August’s Community Wealth Building Roundup

Jay OwenCommunity Development Solutions

For the past several years, The Democracy Collaborative has been building a transatlantic learning and action network between our organization and like-minded colleagues in Europe. This dialogue has particularly grown throughout the United Kingdom.

For me, what’s especially rewarding is seeing how this growing relationship is leading to the proliferation of new approaches to community wealth building. The latest issue of Renewal focuses on some of these shared learnings, featuring writing from Executive Director of the Next System Project Joe Guinan, Research Director Thomas Hanna, and an interview with myself about the growing interest in economic democracy. Read the full issue here.

The Trans-Atlantic dialogue is also expressing itself in a new project we recently launched with the Manchester-based Center for Local Economic Strategies (CLES) and the Health Foundation investigating the role of National Health Service organizations as anchors in the UK, building on lessons learned from the growth of the Healthcare Anchor Network here in the United States. Read more about the project here. Anchor institution strategies such as these have drawn growing interest from the Labour Party, which has advanced an agenda rooted in broad-based ownership. Resident Fellow Peter Gowan recently contributed an article to Jacobin highlighting the transformative possibilities of this platform. As an adviser to the Labour Party’s new Community Wealth Building Unit, The Democracy Collaborative is able to share our own experience with these types of innovations, while also bringing back novel approaches and strategies that can advance the work in the US.

This symbiotic relationship can be seen in the development of the Preston Model. Inspired in part by Cleveland’s Evergreen Cooperatives, the Preston City Council has been advancing an agenda of local wealth building, leverage anchor spending to support local economic and cooperative development. A recent piece in The Nation highlights how Preston has innovated elements such as a local pension investment fund. City Council leader Matthew Brown now serves as Democracy Collaborative Senior Fellow for the Promotion of Community Wealth Building, helping to facilitate learning across continents. Matthew joined our Anchor Collaborative Convening earlier this summer, discussing advances made in Preston, as well as challenges, with economic development leaders from across the US. Read more about the convening below and hear more about the development of the Preston model from Matthew in the latest Next System Podcast episode.

Earlier this summer, The Democracy Collaborative hosted another conversation that brought together views from both sides of the Atlantic, this one around the issue of housing. Featuring Senior Research Associate Jarrid Green, Resident Fellow Peter Gowan, and Laurie Macfarlane, co-author of “The Economics of Land and Housing,” the dialogue focused on strategies that advance community control of land and housing, and how these can, in turn, help to mitigate the effects of gentrification and displacement. Read more here.

Lastly, The Democracy Collaborative is currently hiring for two fall internships. Find more information here.