmillan.
Download link

Irena Bee

How to tell your story and change the world?

Abstract

We are all affected by compelling stories. From TED Talks, to media interviews, to political ads – great stories cut through.
According to Prof. Uri Hasson of Princeton:
"A story is the only way to activate parts in the brain so that a listener turns the story into their own idea and experience... it's the only way to plant ideas into other people's minds."
The good news is that effective storytelling is a skill that can be learned.
In this workshop you'll understand techniques from the world's most charismatic storytellers so you too can inspire your communities, collaborators and culture.
You'll learn how to structure your story for use in meetings, presentations, media, marketing, social media and lobbying campaigns for maximum impact, memorability and shareability – including:

the three must-have components that makes your story unforgettable,
the one unbreakable rule that will make your message stick.
How to insert your message into your story,
How to use story so your community takes action.
How to use story and storytelling principles in your social media and promotional campaigns.

This panel discussion, hosted by founding members of Redgum Cleaning Cooperative, is aimed at people who may be interested in starting up a worker owned cooperative. Redgum Cleaning Cooperative is the first worker-owned cleaning cooperative in Australia. It provides eco-friendly cleaning services to over 30 homes and offices around Melbourne. It has been operating since February this year and currently has 5 worker members.
Redgum workers will provide first-hand accounts about the processes involved in setting up a worker-owned (distributing) cooperative as part of the Earthworker network. It will be a chance for participants to ask questions and gain valuable insights into the practicalities of running a worker-owned cooperative in the service industry.
The first half of the discussion will look at the steps taken to formulate and then register our business as a distributing cooperative. Panel members will discuss how Redgum Cooperative came about and why, as well as offer critical insights into the regulatory environment in which cooperatives currently sit. The panel will also speak about Earthworker Cooperative, which is building a network of sustainable worker-owned enterprises to promote economic democracy, and how service-based cooperatives like Redgum can help to create dignified, secure and meaningful work that benefits our communities and the planet .The second half of the workshop will focus on the ins and outs of Redgum Cooperative's first six months of operation. Members will share some of the challenges faced in running a worker-owned business and discuss how they were dealt with in the context of democratic decision-making, as well as share the personal benefits of being a worker-owner. The panel will allow for questions and answers.

Biography

Ella is a founding member of Redgum Cleaning Cooperative and, like all members of the cooperative, she works as a green cleaner. Ella is also a qualified primary school teacher and works as a casual environmental educator at Port Phillip Eco Centre. Ella has been active in various environmental and social justice campaigns over the past decade. In 2016, Ella was driven to join the cleaning cooperative when she witnessed school cleaners being severely underpaid and exploited. She realised just how fraught the cleaning industry is in Victoria and felt the need to do something about it.Alex is one of the founding members of Redgum Cleaning Cooperative. He has worked in the cleaning industry for several years, of which the last few were in green cleaning. Alex's disillusionment with trickle-down economics led him to join the cleaning cooperative. He sees worker cooperatives as an alternative that does not put profit ahead of everything else.

Eleanor, another founding member, has been a volunteer organiser with the Earthworker Cooperative for four years. While working as a casual cleaner, she connected with others interested in setting up a worker-owned cleaning cooperative, and eventually Redgum was born. She's been inspired by the stories of worker-cooperatives around the world, where this model has been used by communities to reclaim economic agency from the corporate sector, and use our labour to benefit each other and the planet.

As a member of Earthworker Cooperative and a founding member of Redgum Cleaning Cooperative, Jason is a keen advocate for the worker-controlled cooperative model and the transition to a post-capitalist economy. He has a background in small business having co-owned an online art supplies store for a number of years.

Peter has worked in the cleaning industry as a casual worker and is a founding member of Redgum Cleaning Cooperative. He is a presenter of the Doing Time radio show on 3CR community radio and has been a human rights activist for many years. Peter comes from a working-class background, his father was a railway worker and a union delegate, and he has thus developed a strong interest in worker cooperatives and the labour movement. Peter also has an interest in alternative lifestyles, he is a Zen practitioner and has studied permaculture in northern NSW.
Download link

Dr Penny Burns

Chair, Talking Infrastructure

Talking Infrastructure – The Four Transitions

Abstract

Infrastructure dominates communities' ability to develop, and once established, is almost impossible, or extremely costly, to undo. With major change on the horizon, we need to rethink.
Keywords in infrastructure decisions for the past 100 years have been efficiency, sustainability, risk and, above all, growth. For large, centralised, mass infrastructure, 'efficiency' was, naturally, a key concern. But technology is now making smaller, distributed, infrastructure, not only cheaper but, with cyber terrorist concerns, safer. 'Effectiveness' is today's key word.
Sustainability in infrastructure has been interpreted as longevity. We design our infrastructure for durability. We can build to last a hundred years or more. But when demands and options change so radically is this what we want? Perhaps we need to think 'Adaptability' rather than 'Sustainability/longevity'?
The notion of risk is also 'at risk' of irrelevance. Risk implies we know the probability of future possibilities. What we need to manage for today is Resilience under uncertainty.
Finally growth, an increase in GDP, needs to change to prosperity for all.
We need new concepts, mindsets, tools and techniques to make four needed transitions:

From Efficiency to Effectiveness
From Sustainability to Adaptability
From Risk to Resilience under Uncertainty
From Growth to Prosperity For All.

Biography

Penny is an Experimental Economist, Asset Management Strategist, and Chair, 'Talking Infrastructure: rethinking decision making for the 21st century'. Foundation Chair, Australian Centre for Experimental Economics. Co-author,'The Adelaide Grand Prix, a social and economic study of a special event.' Editor (for 20 years) of 'Strategic Asset Management'. ministerial advisor, and public speaker.
Download link

Jorge Cantellano

EdibleScapes

Urban Edible Landscape in Common land

Abstract

Edible Landscape Gardens is a project that happen in a community run parkland on the Gold Coast - QLD. The project intervenes with communal food initiative in a city where the City Council have discontinued policies that before supported community gardens, local food strategies and climate change policies.
EdibleScapes the social and ecological services organisation that proposed and run the public Edible Landscape Gardens project is committed to make awareness of the food desert condition of the City and issues of food insecurity.
The organisation will document the expensive ecological footprint of importing food, dependency of mega corporation for food supplier; the nutrient condition of the food we consume and the human cost of the community who work in the industrial production of these food.
Alternatively, EdibleScapes promote local agroecological solutions and community food initiative marge within local community social and solidarity new economic alternatives toward local community human develop respectful of nature's rights.
The practitioner reporting here, initiator of this project, is an industrial product designer with long experience in 3D design for boat building, He is now in transition to social design co-creating community solutions in urban agroecology community enterprise.
The practitioner speaking here, as well bring vision of the Global South from the Latin American Social & Solidarity Economic, agroecology peasant & indigenous movements and Global South decolonial thoughts.

Biography

Jorge Cantellano, currently practic entrepreneur voluntarism as social designer co-design communal agroecological solutions.
Since 2002, he has 15 years freelancer servicing marine industry, with 3D CAD modelling -visualisation for boat construction.
As mature student he gets his first university degree in 2000 with first class honours in Bachelor of Art in Creative Arts.GU. when he was 40 years old. After graduation he was a high researcher student (unfinish PhD GU) visual community. In 1989 Jorge arrived from Chile to Australia as political refugee under humanitarian entry program.
Download link

Dr Rachel Carey

Ecological Regulation: transitions, traps and trajectories

Abstract

This panel brings together research on transforming regulation by looking at the multiple ways that regulation itself is being challenged to respond to the need for a more ecologically sustainable and socially just world. This exploration of transforming regulation has a broad remit - both how regulation itself needs to change, but then how current forms of regulation are being used currently to move towards ecologically sustainable futures. This examination of regulation moves away from an understanding of regulation as being premised on the importance of compliance and enforcement towards understanding regulation as both a resource and an obstacle to an ecologically sustainable future. The work in the panel explores the role protest plays in shaping regulation as well as how the creative and strategic use of regulation by civil society, communities and businesses (defined broadly) is playing and can play in moving towards a more ecologically sustainable future.
Paper 1: Grappling towards an ecologically sustainable future: the search for ecologically responsive regulation; Paper 2: Corporate "Regulation" and Its Discontents; Paper 3: Rainbows, resistance and regulations: Tracing low carbon imaginaries in Byron Shire; Paper 4: Co-designing policy for sustainable and fair food systems:

Biography

Dr Rachel Carey is a Research Fellow at the University of Melbourne, where her research focuses on policy for sustainable and resilient food systems. She leads the Foodprint Melbourne research project, which is investigating strategies to strengthen the resilience of Melbourne's foodbowl in the face of pressures from population growth, urban sprawl and climate change. Rachel has a background in food policy and collaborative design, and has worked on food policies for the City of Melbourne and the City of Greater Geelong.
Download link

Samantha Castro (facilitator)

