https://znetwork.org/category/topic/vision-strategy/reimagining-society/ Independent Left News, Analysis, Vision and Strategy Mon, 22 Dec 2025 17:09:38 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://znetwork.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/cropped-Z_logo_512-32x32.png https://znetwork.org/category/topic/vision-strategy/reimagining-society/ 32 32 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/mutual-aid-in-motion-one-participants-story/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/mutual-aid-in-motion-one-participants-story/#respond Mon, 22 Dec 2025 17:09:30 +0000 I am a daughter of refugees, a Southeast Asian woman, and a mom raising two girls in an increasingly hostile world. When overwhelmed, I tend to look for action—some physical thing I can do to take back some semblance of balance or calm.  In 2017, when Donald Trump took office as president, I felt unmoored [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/mutual-aid-in-motion-one-participants-story/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/homo-stultus-the-case-for-renaming-ourselves/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/homo-stultus-the-case-for-renaming-ourselves/#respond Tue, 09 Dec 2025 18:01:00 +0000 The name Homo sapiens—Latin for “wise man”—has always carried an air of self-congratulation. Carl Linnaeus, the father of modern taxonomy, coined the term in 1758, confident that his species stood apart by virtue of intelligence and reason. But what if wisdom, properly defined as the capacity to act with foresight and moral restraint, has proven [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/homo-stultus-the-case-for-renaming-ourselves/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-happiness-trap-cultivating-contentment-and-wonder-as-a-radical-path-forward/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-happiness-trap-cultivating-contentment-and-wonder-as-a-radical-path-forward/#respond Mon, 10 Nov 2025 19:48:37 +0000 Much has been written about happiness. Encyclopedias of advice, viral think pieces, TED Talks, Instagram affirmations—all converge on a single premise: that happiness is the apex of human ambition, the measure of a life well-lived, the summit we are morally and psychologically bound to reach. Nations, too, have adopted happiness as a metric of civic [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-happiness-trap-cultivating-contentment-and-wonder-as-a-radical-path-forward/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/military-moral-injury-violence-and-the-parable-of-the-guinea-worm/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/military-moral-injury-violence-and-the-parable-of-the-guinea-worm/#respond Mon, 10 Nov 2025 19:24:08 +0000 It’s been a while since I’ve written for TomDispatch and there’s a reason for that. About 16 months ago, I experienced a catastrophic car crash. An SUV veered across the double yellow line of the highway I was traveling on and hit my little Chevy Spark head-on — on the driver’s side. I’ve been told that I’m lucky [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/military-moral-injury-violence-and-the-parable-of-the-guinea-worm/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/zvideo/what-happens-after-capitalism/ https://znetwork.org/zvideo/what-happens-after-capitalism/#respond Mon, 06 Oct 2025 15:44:34 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=video&p=1289575 In this Our Changing Climate climate change video essay, I examine what ecosocialism might look like in the future. From zero-carbon, accessible, and free public transit, to low-cost housing, all the way to a planned economy, an ecosocialist future would seek to bring better well-being to all people and the planet. Thumbnail art by: Aerroscape [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/zvideo/what-happens-after-capitalism/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-radical-power-of-kindness-frank-caprios-mercy-in-the-face-of-justice/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-radical-power-of-kindness-frank-caprios-mercy-in-the-face-of-justice/#respond Tue, 26 Aug 2025 16:01:00 +0000 If you’re like me, you’ve probably been struggling with what feels like a world turned upside down, where justice, mercy, and compassion are in painfully short supply. The days feel darker, and the nights heavier. I say this as I sit in our nation’s capital, where the National Guard patrols our streets, homeless encampments are [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-radical-power-of-kindness-frank-caprios-mercy-in-the-face-of-justice/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/missing-words/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/missing-words/#respond Mon, 11 Aug 2025 16:43:58 +0000 In 2022, I did an Earth Day talk called Words vs Reality, and it cataloged three dozen or so terms that – from a systems perspective – would actually require new labels. For example, fossil fuels might better be labeled flammable fossils, or consumer might be human. After reflecting on that exercise, it made me wonder what words in our culture don’t exist, [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/missing-words/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/america-should-sprawl-not-if-we-want-strong-towns/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/america-should-sprawl-not-if-we-want-strong-towns/#respond Mon, 21 Jul 2025 18:39:29 +0000 There’s been a lot of buzz around Conor Dougherty’s recent New York Times piece, “Why America Should Sprawl.” The