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"Recent years have seen a surge of interest in 'the commons' based on a simple yet radical idea: great improvements in production and management could be achieved by reducing barriers to knowledge exchange and power-sharing. Ranging from meadows, forests and parks to language, open source software (FLOSS and Blockchain) and 3D printers, the commons are distributed or common property resources/infrastructures which are self-managed by their user communities. While acknowledging the significant contributions that can be made through commons-based peer production, this book provides a critical examination of the commons with the aim of contributing to their long-term sustainability. In particular, the book examines the relation of Blockchain to the commons by illustrating the case study of the Commons Stack. Drawing on a range of interdisciplinary ideas and methodologies, the chapters argue that there are a number of economic and social barriers which are obstructing the wider reproduction of the commons. Problems with access to capital and training, the lack of entrepreneurial and managerial skills, and the absence of institutional support from governments, larger coops, and NGOs, are some of the external problems facing the commons today. Meanwhile, localism, gated communities, vested interests, atavism, traditionalism, ideology, conflict, neo-conservatism and techno-elitism represent some of the internal contradictions inherent in the commons. Through overcoming these contradictions, the ultimate goal is to transform capitalism into the postcapitalism of the commons: the creation of a social economy self-organised around the commons. This book provides vital reading for anyone interested in the commons from economics, techno-politics and across the social sciences. Vangelis Papadimitropoulos is a post doc researcher in the School of Political Sciences at Panteion University, Athens, Greece"--

"Recent years have seen a surge of interest in 'the commons' based on a simple yet radical idea: great improvements in production and management could be achieved by reducing barriers to knowledge exchange and power-sharing. Ranging from meadows, forests and parks to language, open source software (FLOSS and Blockchain) and 3D printers, the commons are distributed or common property resources/infrastructures which are self-managed by their user communities. While acknowledging the significant contributions that can be made through commons-based peer production, this book provides a critical examination of the commons with the aim of contributing to their long-term sustainability. In particular, the book examines the relation of Blockchain to the commons by illustrating the case study of the Commons Stack. Drawing on a range of interdisciplinary ideas and methodologies, the chapters argue that there are a number of economic and social barriers which are obstructing the wider reproduction of the commons. Problems with access to capital and training, the lack of entrepreneurial and managerial skills, and the absence of institutional support from governments, larger coops, and NGOs, are some of the external problems facing the commons today. Meanwhile, localism, gated communities, vested interests, atavism, traditionalism, ideology, conflict, neo-conservatism and techno-elitism represent some of the internal contradictions inherent in the commons. Through overcoming these contradictions, the ultimate goal is to transform capitalism into the postcapitalism of the commons: the creation of a social economy self-organised around the commons. This book provides vital reading for anyone interested in the commons from economics, techno-politics and across the social sciences. Vangelis Papadimitropoulos is a post doc researcher in the School of Political Sciences at Panteion University, Athens, Greece"--

"This book explores the potential creation of a broader collaborative economy through commons-based peer production (P2P) and the emergent role of information and communication technologies (ICTs). The book seeks to critically engage in the political discussion of commons-based peer production, which can be classified into three basic arguments: the liberal, the reformist and the anti-capitalist. This book categorises the liberal argument as being in favour of the coexistence of the commons with the market and the state. Reformists, on the other hand, advocate for the gradual adjustment of the state and of capitalism to the commons, while anti-capitalists situate the commons against capitalism and the state. By discussing these three viewpoints, the book contributes to contemporary debates concerning the future of commons-based peer production.
Further, the author argues that for the commons to become a fully operational mode of peer production, it needs to reach critical mass arguing that the liberal argument underestimates the reformist insight that technology has the potential to decentralise production, thereby forcing capitalism to transition to post-capitalism. Surveying the three main strands of commons-based peer production, this book makes the case for a post-capitalist commons-orientated transition that moves beyond neoliberalism."

The digital commons support novel organizational models such as cosmolocalism and open cooperativism that seek to challenge the capitalist mode of production. They set out to establish a counter-hegemony vis-à-vis the current hegemony of neoliberalism. The paper engages in the debate between Marinus Ossewaarde, Wessel Reijers and Vasilis Kostakis over the emancipatory potential of the digital commons by reviewing the P2P Lab and Tzoumakers as illustrative cases of cosmolocalism and open cooperativism. The paper shows that the P2P Lab and Tzoumakers exhibit core features of cosmolocalism and prefigure a sketch of open cooperativism. For the digital commons in general and P2P Lab/Tzoumakers in particular to contribute to the counter-hegemony of open cooperativism, it is necessary to link to a chain of equivalence criss-crossing the commons, ethical market entities and a partner state via cross-sectoral value propositions, inclusive governance, and economic models, innovative law policies and open sustainability standards, all aiming to force capitalism adjust to a commons-oriented post-capitalist transition.

The Commons are an emerging economic anti-paradigm that favor decentralization over central control, self-management over hierarchy, transparency over privacy, and sustainability over growth at all costs. But the Commons are still in their infancy, and they face several contradictions, as they develop in mutual dependence with capitalism. This article is an attempt to tackle these contradictions by building on a number of proposals already presented by Michel Bauwens, Vasilis Kostakis, Stefan Meretz, and Jacob Rigi.