Friends of the Earth Australia

Post capitalising post carbon - rhizome community organising

Abstract

What are the characteristics of hierarchy and anti-hierarchy? What lessons, what technology, what processes, what DNA can be replicated from anti-hierarchical, anti-capitalist grassroots organisation like Friends of the Earth to assist in the creation of a thriving movement of successful 'bossless', post-capitalist organisations in the New Economy?
These questions will be explored through a presentation and facilitated discussion around decentralised systems of organising and the metaphor of the tree vs the rhizome
Most organisations (including many NGOs) take the form of a tree.
Trees have connections between roots and branches are vertical and linear, much like the linkages between people in a hierarchical organisation.Their avenue for growth is roots and branches that give off to more roots and branches. They are largely stationary (its near on impossible to move them) and they find it difficult to adapt to changes in the environmental system.
In order to reproduce, they have to seed off entirely new organisations, roughly along their same structures. Rhizomes, by comparison, are a continuously growing horizontal underground stem which puts out lateral shoots and roots at intervals. Think of how bulbs or tubers (like ginger) grow. Unlike a tree, A rhizome is open- in the sense that it can grow from any point.
Rhizomes are flexible and adaptable. If you break off any root or shoot, it will not kill the organism, it will continue to grow from elsewhere in the system, and to create new connections with parts of the rhizome around it.
In this sense, it can be considered anarchic, non-linear and multidirectional. They are open for spontaneity and creativity emerging at any point (think about all the crazy shapes ginger creates). They are not rooted in any one place, are capable of expansion that make them nomadic in a sense. They value their multiplicity.

Biography

Sam Castro is a lifelong feminist activist, defender of the environment and mother of 3 children. She is Operations Coordinator for Friends of the Earth Australia. Sam sits on a FoE International working group for Gender Justice and Dismantling Patriarchy and is a co-founder and volunteer at WACA (whistleblowers, activists and citizens alliance). Sam has previously worked in International Aid and Development and has a background in media and communications. Sam holds a Masters in Communication, with her specialty exploring the relationship between global media and the War On Terror.

Download link

Sabrina Chakori

Brisbane Tool Library

A new economy menu into traditional politics

Abstract

The New Economy movement is raising and hundreds of great grassroots small to medium projects and movements are shaping new life styles. However, while communities are getting organised for a transition toward a more ecological and social just society, there is still an inability of traditional politics to address economic failings.
Politicians still measure economic success just in terms of GPD, subsidies are given to the fossil fuel industry, procurement for social enterprises is still missing, workers rights are degrading and within the profit seeking economic system we are still creating many social and environmental negative externalities locally and globally.
In this session we will discuss how the new economy movement, and in particular NENA, could advocate in the political arena. We will work on the priorities that need to be changed in the political-economic agenda of the Australian government.
This session is just a first step toward the creation of a working group working across Australia, eventually through NENA, to develop a strategy to implement a new economy program.
The goal is to bring a fresh new economy menu to our local councillors and to all the states and federal politicians.
This session aims to be a practical, real world action plan.

Biography

In 2017 Sabrina Chakori founded the Brisbane Tool Library, social enterprise that aims to reduce consumption and waste. For more than a decade she has been advocating for a more sustainable society in many different countries. She is currently PhD student (University of Queensland) focusing on the reduction of food packaging and circular economy.
Download link

Jason Chaplin

Redgum Cleaning Cooperative

Starting and running a worker-owned cooperative

Abstract

Biography

Rohan Clarke

incubator.coop

Co-operative Pitch Event

Abstract

Incubator.coop would like to showcase 3/4 of its members and help them build momentum in growing membership and funding their various projects. The projects that we are considering include an organic farming cooperative, a community power project, an open-source co-operative operating system and an aged care housing co-operative.
We are currently developing the format of our pitch events. It is likely that there will be 5-7 minutes allocated for each project to pitch their coop. We would then like to gather real-time feedback from conference attendees as to their response. This would involve both facilitated questions from the floor and online interaction. It is intended to be a fun, punchy and high-energy session.

Friends of the Earth Australia

Post capitalising post carbon - rhizome community organising

Abstract

Biography

Karun Cowper is a P2P Commoner, Neohumanist, PROUTist. He is on the team at Friends of the Earth Perth, is administrator and holistic counsellor/educator at the LiFE Academy, is organiser of rad 'New Economy' and Postcapitalist events and is long time ratbag activist and citizen journalist."
Download link

Kevin Cox

WLPC

Pre Power: Affordable renewable energy for all

Abstract

In a Pre Power Cooperative households typically pay about 30% of cost of fossil fuel power. Investors receive a 9% return on investment by prepaying for electricity. If an household invests in a Pre Power Cooperative their price of electricity is typically 35% of the cost of fossil fuel energy.
The presenters will outline the principles and theory behind Pre Power Co-ops before giving a plain english description of how this surprisingly simple business model works.
We will be seeking interest from others to either form local Pre Power Co-ops or work with us to set up a Pre Power Co-operative Franchisor system. Others may wish to set up a Pre Rent, Pre Food, Pre Education, Pre Health, Pre Water, Pre Waste or other Co-ops. We will be interested in helping set these systems up after the conference.

Biography

Kevin is a member of Co Canberra and several other community groups in Canberra. He is CEO of White Label Personal Clouds an IT Research and Development Company. He has been researching and developing a new way for a local community organisation to self-fund community investments. These systems are one of the building blocks for the New Economy. The building blocks fit seamlessly with the existing economic system, with other initiatives and enable the old economy to evolve into a new economy one community activity at a time.
Download link

Katherine Cunningham

Inter-cooperation for a solidarity economy

Abstract

If capitalism is 'the sea', and co-operatives are 'the islands' - how can we build a thriving and sustainable 'continent'? The history of co-operatives and mutuals in Australia has too often followed a path where a community establishes a co-op to meet a real need only to eventually demutualise into a regular company owned by removed shareholders extracting profit as an end in itself.
There is an alternative. A third of the GDP of the Italian Emilia Romagna region is generated by co-ops that organically work together to give back to the local community and economy. Mondragon in Basque Spain features a model of centralised cooperation that promotes the sovereignty of labour. What if created a hybrid of both approaches in Australia?
Come along to our panel workshop so we all play a part in building inter-cooperation in the solidarity economy. This will feature Earthworker (a network of worker co-ops), ORICoop (organic farming investment), Co-operative Power Australia (democratising energy retailing) with Incubator Co-op and Co-operative Bonds (others TBC). Come along to learn about:

techniques for working together for the common good
inspiring organisations and enterprises in the new economy
networked governance and member financing tools to build a new economy.

Working together, we can develop new ways to provide an alternative to an extractive and often exploitative economy.

Biography

Katherine Cunningham, Earthworker Cooperative Start-up Coordinator, Degree in Entrepreneurial Business. Katherine worked for Community College East Gippsland 2011-2013, creating and delivering business education to small business. Joining Earthworker August 2017, on both Earthworker Energy Manufacturing Cooperative interim and Earthworker boards. Excited to explore a Hemp industry with Cooperatives.

Download link

Nilmini De Silva

Director Polisplan

Keeping Time

Abstract

In 2016 my partner Steven and I had the opportunity to experience a part of Tasmania that we had not ventured to previously. The Tarkine is one of the world's most significant tracts of temperate rainforests with both cultural and natural values. It is an ancient place threatened by new mining, logging, and four-wheel driving on sacred sites. The Bob Brown Foundation organised for over one hundred artists—mostly photographers but also painters, writers, song-writers, dancers—to spend the Easter weekend immersed in these forests so they could produce creative work. The output is then used in exhibitions and publications to create awareness about one of the world's great natural treasures, and to lobby for protection as a National Park and for listing as a World Heritage listed area.
I would like to share a poem that I wrote, inspired by my time there and titled 'Keeping Time'. The poem was published by the Foundation in the 2017 Artist's Journal. It compares how we see time and how indigenous people view time and asks if there is a way for us to embrace the best of both worlds.

Biography

Nilmini De Silva

Director, PolisPlan

Implementing a New Human Settlement Theory

Abstract

The authors are currently developing an implementation strategy for a human settlement theory developed by Steven Liaros and Nilmini De Silva. The theory proposes that land development should create a built environment that provides the living and working spaces for up to 200 people, integrated with water and energy micro-grids and a poly-culture food system. Described as a Circular Economy Innovation Hub, such a planning strategy adopts the principles of the Circular Economyâ€"systems thinking, life-cycle planning and striving for zero waste. By integrating the water, energy, food and built systems, the overall efficiency of the system is significantly increased. The more efficient delivery of the identified natural needs then offers residents more free time for innovation and creativity. Finally, such places are not isolated villages but hubs or nodes in a network, connecting and collaborating with others in their bio-region and beyond.
Creating places where local residents can collaborate to provide their basic needs is a form of Place-Making as well as an achievable alternative to the Universal Basic Income (UBI). The direct delivery of basic needs by the producing community requires communities to take responsibility for their local environment, supporting infrastructure and others in their community.
Discussions are currently underway with Local Councils in NSW, Queensland and South Australia to inform town planning strategies and policies that would enable the development of pilot projects of Circular Economy Innovation Hubs.The session will include a short overview presentation (15min) followed by Q&A (10min). The remaining time (25min) will be dedicated to a mini workshop to identify and discuss strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats for the implementation of this planning strategy, and to identify partners, stakeholders, and contributors amongst NENA delegates and those not in the room.

