[Campaignforrealdemocracy] CRD 16th Jan? Fwd: [project2012] + Update

Fri Jan 8 16:09:07 UTC 2010

Hi Everyone

James, thanks for the CRD update (see below my email).

Also, this just rec/d on the 2012 list

FWD ////....[ad: revolutionation xv at passing clouds, sat 16th jan
2010 midday till the next day, films debates music, CRD warmly invited
to produce a public debate? "revolutionary philosophy and technique"
the working title]........

I plan to attend the London Climate Camp gathering that w/e but not
sure what times I'd be able to get away for this? James could we maybe
go down together and do a slot at PC? Maybe with some other CRD
people.. ? And even maybe pull in a few other Climate Campers?

Also, everyone else I just put this together yesterday for the 21st
Century Network newsletter, and thought it might be of interest

Within 3 months as part of CRD I hope to:

1. Achieve regular video livestreamed CRD meetings at a central London
venue and/or be holding regular 21stC Network CRD webinars
2. Help mobilise a reasonable joined up coalition in response to the
coming General Election and strategically towards London in 2012
3. Develop a possible CRD inspired manifesto further, consulting with
other groups on it and presenting it on-line in video and/or other
formats
4. Co-convene CRD meetings with other groups to build understanding and capacity

 Action plan to do this:

1. Invite CRD people to attend 'The People Speak' www.pstv.net monthly
training session in Hackney on the eve of 27th January, and to secure
a venue in central London for 'televised' regular meetings
2. Convene a two-day election mobilisation / movement building meeting
on Saturday and Sunday Jan 30th/31st
at the Foundry 3pm - 7pm (near Old Street tube station) 80 Great
Eastern Street, London, EC2A 3JL‎‎
http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?q=51.526301,-0.083771&num=1&sll=51.526748,-0.083588&sspn=0.002496,0.010375&hl=en&ie=UTF8&ll=51.526248,-0.083685&spn=0.002663,0.010375&z=17
All welcome
3. This is an ongoing project, email crdlondon at gmail.com for more info
4. With CRD's Matt Scott and his networks including The Community
Sector Coalition (CSC) co-convened meeting at UCL on Feb 20th to
connect CRD with the voluntary 'third sector' about real democracy and
local environmentalism, and we're looking for other opportunities to
do the same with other groups. See
http://groups.google.co.uk/group/project2012/web/CRD_CSC_CDNL__Flyer_Feb_20th_20091%5B1%5D.doc

Also within six months I hope to:

Hold a 21st Century Meet Up to follow on from earlier 'Real Third Way'
and the Right to the City and CRD meet ups, around the questions: how
best are we to empower civil society in accordance with the principles
of CRD to ensure gains 'equality of arms' with the state and the
market? and what are the historic, British / EU constitutional
implications of this? The event with CSC on February 20th mentioned
abovbe is also being held by way of preparation for this proposed Meet
Up.

Hopefully this is also a useful update for the lists.

Cheers
Mark

>From James:

since last autumn i've been critically evaluating the CRD project and
i've come up with a few thoughts that have informed me on where to put
my efforts.

'real democracy' is a long term goal, and so i tried to work out what
some intermediate goals might be

i think the idea of people from a local community coming together,
organising horizonally / non hierachically and taking (direct) action
to improve their lives and community is a crucial first step. There is
already a thriving movement of groups and networks taking this kind of
'community action' - one of the most well known is haringey solidarity
group http://www.haringey.org.uk but there are loads of others. (see
below for a draft definition i've been working with)

So, the project i'm focussing on is building, developing, publicising
and supporting the idea and practice of 'community action'. The first
thing i want to do is to get people who are activists currently
working on big, national or global issues to see how this is relevant
to where they live and get involved in community action, to that end
i've submitted a proposal to to the climate camp.

I'm keen to get involved and link this with any other CRD strands that
any one else is working on, please get in touch

'community action' proposal to climate camp (submitted 02.01.10)
We start a national 'community action' working group to encourage
climate campers to get involved in (or help start) local
groups/networks where they live that use a similar ethos and tactics
to the climate camp to support action based campaigns on all issues
that are relevant to local people (not just climate) and by doing this
start the process of moving their community towards being more
empowered, sustainable and consensually organised.

(Draft) definition of community action i'm using

Community action could mean any number of things, but here is a
definition of the type of action I am refferring to:
Any open and horizontally organised grassroots action involving
members of a localised community which directly benefits that
community and/or helps a local community to be more empowered or
organised.
The first seems an obvious definition, but the second part might not
be the kind of thing that comes to mind when we think of what
community action is. It means that even actions that are not
specifically designed to help people of a community but in which
people get involved in and, perhaps even as a by-product, help them to
be more organised, skilled or empowered also count as community
action.
A good example of this is the community work done by climate camp in
gillingham – they opened a info shop called 'tipping point' as part of
their campaign to stop kingsnorth, this campaign wasn't aimed at
helping the local peope directly but film showings, skill sharing and
information distribution meant that many local people benefitted from
tipping point. This kind of community action can (and perhaps should)
be added into almost any other campaigning activity
This definition of CA brings together classic charitable volunteering,
the activity of more general groupings such as residents associations,
stuff that might well be seen as classic 'activist' stuff on 'big
issues' in a local area, stuff that might be seen as local NIMBY
activism (campaigning against a new supermaket) and also individual
casework (as practiced by LCAP) all organised in a comletely open and
horizontal way.

-- 
James Holland

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