article argues that the country’s housing crisis is so severe—and infill development so insufficient—that we need to embrace aggressive outward expansion of our metro regions, what many would call sprawl, to build the millions of homes America [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/america-should-sprawl-not-if-we-want-strong-towns/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/dreaming-of-a-small-fashion-farm/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/dreaming-of-a-small-fashion-farm/#respond Mon, 21 Jul 2025 18:33:08 +0000 As I write this note, I am about to embark on a month long journey around Europe researching small scale, bioregional textile processing and the collaborative governance and distributive finance that will support such initiatives. Supported by a Churchill Fellowship, I will be meeting a wide range of amazing people from farmers, to designers, academics, [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/dreaming-of-a-small-fashion-farm/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/care-home-farm-energy/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/care-home-farm-energy/#respond Mon, 14 Jul 2025 16:40:27 +0000 An exploration of what independence from purchasing fossil fuels or electricity on the market would achieve, and how we could achieve it. Energy is such a massive topic to discuss, particularly in our age of what Nate Hagens calls- Energy Blindness. The use of electricity or fossil fuels to take the physical work out of [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/care-home-farm-energy/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/agtech-for-agroecology/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/agtech-for-agroecology/#respond Tue, 01 Jul 2025 19:00:29 +0000 I was invited to contribute to the Advanced Lecture Series
 at Tongji University, in Shanghai. These high-level, cross-disciplinary lectures are organized by the Graduate School. I thank them for this opportunity. I am also grateful to Professor Francesca Valsecchi for supporting me in this challenging commission. The following transcript accompanies the YouTube recording. Takeaways Sustainability [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/agtech-for-agroecology/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/economists-unite-in-support-of-zohran-mamdanis-plan-for-new-york-city/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/economists-unite-in-support-of-zohran-mamdanis-plan-for-new-york-city/#respond Tue, 24 Jun 2025 16:01:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1285402 Mamdani’s campaign, featuring rent stabilization, fare-free transit, universal no-cost child care, and municipal groceries, offers immediate relief while addressing NYC’s affordability crisis. Leading economists worldwide endorse Mamdani’s “coherent agenda that rejects austerity and embraces the City’s power to make life more affordable for New Yorkers.” We write, as economists from across the world, to support Zohran [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/economists-unite-in-support-of-zohran-mamdanis-plan-for-new-york-city/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/commoning-diversity-and-small-scale-manufacturing/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/commoning-diversity-and-small-scale-manufacturing/#respond Mon, 23 Jun 2025 13:53:43 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1285356 Tyson Yunkaporta, indigenous academic and Australian deep-thinker, has described how if we are to address the polycrises and create a long-term liveable planet we need diversity. Diversity of thought, process, peoples, concepts, ecosystems, everything. (Donald Trump is doing everything he can to limit diversity in the US, because perhaps instinctively he understands it has the [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/commoning-diversity-and-small-scale-manufacturing/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/prison-is-designed-to-make-fatherhood-impossible/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/prison-is-designed-to-make-fatherhood-impossible/#respond Mon, 16 Jun 2025 14:51:27 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1285059 In the movies, people bolt upright, panting after dramatic awakenings from bad dreams. I thought that was an exaggeration until I experienced it behind bars. In my nightmare, my 2-year-old son entered the prison where I was incarcerated. He was trying to reach me, but the prison guards grabbed him and wouldn’t let go. I [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/prison-is-designed-to-make-fatherhood-impossible/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-consumer-power-myth/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-consumer-power-myth/#respond Mon, 02 Jun 2025 13:00:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1284482 The globalization of trade has given the wealthier share of the global population the impression that you can eat what you want. This fits well with the neoliberal ideology that portrays capitalism as democratic where people “vote with their wallets”. But it is an illusion – even for the rich countries. Rather than putting our [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-consumer-power-myth/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/from-inner-change-to-systemic-change/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/from-inner-change-to-systemic-change/#respond Fri, 30 May 2025 15:46:19 +0000 With the release of my significantly revised, new edition