Biography

Steven Liaros and Nilmini De Silva are Directors of the mobile town planning consultancy PolisPlan (www.polisplan.com.au). Over recent years they have been researching how cities and land development might be transformed by renewable energy micro-grids, sharing economy platforms and circular economy principles such as zero waste and systems thinking. Their vision of a new paradigm for regenerative land development s described at beautilitydevelopments.com.au. Steven is a town planner and author of Rethinking the City, who is currently undertaking a PhD research project in Political Economy. Nilmini is a Civil Engineer who specialized in water management. She is the author of Fate or Destiny and is an accomplished documentary photographer.

Download link

Barry Disch

Public Banking Institute

Banking Reform and Money Creation

Abstract

Biography

Barry Disch is a member of the Public Banking Institute in the U.S. And has been following public banking for over a decade as well as spearheading an effort to start a public bank in Carlsbad, California.
Download link

Mike Dowson

Pre Power: Affordable renewable energy for all

Abstract

Biography

Mike Dowson is a management consultant, productivity analyst, writer and systems theorist. His particular interest is the dynamics of collective enterprise and the influence of systems and technology on the ways people think and do things together. In recent years, Mike has begun to integrate an interest in theories and research into complex adaptive systems and transpersonal psychology, in particular the theory of Spiral Dynamics, with emerging technological trends in communication, automation and augmentation. His aim is to uncover ways that existing systems and institutions may be artfully transformed and repurposed to support well-being in the face of rapid planetary change.
Download link

Sharon Ede

Audacities (www.audacities.co)

Audience Segmentation: How to Effectively Communicate Your Initiative to Different Audiences

Abstract

"One of the most powerful realisations an activist, or anyone working on change can have is that when it comes to communication, one size does not fit all, and that people are scattered along a spectrum of values, awareness, issue literacy and motivation. This workshop objective is to support change agents in better identifying, and communicating with, the audiences they are seeking to engage.
In this workshop, participants will be introduced to a way of developing an Audience Segmentation Spreadsheet for their initiative, shown two different examples, and given the opportunity to test the approach for themselves with their own ideas."

Co-ops, Commons and Communities Canberra (Co-Canberra) is a community group who facilitate local community and sustainability projects. The Household and Community Sustainability Co-operative (HCSC) is a Co-Canberra initiative that will assist local communities to undertake practical sustainability measures in the ACT region. The HCSC will consist of a group of people (contributing members) who make regular contributions into a collective fund that will be used to coordinate and undertake energy efficiency and other sustainability activities. These will include all feasible efficiency works to the building stock of the contributing members. Activities will begin at a household level, and once household works are completed, will move to projects at the local community scale, then the broader region. The HSCS will provide an easily replicable model to be rolled out throughout the region.
Objectives

Reduced household bills for members
Improved energy use in built structures within the HCSC
Neighborhoods empowered to affordably manage improvements to household and community sustainability
Local communities contributing to the improved sustainability of the broader region
Improved communication and co-operation amongst local communities
Increased numbers of Co-operative enterprises, creating local jobs
Increased community cohesion and autonomy

Biography

Scotty Foster is a solar powered, radio broadcasting, organic growing, co-operative creating, earth and people protecting lunatic worker from Canberra, Australia.s
Download link

Scotty Foster

Radio Behind the Lines on Community Radio 2XX 98.3FM

Radio NENA - Align in the Sound

Abstract

Everyone's invited to get involved with our NENA Radio Show, to help promote the work of the New Economy Network Australia, get to know what's already happening in your community, share stories of success and promote great events and new economy activities.
The plan is to work towards a 1 hour long NENA radio show and podcast, to be broadcast across the nation via the Community Radio Satellite, which is run by the Community Broadcasting Association of Australia (CBAA).Broadcast via the satellite means that anyone within listening range of a community radio station (which is a vast chunk of the population) can ask them to put it into their schedule at some point during the week.

Biography

Scotty Foster is a solar powered, radio broadcasting, organic growing, co-operative creating, earth and people protecting lunatic worker from Canberra, Australia.
Download link

Professor Marcus Foth

QUT Design Lab, Brisbane, Australia

Towards More-Than-Human Cities

Abstract

Many early adopters of sustainable smart city technology employed a technocratic approach. The dominant visions of these future cities, such as in the "eco smart city", address sustainability through the optimisation and rationalisation of urban processes, making them merely more efficient. However, such approaches are too simplistic, are unable to deal with the complexities of real, messy cities [19] and perform sustainability in specific ways that leave little room for participation and citizen agency. Furthermore, the technocratic approach limited the actual social benefit people could expect from their urban habitat, and this has led to a participatory turn in smart cities. For example, many local governments have started using human-centred approaches to integrate technology in urban environments and to tackle sustainability.

However, smart cities continue to fail to address a human-exceptionalist notion of cities, in which urban space is designed for, and inhabited by, humans only. Within the age of the Anthropocene – a term used to refer to a new geological era in which human activity is transforming earth systems, accelerating climate change and causing mass extinctions – a human-centred perspective is increasingly seen as untenable. In fields such as STS, environmental humanities, geography, planning, design and HCI, scholars are expanding and challenging traditional binaries of Western thought such as City/Nature, Human/Non-human, to consider the entanglements between human and non-human worlds including in urban contexts in order to overcome problematic narratives of human privilege and exceptionalism.

This talk will report on the contributions, deliberations, and outcomes from a full day workshop held at the Participatory Design Conference on 21 August 2018 in Genk, Belgium on the topic of "Avoiding Ecocidal Smart Cities: Participatory Design for More-than-Human Futures" (pd4more.urbaninformatics.net). The aim of this talk is to inspire the audience in thinking about more-than-human cities and to advance this

Biography

Marcus Foth is Professor of Urban Informatics with the QUT Design Lab, Brisbane, Australia, and Honorary Professor with the School of Communication and Culture at Aarhus University, Denmark. Marcus has (co-)authored over 190 publications. In 2013, he received a Queensland Young Tall Poppy Science Award, and was made a fellow of the Australian Computer Society in 2017. The planning, design and development site Planetizen inducted him to the world's top 25 leading thinkers and innovators in the field of urban planning and technology. He is also a passionate wombassador, beekeeper, and cyclist. He tweets @sunday9pm
Download link

Professor Marcus Foth

Urban Informatics, QUT Design Lab

Implementing a New Human Settlement Theory

Abstract

The authors are currently developing an implementation strategy for a human settlement theory developed by Steven Liaros and Nilmini De Silva. The theory proposes that land development should create a built environment that provides the living and working spaces for up to 200 people, integrated with water and energy micro-grids and a poly-culture food system. Described as a Circular Economy Innovation Hub, such a planning strategy adopts the principles of the Circular Economy systems thinking, life-cycle planning and striving for zero waste. By integrating the water, energy, food and built systems, the overall efficiency of the system is significantly increased. The more efficient delivery of the identified natural needs then offers residents more free time for innovation and creativity. Finally, such places are not isolated villages but hubs or nodes in a network, connecting and collaborating with others in their bio-region and beyond.
Creating places where local residents can collaborate to provide their basic needs is a form of Place-Making as well as an achievable alternative to the Universal Basic Income (UBI). The direct delivery of basic needs by the producing community requires communities to take responsibility for their local environment, supporting infrastructure and others in their community.
Discussions are currently underway with Local Councils in NSW, Queensland and South Australia to inform town planning strategies and policies that would enable the development of pilot projects of Circular Economy Innovation Hubs.The session will include a short overview presentation (15min) followed by Q&A (10min). The remaining time (25min) will be dedicated to a mini workshop to identify and discuss strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats for the implementation of this planning strategy, and to identify partners, stakeholders, and contributors amongst NENA delegates and those not in the room.

