Organising and strategies to politicise the commons

The Dutch are a depoliticised bunch. But that doesn't mean that we're not busy organising many aspects in our lives in common, through communal gardens, child care collectives run by parents, alternative educational systems or working through the issue of affordable housing. Facing precarity, privatisation and enclosures of public services, many interesting initiatives, groups and collectives are (and have been for centuries) organising themselves differently.

The idea of the commons has become very popular as both an alternative to our current capitalist and neoliberal economic system and as a way to transform our current value system right now. Researchers from (Un)usual Business, a project by Casco - Office for Art, Design and Theory in collaboration with Kritische Studenten Utrecht, have looked into various commoning practices in and around Utrecht. They are trying to find out  how different groups are organising themselves and what their practice could mean for a way of organising our resources in common, independent from the market or the state.

It seems, however, that although many people are actively taking back control of their lives in common, they are not always doing this within a larger political strategy. During this workshop, we would like to review different commoning practices in terms of organisation here in the Netherlands. But we would also like to think about strategies to politicise these practices, so that they may be involved in a larger political struggle instead of staying in the invisible margins of our economy.

Ying Que is an Anthropologist, Projects and Community organiser with Casco - Office for Art, Design and Theory & active with the Kritische Studenten Utrecht