of Think Like a Commoner: A Short Introduction to the Life of the Commons, I’ve had a chance to start some new conversations and engage with different communities of practice. Recently, the Garrison Institute, a retreat center for contemplation and social action in the Hudson Valley of New York [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/from-inner-change-to-systemic-change/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/ecuador-rights-of-nature-on-paper-the-case-of-sarayaku/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/ecuador-rights-of-nature-on-paper-the-case-of-sarayaku/#respond Tue, 27 May 2025 16:00:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1284256 In 2012, the Kichwa people of Sarayaku won a historic lawsuit against the Ecuadorian state in the Inter-American Court of Human Rights—one of the first major tests of Ecuador’s trailblazing 2008 Constitution, the first in the world to recognize the Rights of Nature. But thirteen years later, the promises of that legal victory remain largely [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/ecuador-rights-of-nature-on-paper-the-case-of-sarayaku/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/why-building-inspiring-alternatives-is-necessary-to-counter-authoritarianism/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/why-building-inspiring-alternatives-is-necessary-to-counter-authoritarianism/#respond Fri, 16 May 2025 16:30:00 +0000 We are heading down a perilous road. Vulnerable communities face growing threats. The climate crisis is outpacing scientists’ worst predictions. Authoritarianism is no longer a distant possibility — it is rising, with democracy backsliding across the globe. With Trump’s return, public services like education, labor protections, humane immigration policies, health care and diversity programs are [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/why-building-inspiring-alternatives-is-necessary-to-counter-authoritarianism/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-us-is-in-free-fall-but-we-can-turn-things-around-by-valuing-our-neighbors-over-money/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-us-is-in-free-fall-but-we-can-turn-things-around-by-valuing-our-neighbors-over-money/#respond Mon, 12 May 2025 16:25:28 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1283620 The United States is often revered as the most powerful nation in the world. The U.S. has a strong economy; the most equipped military on the planet; a working class of over 130 million people; the biggest GDP of any nation; and large music, film, agricultural, beauty, food, fossil fuel, and technology industries. However, many [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-us-is-in-free-fall-but-we-can-turn-things-around-by-valuing-our-neighbors-over-money/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/when-the-future-was-now-prefigurative-politics-and-the-carnation-revolution/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/when-the-future-was-now-prefigurative-politics-and-the-carnation-revolution/#respond Fri, 02 May 2025 14:15:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1283246 Note from the editors The translation of this article by Raquel Varela and Roberta Della Santa began as a collaboration between Posle and LeftEast in 2024, marking the 50 year anniversary of the Carnation Revolution. We are publishing it now, in 2025, a year marking the independence of Cape Verde and Guinea Bissau as well as the [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/when-the-future-was-now-prefigurative-politics-and-the-carnation-revolution/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/community-struggles-for-self-governance-in-the-global-south/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/community-struggles-for-self-governance-in-the-global-south/#respond Tue, 29 Apr 2025 16:00:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1283136 Are we really free? With this seemingly straightforward yet provocative question, Vijay Dethe from Pachgaon village in the Chandrapur district of Maharashtra, India, opened several philosophical and political questions. Vijay belongs to Dalit community and works with the Gond adivasis (indigenous peoples in India) and other marginal communities of Pachgaon towards self rule and overall [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/community-struggles-for-self-governance-in-the-global-south/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/energy-transition-the-end-of-an-idea/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/energy-transition-the-end-of-an-idea/#respond Mon, 28 Apr 2025 15:49:01 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1283060 Pretty much the last nail in the coffin for the idea that there’s going to be a smooth transition out of fossil fuels and into renewables that can rescue the existing high-energy global economy in anything like its present form comes courtesy of Jean-Baptiste Fressoz and his 2024 book More and More and More: An All-Consuming [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/energy-transition-the-end-of-an-idea/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/we-shouldnt-have-to-work-this-hard/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/we-shouldnt-have-to-work-this-hard/#respond Mon, 24 Mar 2025 14:44:31 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1281479 In 1930, economist John Maynard Keynes famously predicted that technological progress and economic growth would solve the problem of material scarcity. In one hundred