Biography

Marcus Foth is Professor of Urban Informatics with the QUT Design Lab, Brisbane, Australia, and Honorary Professor with the School of Communication and Culture at Aarhus University, Denmark. Marcus has (co-)authored over 190 publications. In 2013, he received a Queensland Young Tall Poppy Science Award, and was made a fellow of the Australian Computer Society in 2017. The planning, design and development site Planetizen inducted him to the worldâ€™s top 25 leading thinkers and innovators in the field of urban planning and technology. He is also a passionate wombassador, beekeeper, and cyclist. He tweets @sunday9pm
Download link

Amelia Franklin

People of Coffee

Protecting the integrity of specialty coffee: putting coffee on the blockchain

Abstract

After oil, coffee is the world's biggest traded commodity by volume and monetary value. According to the International Coffee Organisation, total global coffee production has risen by 61% in the past two decades and total export value reached $US19 bn in 2016. A staggering 2.25 bn cups of coffee are consumed every day, making the coffee worth in excess of $US100 bn annually. In over 50 countries 25 million, mainly small producers, rely on coffee for their livelihoods. For the new economy to become mainstream and have a massive, transformative impact, we need to pay attention to major commodity industries like coffee. And fortunately for us, there are plenty of passionate coffee entrepreneurs who are doing just that. Disappointed with the devaluation of the 'fair trade' label, leading players in Melbourne's booming coffee scene have blazed the path of 'specialty coffee': relationships all along the value chain that are premised on making sure the growers of the great beans we enjoy every day get a truly fair price for their labour. But now, specialty coffee itself is in danger of losing its integrity and becoming de-valued as more roasteries and cafes are branding themselves as offering 'specialty coffee' without committing to the values, ethics and business practices it demands. This session will showcase two independent roasters who are leading the charge to protect the integrity of specialty coffee. Joe Molloy of Rumble Coffee in Kensington will discuss Rumble's recently-launched Transparency Project; and Amelia Franklin from Bellingen, NSW, will share her People of Coffee initiative and her dream of "putting coffee on the blockchain". To discuss how that could happen and what it would mean for growers, importers, roasters and consumers of coffee, they will be joined by leading Blockchain speciality Anouk Pinchetti.This is an action and activist-oriented session. You will not only learn about leading business-led initiatives to tackle deep-rooted structural inequalities in the global trading system and economy. You will also learn about how you can get involved and support this vital work – be prepared for a rousing call to arms!

Session facilitated by Nick Rose, Executive Director of Sustain: The Australian Food Network

Biography

Amelia Franklin is Australia's first woman independent coffee roaster. She is the founder of People Of Coffee, which is one of the few real-life applications in blockchain technology to decentralise the food industry and create transparency. People Of Coffee will be adding coffee to the blockchain in 2018. Amelia is the bestselling author of Pirate This Life; A Modern Pirate's Guide to Cryptocurrency, World Schooling & Location Freedom. She is the Director and Founder of Amelia Franklin Coffee Roaster est. 2007.Anouk Pinchetti's career has spanned three decades in the IT industries across three continents within theGovernment, Utilities, Corporate and Community sectors.

Download link

Morag Gamble

Permaculture Education Institute

Abstract

Communities that are actively engaged in designing, creating and maintaining their commons have enormously transformative potential - for the residents, for the neighbourhood and beyond. The positive ripple effect is so powerful. Seeing a different and appealing alternative opens our hearts and minds to new possibilities. We should never underestimate the power of an activated community.

So, how do we activate our community and reclaim our commons for shared food production, for shared living spaces, for shared working spaces? What does that life look like? How do we transition?

Biography

For over 25 years, Morag Gamble of Our Permaculture Life and the Permaculture Education Institute, has been examining these questions locally and internationally through the lens of citizen design, permaculture education, community food systems and ecovillage living. She is a co-founder of Northey Street City Farm, the Australian City Farms and Community Gardens Network and long time resident of Crystal Waters Permaculture Village.

Download link

Juli Gassner

Biography

Jarra is the co-founder of the Community Power Agency, a not-for-profit worker's cooperative that supports communities to participate in the renewable energy transition. She is motivated by the power that people are engaging everyday to make real contributions to the sustainability of their communities. She has co-founded and worked for a range of community organisations and social enterprises, from food to energy, advocacy to banking. Jarra recently completed her PhD on the potential for community energy projects to contribute positive social, economic and environmental outcomes for regional communities. Her research focuses on the development processes, social enterprise models and diverse economic arrangements that community energy projects engage. In particular, it analyses the implications of enterprise design on community participation and the flow-on impacts this has on a range of social outcomes, such as empowerment, capacity building, and sense of community. Jarra is also a lecturer in social enterprise and cooperatives at the University of Newcastle. She grew up between regional NSW, the Philippines and Thailand. Her other life passions involve riding bicycles, growing food gardens, making ceramics and dancing.

Download link

David Holmgren

Holmgren Design

Retrosuburbia

Abstract

Leading ecological thinker and permaculture co-originator David Holmgren will speak to conceptual ideas and practical actions from his acclaimed new book, RetroSuburbia: the downshifter's guide to a resilient future (Melliodora Publishing 2018) which is re-energising the vibrant household and community non-monetary economies of exchange, gift and reciprocity.
RetroSuburbia involves making full use of, and creatively repurposing, what we have already built in the last 40 years of debt-fuelled overgrowth of an increasing corporatised monetary economy. By reframing household activity as economically productive, Holmgren builds upon the current grass roots enthusiasm for household self-reliance.
Holmgren argues that larger and more capable households are not only more ecologically and economically efficient systems for providing basic needs, but are also the nursery for new, emergent monetary-level enterprises.
Using his core permaculture concepts, Holmgren will articulate his RetroSuburbia vision to challenge academics, activists and policymakers to foster greater participation in household and community non-monetary economies. Such action will drive a transition to cooperative, re-localised and self-organised monetary economies able to weather the storms of climate, resources, finance and geo-political instabilities. With Holmgren's RetroSuburbia vision, in the problem lies the solution.

Biography

David Holmgren is the co-originator of the permaculture concept following publication of Permaculture One, co-authored with Bill Mollison in 1978. David is globally recognised as a leading ecological thinker, teacher, respected writer and thought-provoking speaker promoting permaculture lifestyle as a realistic, attractive and powerful alternative to dependent consumerism. Other key publications include Permaculture: Principles and Pathways Beyond Sustainability (2002) and Future Scenarios: How Communities Can Adapt To Peak Oil and Climate Change (2009) and most recently, RetroSuburbia; the downshifter guide to a resilient Future (2018).
Download link

Eric Holt Gimenez

Executive Director, Food First

A Foodies Guide to Capitalism: Understanding the Political Economy of What We Eat

Abstract

In his latest book, A Foodies Guide to Capitalism, Eric Holt-Giménez asserts that the food system cannot be transformed without addressing the economic system of capitalism. Using the wide-angle lens of political economy, Holt-Giménez delves into the economic and political context of the current corporate food regime, exploring the commoditization of food and land as well as issues of power, privilege, and exploitation across the food chain.

Part history book, part practical guide, A Foodies Guide to Capitalism offers emblematic accounts—and critiques—of past and present-day struggles to change the food system, from "voting with your fork," to land occupations and the need to build longer-term political movements dedicated to systemic change. Intended as "an intellectual toolkit" for food activists, Holt-Giménez affirms that "to create a good, clean, and fair food system, we will have to transform the capitalist system itself."

Food First Overview:
Called one of the county's "most established food think tanks" by the New York Times, the Institute for Food and Development Policy, also known as Food First, is a "people's" think tank. Food First's mission is to end the injustices that cause hunger, poverty and environmental degradation throughout the world. They believe a world free of hunger is possible if farmers and communities take back control of the food systems presently dominated by transnational agri-foods industries. Food First carries out research, analysis, advocacy and education for informed citizen engagement with the institutions and policies that control production, distribution and access to food. Their work both informs and amplifies the voices of social movements fighting for food sovereignty: people's right to healthy and culturally appropriate food produced through ecologically sound and sustainable methods, and their right to define their own food and agriculture systems—in the United States and abroad.

Biography

Eric Holt-Giménez, PhD is an agroecologist, political economist, lecturer and author.
In his path-breaking participatory research, "Measuring Farmer's Agroecological Resistance to Hurricane Mitch," 2,000 farmers documented the superior sustainability of agroecologically- managed farms to conventional farms in Central America, spurring the Movimiento Campesino- a-Campesino (Farmer-to-Farmer Movement), a transnational peasant movement for sustainable agriculture. His first book, Campesino a Campesino, chronicles nearly 30 years work with peasant culture and agroecology in Central America and the political, socioeconomic, and ecological factors that galvanised the movement.
As a lecturer, Eric has given yearly courses in international development, agroecology, social movements and food systems transformation at the University of California, Boston University, the University of Gastronomic Sciences, Pollenzo (Slow Food) and the Universidad de Antioquia
in Medellín, Colombia.
As the current Executive Director of Food First, Eric's work both informs and amplifies the voices of social movements fighting for food justice and sovereignty across the globe. Food First's frontline publishing approach brings researchers, writers, and social movements together in a collective effort to amplify the voices of frontline communities fighting for food systems transformation. Food First generates research and education for action, bringing the perspective of community-based struggles to broader development and policy debates.
In Eric's words, "successful social movements are formed by integrating activism with livelihoods. These integrated movements create the sustained social pressure that produces political will—the key to changing the financial, governmental and market structures that presently work against sustainability.
Download link

Eric Holt Gimenez

Food First

Threats to the commons/strategies for responding

Abstract

Facilitated Panel Discussion

Sarah P. Houseman

PhD candidate, La Trobe University

Dynamic and Regenerative Governance for a New Economy

Abstract

Transforming the global economy to pursue low carbon futures in the next 20 years entails a considerable shift in the philosophical mindset and worldview of humanity. Governance is at the centre of every organisation defining their values and establishing the rules of engagement informing their purpose and objectives. The development and flourishing of robust alternative organisational models is an important step towards the transition to a new economy.

Abstract

Presentation 1: Introduction to the concept of the "Right to Food," which conceptualises the right to feed oneself with dignity as a basic human right. Discuss how the Right to Food regards current responses to food insecurity -such as food charities as band aid solution which fit comfortably within the current economic system of capital concentration and corporate control of the food system. Explore Australian and international case studies.
Presentation 2: A look at the evidence of the economic linked between food insecurity and financial security. Some proposed changes to the economic system which would help to address food insecurity. Explored in this talk using national and international examples: a raise to the New Start Allowance, subsidised fruit and vegetables, UBI, Basic Income Grantee.
Presentation 3: Voice of the consumer. Presentation given by a person who has experienced food insecurity. Connected with through the Council to Homeless Persons or Asylum Seeker Resource Centre. Key themes of this presentation may include experience with emergency food aid, how they came to need food aid, their perceived understanding of the causes. Their perceptions of the best solutions, their concerns for the future.
Panel Discussion– opportunity for audience questions

Biography

Sophie Jamieson is a qualified Accredited Practicing Dietitian working in Food Systems. She holds a Bachelor in Food and Nutrition and Master of Dietetics from Deakin University. Sophie is one of the co-convenors for the Right to Food Coalition and teaches into the Food Studies Bachelor at William Angliss Institute on Diet and Health in Society and Food Systems. In 2017 she consulted on behalf of the Right to Food Coalition to Moreland City Council in the development of their Food System Strategy.

Providing there is someone willing and able, the Right to Food Coalition is able to engage the consumer voice by collaborating with either the Council for Homeless Persons or the Asylum Seeker Resource Centre.
Download link

Phil Jones

NSW Chapter of the Centre for the Advancement of the Steady State Economy

The New Economy and High School Education

Abstract

While 'Sustainability across the Curriculum" has recently been made a compulsory theme in high schools across Australia, it is a reasonable to claim to say that it is failing to establish the need for a new economy within the school population. This is largely due to the 'silo effect'. The science syllabus that provides the basis for the new economy is divorced from the study of economics. This presentation will provide an insight as to how this problem can be effectively approached.

Biography

Phil Jones has been teaching Science in high schools for many years and describes himself as an activist in support of social justice and a sustainable environment. He was a contributing author to the book 'Positive Steps Towards a Steady State Economy' edited by Haydn Washington.
Download link

Phil Jones

SJ Around the Bay

The New Economy and the Message of Pope Francis

Abstract

SJ Around the Bay is a network of Catholic Parish Social Justice Groups in the Diocese of Broken Bay located in the northern regions of Sydney and the NSW Central Coast" "We must work toward changing the rules of the game of the socio-economic system. Imitating the Good Samaritan of the Gospel is not enough."[1]. So says Pope Francis. In recent years he has called for a New Economy. This presentation reviews the reasons for this radical change, the basic ethical principals upon which the rules should rest and the immediate steps that can be taken to progress towards this New Economy. The presentation will encompass a global perspective, briefly outlining the efforts being made to deal with global structural injustice, financial integrity (particularly in the extractive industries), international indebtedness and caring for the environment. It will include and evaluation of the UNs Sustainable Development Goals.

Biography

Phil Jones is an active member of the NSW Chapter of the Centre for the Advancement of the Steady State Economy. He is also the convenor of a network of Catholic parish Social Justice Groups in the Diocese of Broken Bay in the Sydney region.
Download link

Rachael Kelly

FNQCES, Brisbane Sharing Map

This facilitated workshop follows on from Elsie's 'Taking Back Control : Power and Value in the New Economy' address at the 2017 conference. It will provide an opportunity for people to explore the 'deep sociology' needed to understand and change hegemonic forces that currently control the global political, economic and social order. 'Commonics' is about understanding and changing the codes that bind us and building new patterns for local action under the banner of Commons Transition Planning.

Biography

Elsie L'Huillier is an academic and community activist whose research is focused on understanding and influencing power and value within progressive paradigms. She has worked at senior level in government and not for profits and is active within the Commons Transition Movement in Central Victoria. She teaches at RMIT in Melbourne and is a co-founder of Commoners Coop.
Download link

Jennifer Lacy-Nichols

Right to Food Coalition/University of Melbourne

The economics and lived experience of food insecurity

Abstract

Biography

Jennifer Lacy-Nichols is a PhD candidate in the food policy research group of the Faculty of Veterinary and Agricultural Sciences at the University of Melbourne. Her thesis examines how the soft drink industry is responding to concerns about the health ramifications of sugary drink consumption, in particular: framing the debate around nutrition and energy balance, reformulating and expanding beverage portfolios, and developing and promoting voluntary self-regulation.

Rumble

Protecting the integrity of specialty coffee: putting coffee on the blockchain

Abstract

Biography

Joe Malloy is the Director and Business DevelopmentManager at Rumble Coffee, which has been roasting great coffee in Melbourne since its launch in 2014. Joe and Head Roaster / Green Buyer Matt Hampton recently launched their cutting-edge Transparency Project, which will provide to every buyer and consumer the FOB (Free on Board) price paid to the farmer for each of its lines of coffee, which is at least 25% higher than Fairtrade – and often in excess of 100% higher. Joe, Matt and the team at Rumble "hope [that their] Transparency Project model will be one further step to changing the buying culture of coffee – for good, not profit." (Bean Scene Mag).

Download link

Michelle Maloney

AELA/NENA

Doughnut economics and bioregional governance: living within our eco-limits

Abstract

Plenary presentation

Ian McBurney

Creating Sydney as a Sharing City: exploring actually existing communal sharing

Abstract

Recently, many cities have seen the rise of new sharing practices and community initiatives that have come to challenge the existing economic and political organisation of the city. For sharing advocates, these social movements demonstrate that people are able to govern themselves and harness the power of collaboration to create healthier and more inclusive local economies. Yet, despite growing interest in supporting these mission-driven sharing initiatives and their potential to create socially just and environmentally sustainable Sharing Cities of the future, there is little research into how these initiatives emerge, what are the aspirations behind these sharing practices, or the potential capabilities and contradictions involved. This paper reports on a project that aims to understand the practices of communal sharing as they are emerging in the City of Sydney. Based on participant observation with a not-for-profit organisation called Share Sydney and their Sharing Map project, the paper provides insights into the social process of sharing, the diversity of actors involved, as well as the multiple logics of organisation that it might employ. The results shed light on the actually-existing nature of sharing in urban space as well as the complexities, possibilities and challenges involved.

Biography

Ian McBurney is the co-founder of bHive.coop, Australia's first platform co-operative. He is an ecological sustainability educator, entrepreneur, facilitator, speaker, MC and author. Ian's specialty is change practice: how do we inspire others around us? Ian spent 5 years in the early 2000s at Vox Bandicoot in Melbourne, delivering the famous environmental theatre program to ten thousand students, workplace culture change training to six thousand staff in local government and manufacturing. Ian was responsible for the expansion and delivery of the Sustainability Street Approach to over 40 local governments around Australia, and cofounded the Bendigo Sustainability Group in 2007, Bendigo – A Thinking City in 2012 and the Synergize CoWorking Hub in 2013. He published Talking ecoLogical in 2014. With his business Live ecoLogical, he has worked across health, manufacturing and social sectors, schools, state government and 60 local governments in four states and two countries.
Download link

Dr Helen Mcgregor

Director and consultant, Redefining Agriculture Pty Ltd

"Price setters are price getters!"

Abstract

There is a history and culture of price taking for Australian farmers, which transcends sector, geography and generation. However, the emergence and growth of the "new-age" cooperative model is challenging this paradigm and opening up new opportunities to price set. What opportunities does this really present and is widespread cultural change possible, in the shadow of an immature supply chain and dominant corporate players? The buoyancy of the Australian export market based on the "clean, green" persona of Australian commodities and growing domestic consumer interest in how food is produced, present unique opportunities to close ranks on the corporate price setters and generate independent markets and marketing opportunities within and for all sectors. This presentation explores the evolution of today's markets and how they are perceived by our farming communities, delving into the culture of price taking to emerge with working examples of people creating market inertia and leveraging cultural change.

Biography

From a background of over 20 years working in veterinary and agricultural industries I offer specialist consultancy to multiple sectors in our food systems, including broad acre industry. I have specialist interest and experience in; decision making in agricultural businesses, understanding motivators for behavioural change and adoption, holistic approach to grazing livestock production, and the appropriate use of technology for enhancement of food production systems and practises. I engage with all sectors and through the whole value chain, working to support and challenge the way we; consumers, policy makers, farmers and communities, undertake, talk and think about agriculture in Australia.
Download link

Associate Professor Nick McGuigan

Monash Business School

Creating Accountable Business Reporting Frameworks - Disrupting Business Norms through Artistic Intervention

Abstract

Accounting has and continues to develop approaches to the measurement of value, provide accountability for that created value and act as the means through which value is mediated. It exists as the core language of business and economics and yet often receives inadequate attention in building the new economy. It is an industry under disruption (Susskind & Susskind, 2015). New technologies are set to transform the information available to accounting professionals. The willingness to experiment and be creative is crucial to creating and adding value in today's world (Porter, Hills, Pfitzer, Patscheke, & Hawkins 2011).
The professions of the future will require individuals to transcend traditional disciplinary boundaries, hold high degrees of resilence, agility, creativity, social intelligence and be able to think in novel, integrated and adapative ways (Davies, Fidler, & Gorbis, 2011). Remarkably different to the current model of business education. To better equip individuals for the professions of the future an accounting curricula that provide meaningful opportunities for students to actively shape, discover and explore their own professional identities will be required.
This workshop aims to explore how art can be used as a mechanism in which to ground the learning of accounting in the students lived experience. Therefore affording students an opportunity to form deeper connections to accounting and their own professional identity. Taking a humanistic approach in mainstream business education in order to develop more responsible, authentic leaders. Practical examples will explore how art and creative thought is used to place an emphasis on creativity, design and integration as key elements of social professions of the future.
Illustrative examples will explore how artists can influence accounting educators (formal accounting artist-in-residence program within business schools; use of visual tools and metaphors workshops; shakespeare actor-led workshops that explore body, presence and awareness) and art pedagogical techniques and methodologies implemented in auditing, capstones, financial and management accounting courses, can be used to empower student-centered learning (structural modelling, photographic documentation and analysis, portfolio design, film and digital media, image collage construction). Interactive activity with participants will illustrate the social role accounting plays in society and how a rigid, analytical, siloed discipline is currently being disrupted for needed social change.

Biography

Associate Professor Nick McGuigan works as an Innovator, Instigator and Disruptor in Monash Business School to create futureoriented business education programs that focus on innovation, creativity and design thinking. He has a particular passion for accountability where he coinstigated The Accountability Institute, a progressive platform with an aim of fostering collaborations between art, science, technology and economics, bringing these fields into conversation to create a new language of accountability. He instigated Monash Business School's newly created ArtistIn-Residence program, conceptually designed the world's first ever accounting perfume and is currently chartering into Queering Accounting.

Download link

Pauline McGuirk

University of Wollongong

Creating Sydney as a Sharing City: exploring actually existing communal sharing

Abstract

Biography

Pauline McGuirk is Senior Professor of Human Geography at UOW and Director of AUSCCER. Her research focuses on the geographies and politics of urban governance. Her current projects focus on urban regeneration; urban energy transition, and the governance practices involved in making cities smart in Australia. Pauline is an Editor of Progress in Human Geography.
Download link

Professor Pauline McGuirk

University of Wollongong, Director of the Australian Centre for Culture, Environment, Society and Space (ACCESS)

Platform Cooperativism: From Vision to Practicalities

Abstract

The emergence of sharing economy business models in recent years has generated much debate, including concern over their social effects. Many negative impacts appear to derive from sharing systems premised on venture capital investment driving rapid expansion toward monopolistic market domination. The systems and interfaces of digital platforms have substantially lowered the transaction costs of many kinds of economic interactions, but have often done so in under-regulated ways. Many current responses focus on regulating or constraining the sharing economy, but a more creative economic strategy may well be offered by Platform Cooperativism. A cooperative platform economy aims to build and support a vision for a more participatory economy, where digital platforms enable place-based, collaborative and holistic economic development. Platform cooperativism draws on entrepreneurial energies to respond, building new economic and social opportunities based on models of shared ownership and control and fostering new practices guided by design-derived methodologies.
This session will host a dialogue between academic researchers and Australian platform cooperative startups that will explore a range of issues confronting this development: What are emerging legal models for cooperatives use of digital platforms? How might digital platforms be designed to enable their use by cooperatives? What are the appropriate scales of operation for platform cooperatives? What difference does the geographical setting of their communities make? In what ways might they intersect productively with urban policy?"

Biography

Pauline McGuirk is Professor of Human Geography at UOW and Director of the Australian Centre for Culture, Environment, Society and Space (ACCESS). Her research focuses on the geographies and politics of urban governance. Her current projects focus on urban regeneration; urban energy transition, and the governance practices involved in making cities smart in Australia.

Download link

Dr Katharine McKinnon

La Trobe University

Enacting and imagining post-capitalist futures using the diverse economies framework

Abstract

Biography

Katharine McKinnon is a Senior Research Fellow at La Trobe University whose work engages with community economies, gender, development and care. Her current research focuses on women's economic empowerment, community based indicators of gender equality, and on the politics of childbirth and maternity care. She is also currently engaged in an ARC Discovery project Mapping the impact of social enterprise on regional city disadvantage.

Download link

Antony McMullen

incubator.coop

Co-operative Pitch Event

Abstract

Biography

Antony McMullen - Belbin character profile peer-assessment: analytical, broad in outlook, clever, hard-driving, innovative, loyal, persistent, professionally dedicated, dynamic and entrepreneurial; possessing all-round leadership characteristics. Specialising: innovative policy, cooperative entrepreneurship and communications.
Download link

Antony McMullen

Inter-cooperation for a solidarity economy

Abstract

techniques for working together for the common good
inspiring organisations and enterprises in the new economy
networked governance and member financing tools to build a new economy.

Working together, we can develop new ways to provide an alternative to an extractive and often exploitative economy.

Abstract

Facilitated Panel Discussion

Abstract

On March 2018 Share Sydney collective organised a Map Jam and a series of four workshops in the City of Sydney. Their aim was to reveal and facilitate access to Sydneys shared resources, enhance community development, and strengthen the sharing economy. This presentation provides an overview of these events, reflecting on successes and challenges. Each presenter will offer a range of insights into the work of Share Sydney and the processes involved in developing the Sharing Map. The presentation will shed light on the aspirations and practices behind the work of Share Sydney, through discussions related to the process of collaborative mapping and vision building. The presentation will also compare the Sydney Sharing Map with other Sharing Maps in Australia. The aim of the presentation is not only to share experiences and insights from the Sharing Map project, but also to open space for constructive discussions on the ways in which sharing is and could be supported and facilitated in cities across Australia.

Biography

Rebecca Moore is a Design Honours student at the University of New South Wales. As part of her studies, Rebecca has undertaken an Internship with Share Sydney, to assist with adding data to the Sydney Sharing Map, critically reflecting on the maps effectiveness and promoting engagement through social media platforms.

Download link

Professor Bronwen Morgan

UNSW Law

Platform Cooperativism: From Vision to Practicalities

Abstract

Biography

Bronwen Morgan is Professor of Law at UNSW. Her research focuses on transformations of the regulatory state in both national-comparative and transnational contexts, and the interaction between regulation and social activism. Her current projects explore the 'new economy', especially the tensions between sharing economies, solidarity economies and commons-based economies.

Download link

Dr Patricia Morgan

Share Sydney collective

Reflections on the Sharing Map Sydney

Abstract

Biography

In her early work as a performance and video artist Patricia explored the ways her abstract trance videos could induce contemplation. Her interest in contemplative practice led to her successful completion of an interdisciplinary PhD in contemplative philosophy. She now teaches and conducts research in contemplative inquiry. See: www.thecontemplativeacademy.comDownload link

Dr Patricia Morgan

Facilitator Inner Dimensions of the New Economy working group, UNSW, Nan Tien Institute

Transitioning from the Old to the New Economy: The Inner Dimension a missing piece of the puzzle

Abstract

The economy (old and new) is a social system comprised of 'economic agents', individuals and organisations, relating to each other through transactions. Despite the core of these social relations residing inside each of us, this foundational aspect of our inner ecologies, and ability to learn and transform, is mostly ignored. This presentation suggests why this might be the case and why paying attention to our inner worlds is essential if we want to transition from the Old to the New Economy. While new theory, policy, technology, and their applications are a vital part of making change, Iâ€™m suggesting the place where change starts is in our subjectivities. It happens when we gain awareness through contemplative or reflective practice of the workings of body-mind-emotion-spirit-intersubjectivity, of memory, past experience and cultural norms, and their impacts on the way we treat ourselves, others and the environment. There is a growing awareness in the New Economy of the need to address inner foundations of a healthy and equitable New Economy. To outline central elements of including the internal landscape in the creation of a holistic New Economy, this presentation will introduce four of these initiatives: NENA's Inner dimensions of the New Economy working group; Inner Transition from the Transition Movement; Christine Wamsler's work on mindfulness in sustainability science, and Contemplative Commoning focused in distributive governance.

Biography

Dan Musil

Inter-cooperation for a solidarity economy

Abstract

techniques for working together for the common good
inspiring organisations and enterprises in the new economy
networked governance and member financing tools to build a new economy.

Working together, we can develop new ways to provide an alternative to an extractive and often exploitative economy.

Biography

Dan Musil, Earthworker Cooperative Secretary, has been coordinating the Earthworker Energy Manufacturing Cooperative project for a number of years. He has extensive experience managing projects and budgets in a range of non-profit organisations and settings. Dan is also undertaking PhD research into worker-cooperative enterprises and regional economic transition.
Download link

Dan Musil

EarthWorker Cooperative & Western Sydney University

Enacting and imagining post-capitalist futures using the diverse economies framework

Abstract

Biography

Dan Musil is undertaking PhD research through Western Sydney University, examining worker-cooperatives and low-carbon transitions in the Latrobe Valley, where he lives. Dan is also the Secretary of the Earthworker Cooperative - a community-led and union-supported initiative to establish a network of worker-run cooperative enterprises in sustainability-focused industries.
Download link

John Niyera

Food Next Door project – Mildura

Food Next Door Project, Mildura

Abstract

Tom Nockolds

Pingala

Pre Power: Affordable renewable energy for all

Abstract

Biography

Tom is a member of the founding team at Pingala.org.au, a community energy organisation with a vision for fairer energy, delivered by bringing people closer together. He is also an associate at Community Power Agency, Australia's only support organisation 100% dedicated to the community energy sector in Australia. Tom left is corporate career in 2012 to pursue his vision of a future where people share the benefits and the burdens of the world more fairly, creating abundance for everyone. He is passionate about community energy, co-operative ownership and governance models and citizen participation in all its guises.
Download link

Christine Parker

Ecological Regulation: transitions, traps and trajectories

Abstract

Koji Payne

Free software for human rights, community empowerment and the commons

Abstract

Information technology now plays a dominant role in societies. Despite its rapid adoption, social and ethical issues of technology often remain unaddressed, often in favour of the corporations and governments who control its power.
Software determines how computers behave, and therefore it has influence on communication, economic activity, democracy, infrastructure and the physical world. Unfortunately, control over this software is often concentrated to a few, and therefore we are given no way of knowing exactly what it does or any power to make it work for us. There is a better way to do software. Free software (""free"" as in ""freedom"") respects human rights and empowers people, anyone can get involved, and contributing to it strengthens the digital commons.
What is free software? Why is free software good? How does software (and technology more generally) interact with power and human rights? What challenges to adopting and enhancing free software exist? How do we harness free software for good? How can we contribute to free software? These questions will be explained and explored in this workshop.
The proposed structure is a workshop that combines presenting concepts and examples, running audience exercises, and having dialog with the audience."

Biography

Koji has some background in software development, computer science and electronics. He believes that we should be masters of technology, not slaves to it. More generally, he strives to improve peace, freedom, democracy, ecological wellbeing and community wellbeing.
Download link

Vanessa Petrie

CEO Beyond Zero Emissions Cooperatives

Threats to the commons/strategies for responding

Abstract

Facilitated Panel Discussion

Biography

Vanessa Petrie is the CEO of Beyond Zero Emissions. Since joining BZE in early 2017 Vanessa has partnered with her team to deliver Rethinking Cement, the world's first strategy for decarbonising the cement industry, the Zero Carbon Communities Guide, won Best International Energy Think Tank in the 2018 Prospect Think Tank Awards, and secured BZE's ranking as 50th Best Independent Think Tank in the world.

Prior to joining BZE Vanessa worked in diverse roles across local and State Government including infrastructure planning and project management, legislative policy development, major policy reform and waste and resource recovery strategic planning. Vanessa is a Director of the Goulburn Valley Waste and Resource Recovery Group Board, and member of the Climate Emergency Darebin Management Committee. She has a Bachelor of Environmental Engineering from RMIT University and a Masters of Environment from the University of Melbourne.

Download link

Anouk Pinchetti

Blockchain Centre Melbourne

Protecting the integrity of specialty coffee: putting coffee on the blockchain

Abstract

Biography

Anouk Pinchetti's career has spanned three decades in the IT industries across three continents within the Government, Utilities, Corporate and Community sectors. Anouk has studied complementary and alternative currencies for twenty years and first heard about Bitcoin in 2010, and began leading workshops in the technology in 2017. Anouk is a Blockchain Technology Educator and Consultant with the Blockchain Centre in Melbourne, as well as an Educator and Business Strategy Consultant with Intraverse Blockchain Technologies.
Download link

Joel Orchard

futurefeeders.org

Community Supported Agriculture as a model for "Rethinking Food Systems

Abstract

As consumers across the globe increase their awareness of eating healthy locally grown food, the benefits of localisation, solidarity economy, alternative food systems and the issues surrounding food justice and food sustainability : Community Supported Agriculture provides a model for direct distribution and engagement between farmers and consumers and offers a economic model of distributed risk and reward sharing.
The Community Supported Agriculture Network Australia and New Zealand has develop to serve the growing CSA movement in Australia and New Zealand. It is an advocacy group, dedicated to highlighting and supporting CSAs in the region and connecting with the international CSA community.We will discuss in brief the CSA model, its value within the Australian context and the goals of the Network.

Biography

Joel and Sally are co-founders of the "Community Supported Agriculture Network Australia and New Zealand". They are active participants, advocates and activists for new food economies and localised food systems. The CSA network exists as both a platform for raising the profile of the CSA model, for sharing, communications and collective support between CSA farmers and providing resources for both CSA farmers and consumers. The CSA Network Australia New Zealand is a member of Urgenci - The International CSA Network and since its inception in March this year has mapped a register of 30 CSA's
Download link

Dr Anne Poelina

Economics in the Kimberly

Abstract

Available soon

Biography

Available soon
Download link

Stephen Pollard

Ecological Regulation: transitions, traps and trajectories

Abstract

Biography

Stephen Pollard is a PhD student at the University of Melbourne, Faculty of Architecture, Building and Planning. His research considers local efforts to mitigate climate change and different ways of imagining and enacting what it means to be low carbon at the local scale. He has a background in anthropology, urban planning and environment policy.

Download link

Monique Potts

UTS

Learning into a New Economy

Abstract

Learning will become increasingly important in the new economy to maintain a sense of social cohesion and value creation. How can we start to build in learning to our models of individual value creation and income? What would a model of universal basic income that includes learning and caring tasks look like? How might an open value network develop in a community that includes value created through learning, caring, environmental and community activities? This will be an playshop to explore some of these big questions and see if there is interest in an ongoing collaboration from participants.

Biography

Monique is a thought leader in education, innovation and entrepreneurship with a mission to reimagine education for a knowledge economy. Currently Director of Strategic Projects at University of Technology Sydney (UTS) she works with teams across the university to create, develop and implement strategic projects to embed innovation and entrepreneurship into the fabric of the institution, culture and educational experience. Her recent initiates include; UTS:Hatchery student incubator and accelerator programs, winner of the 2017 Australian Financial Review Best Learning Experience award, STEAMpunk Girls a transdisciplinary educational program co-designed with high school girls, UTS Innovation Creative Clusters and New Labs a series of experimental labs in emerging technology and creative practice bringing together industry, academics and students to explore the future of technology in areas such as blockchain, AI, VR and journalism.
Prior to joining UTS Monique worked in digital media and innovation at the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) leading the development of interactive digital services including the seminal ABC Splash education portal, ABC Open Archives and social and participatory media implementation strategy across the organisation. Her areas of research interest include new economy value models, future of work and education and gender and technology.
Download link

Alex Prideaux

Redgum Cleaning Cooperative

Starting and running a worker-owned cooperative

Abstract

Biography

Aviva Reed

Becoming Ecological

Abstract

The Becoming Ecological immersion draws from systems thinking, philosophy, psychology, science and the arts. This immersion presents provocations that explore interpersonal knowledge making, moving our thoughts towards a reverent deep reflection into new and old ways of being. Themes include ecological integrity, deep time and the science of soil.

Biography

Aviva Reed is an interdisciplinary visual ecologist. Her practice explores scientific theories, particularly concepts associated with evolution and the ecological imagination. Her work embodies time and scale using storytelling, visualisations, soundscapes and physical movement to to explore emergent systems occurring through complexity. Aviva is also a core member of the Small Friends Books team (CSIRO Publishing). These books explore the world of microbes. Her most recent project is Oekologie Studio, an art, science and ecology studio. Its first publication, "Eon, the Story of the Fossils", explores what we can learn from billions of years of being part of an evolving ecosystem. Oekologie Studio uses the Biotic Potential methodology, incorporating art making, storytelling and educational theories to explore complexity to create experiences and training in the ecologies within schools, universities, communities and corporate settings.
Download link

Aleesha Rodriguez

Digital Media Research Centre, Queensland University of Technology

The Tesla battery and our appetite for energy

Biography

Angela Rutter

Systems change: what's needed next?

Abstract

Coming soon

Biography

Angela's interest in social change has shaped her career. Initially she worked in advertising creating campaigns across multiple countries for products found in most homes. Now her focus is creating civic leadership and community engagement where community, nature and equality is at the heart of why we do what we do. As Director of Engagement at the Australian Conservation Foundation Angela led the development of new values-based story and community engagement strategies, resulting in a growing & vibrant community speaking out for a world where nature thrives. She has expertise in developing civic leadership, leading Climate Reality Australia for several years, and regularly presents on Leadership Victoria's programs.
Download link

Ella Ryan

Redgum Cleaning Cooperative

Starting and running a worker-owned cooperative

Abstract

Biography

Inka Santala

University of Wollongong

Creating Sydney as a Sharing City: exploring actually existing communal sharing

Abstract

Biography

Inka Santala is a PhD Candidate at the University of Wollongong. Her research project explores Sharing Cities and the potential of community-based sharing initiatives to create new capacities and agency in the urban political context. In addition, Inka has been working with Share Sydney as a research volunteer.

The Youth Enterprise Hub (YEH) is an initiative generated by the Inner North Youth Employment Taskforce (INYET) and driven by the Inner North Local Learning Employment Network (INLLEN). A 2017 report recommended the adoption of the European Commission's interpretation of entrepreneurship to include New Economy principles. YEH is now conducting a co-design process where students, principals and leading teachers are touring social enterprises, sustainable and waste management businesses in the inner north of Melbourne. The six pilot schools will then, in collaboration with these businesses, local councils and university colleagues, construct, trial and evaluate a New Economy Business Course for upper secondary students over 2019-2020.

Download link

Darren Sharp

Social Surplus

Creating Sydney as a Sharing City: exploring actually existing communal sharing

Abstract

Biography

Darren Sharp is a new economy strategist, consultant and researcher. As Director of Social Surplus and Australian editor of Shareable, he works with communities to envision the transition to socially just and sustainable futures. Darren is completing his doctoral research on urban experimentation at Curtin University, funded by the CRC for Low Carbon Living.

Download link

Darren Sharp

Social Surplus & Curtin University

Enacting and imagining post-capitalist futures using the diverse economies framework

Abstract

Biography

Emily Sims

Prosper Australia

Reslience & Tax Reform

Abstract

Biography

Emily Sims is in the final stages of finishing a Masters in Planning (Melbourne Uni). She was a Greens candidate in the 2013 Maribyrnong council elections. Emily was a founding member of Permaculture Out West. Her research interests include gentrification, rezoning windfalls and community land trusts.

Download link

Anika Stobart

Earth Advocates

Community democracy in practice: Creating a Community Governance Charter

Abstract

The current crisis of democracy is leading to increased fragmentation of our communities. In our prevailing social and ecological crisis, we need strong and cohesive communities to respond to the challenges we face together. We cannot merely rely on national governments to address the major challenges of our time. We need communities engaging in active, participatory and deliberative democracies to build a new future; a new paradigm.
People are engaging in participatory democracy all around the world. Communities are leading local democratic rights campaigns in the U.S, drafting rights-based constitutions in Iceland, and strengthening municipalities through citizen juries in Australia. New governance methods are arising that engage civil society and create collaborative citizen "owned" approaches to enhance democracy.
This session will focus on ways to build community governance. It will explore mechanisms to return to community-level thinking and action in an entrenched western neoliberal construct. The key question of this workshop is: How can we build strong and interconnected communities to create a new ecological paradigm?
This workshop will use participatory decision-making processes to develop a draft Community Governance Charter. This charter will include a set of foundational rights and principles, inspired by successful examples from around the world, that can be used to build and maintain egalitarian, ecologically connected, democratic communities.

Biography

Anika Stobart is a co-founder of Earth Advocates, a group of activist lawyers working towards creating the new ecological paradigm. She has experience working in both private organisations and the non-profit environmental sector, including Friends of the Earth and Environmental Justice Australia. She has also helped with the ecological limits and consumption work at the Australian Earth Laws Alliance.
Anika holds a Bachelor of Science and Bachelor of Laws (Honours) from Monash University. Her research interests include governance in the new economy and rights for nature.
Download link

Carolyn Suggate

Inter-cooperation for a solidarity economy

Abstract

techniques for working together for the common good
inspiring organisations and enterprises in the new economy
networked governance and member financing tools to build a new economy.

Working together, we can develop new ways to provide an alternative to an extractive and often exploitative economy.

Biography

Business Council of Co-operatives and Mutuals

The Ownership of Legal Persons

Abstract

Legal personhood has become an important concept for movements seeking to secure rights for animals and the environment. Animals and the environment, so the argument goes, should not be objects of private property, and exploitable as such, but should be recognised as rights-bearing subjects as legal persons.
The proposed paper will support this approach but suggest we also look more closely at another legal person: the corporation. The corporation, I show, though having legal personhood, nevertheless remains a quasi-object, capable of being owned as property. The clearest case of an owned corporation is the public company. Ownership of the company, in the form of shares, is freely tradeable on the market. A legal person who is property, of course, is a slave; and the public company is a slave ruthlessly exploited by shareholders who seek to maximise their private returns from the companys activities.
I argue that a New Economy will only be possible if we free the corporation from its enslavement. A new Abolitionism is needed, advocating for ˜free corporations; corporations which can be privately owned or traded on the market. Such corporations already exist as incorporated associations, companies limited by guarantee and co-operatives are three primary examples.

Biography

Matthew Washington

Eva Willmann De Donlea

1Earth Institute Inc.

The role of indigenous knowledge in the New Economy & cross cultural dialoguing – are we listening?

Abstract

Who can teach us a way of thinking distinct from the prevailing concepts? Though there is not one prescribed way, we will here consider that the answer may lie with our traditional cultures.
An Earth-centered world view is what has always guided our indigenous cultures around the world. Does it matter that indigenous peoples have lived sustainably for millennia and have treated the Earth with profound respect and acted as Her custodians?
Yes. The United Nations estimates that indigenous territories cover approximately 20 percent of the Earth's landmass. This 20 percent landmass stewarded by indigenous peoples amazingly contains 80 percent of the world's remaining biodiversity.
The proposed presentation will address the relevance of traditional knowledge in the New Economy:

Why has the indigenous worldview been marginalized for generations as antiquated and unscientific?
In this time of climate change and massive loss of biodiversity can we understand that the indigenous worldview is a source of wisdom that we urgently need?
Are traditional stories not just tales from other worlds and artifacts from the past, but hold the instructions for our survival and our future?

Biography

Eva is Executive Director of 1Earth Institute Inc. What makes the company unique is that its global boards stand for true cross-cultural partnership with an equal Indigenous-non-indigenous representation. The company works globally and is incorporated in the USA as a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization with offices in the USA & Australia.

With a background in science, business, and finance, has consulted to investment funds and companies on sustainability and ESG integration.

Eva worked for the UN in Geneva and was the founding Chair of The Climate Council Inc, to integrate industry initiatives on climate change.

As ethical investment advisor she advised individuals and NGOs on Socially Responsible Investment (SRI) portfolio strategies and served as the Head of Sustainability and Climate Change at FINSIA, the Financial Services Institute of Australasia.

Download link

Angharad Wynne-Jones

Culture and the New Economy; mobilising the arts to lead change
Can arts and artists help us transition to new ways of living compatible with life in the Anthropocene?

Abstract

This panel discussion of leading thinkers and practitioners in art and music believes they can. Their question is how we can more fully unlock the latent cultural power of artists that will create the stories we need to move into the new economy.
Stories are to culture what genes are to biological life. Moving into a new economy requires not just new ideas and practices around production, consumption, technology, politics and identity, but new stories about who we are as individuals, communities and societies. Our ability to tell new stories is not trivial. For some decades now climate scientists have been vigorously arguing for the need to curb emissions. Yet, despite their increasingly urgent pleas, CO2 levels keep rising. This failure to connect is because this is not just a science problem; it is a problem of culture.
Art is not a mirror to reflect reality, but a hammer with which to shape it, Bertolt Brecht said. Speaking to and changing culture is what the arts do. How do we more effectively work with and mobilise artists, musicians, story tellers, performers and our cultural institutions to give increased and more urgent attention to this? How do we involve arts and artists to help lead change?

Biography

Angharad Wynne-Jones is Head of Participation at Arts Centre Melbourne. From 2011-2017 she was Artistic Director at Arts House, City of Melbourne, initiating projects engaged with environmental sustainability including Refuge, investigating the role of cultural institutions in climate change disasters. She is Founder Director of TippingPoint Australia energising the cultural response to climate changeTim Hollo is Executive Director of the Green Institute. An environmentalist, musician and political strategist, Tim has worked for the Greens, Greenpeace and others, as well as performing around the world. Tim is also founder and Executive Director of Green Music Australia, and has written for a wide range of publications.

Bronwyn Johnson is Executive Director of CLIMARTE, President of Arts Project Australia, produced major street and performance art programs for the Melbourne International Festival for the Arts, among many achievements. She is interested in how we create exhibitions and artworks that provide a visceral/empathetic and compassionate
response from audiences that moves beyond awareness to action

Simon Kerr is a musician, climate thinker, activist and producer of the multimedia climate change show, Music for a Warming World. He also works for La Trobe University developing a climate-culture project built around the power of story-telling. Simon has an academic background in environmental philosophy with a PhD in Political Ecology.

Download link