years, Keynes anticipated in his essay “Economic Possibilities for Our Grandchildren,” humanity was on track to develop the productive capacity to meet its needs with minimal effort, replacing lives of labor with lives [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/we-shouldnt-have-to-work-this-hard/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/housing-justice-beyond-consumerism-an-excerpt-from-defying-displacement/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/housing-justice-beyond-consumerism-an-excerpt-from-defying-displacement/#respond Mon, 17 Mar 2025 15:29:12 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1281161 The following is an excerpt adapted from Defying Displacement: Urban Recomposition and Social War (IAS/AK Press, 2024). Defining displacement Gentrification is commonly understood as consumption: who chooses to rent or purchase which housing unit. From this perspective we can ask many questions: why white people wish to live in “gritty” neighborhoods, or why they have the opposite [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/housing-justice-beyond-consumerism-an-excerpt-from-defying-displacement/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/solandium-2063-playing-for-change/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/solandium-2063-playing-for-change/#respond Wed, 12 Mar 2025 15:01:02 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1280670 How much joy is in your life these days? How much play in your resistance to all the fear, repression, violence, burnout, apathy, broke-ness, and brokenness? When you imagine the future, is it art? These are not cute questions meant to nicen up a dark moment – this is an urgent, strategic concern. Learning from [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/solandium-2063-playing-for-change/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/building-solidarity-around-survival-a-seattle-example/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/building-solidarity-around-survival-a-seattle-example/#respond Fri, 07 Mar 2025 16:16:13 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1280703 The issue is survival We are in for a long hard time in the U.S. and the world as a whole. The divisions between people have grown too deep. The concentration of power in individuals and institutions that care little about the common good, pursuing their own interests at its expense, is too great. The [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/building-solidarity-around-survival-a-seattle-example/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/for-a-democratic-society-democratize-finance/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/for-a-democratic-society-democratize-finance/#respond Tue, 04 Mar 2025 17:01:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1280548 Michael McCarthy’s The Master’s Tools opens with an evocative description of life under a new social order. “It’s a sunny Friday morning in 2045, and you’re running late for a meeting to deliberate over and agree on the priorities of the city.” You ride to the meeting on a public railway network and step off into the [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/for-a-democratic-society-democratize-finance/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/in-its-fight-against-fascism-israeli-academia-remains-blind-to-a-basic-truth/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/in-its-fight-against-fascism-israeli-academia-remains-blind-to-a-basic-truth/#respond Mon, 03 Mar 2025 15:35:35 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1280494 Never before have the two Israeli communities between which I divide most of my time, the academic and the activist, been so estranged from one another — and this, despite both being genuinely concerned about the fascism tightening its grip on Israeli society. An indication of this abyss is the contrast between both communities’ responses [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/in-its-fight-against-fascism-israeli-academia-remains-blind-to-a-basic-truth/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/zvideo/what-if-we-ran-the-economy/ https://znetwork.org/zvideo/what-if-we-ran-the-economy/#respond Sun, 09 Feb 2025 17:05:23 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=video&p=1279519 Can you imagine libraries of tools, clothing, and even housing? The library economy can be the bridge to an entirely new world of human flourishing. Let’s explore what the library economy is, what may or may not be included, and what it might take to bring it to life. Introduction – 0:00 The Library Economy [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/zvideo/what-if-we-ran-the-economy/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/how-a-community-collaborative-in-arkansas-is-pioneering-solutions-to-long-standing-social-problems/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/how-a-community-collaborative-in-arkansas-is-pioneering-solutions-to-long-standing-social-problems/#respond Fri, 03 Jan 2025 15:55:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1277950 Redlining, exclusionary zoning, and predatory lending schemes have put prospective Black homeowners at a severe disadvantage. As the Ballard Center for Social Impact points out, the gap in homeownership rates between Black and white families was larger in 2019 than in the 1960s. In 2023, the National Association of Realtors reported a nearly 29 percent [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/how-a-community-collaborative-in-arkansas-is-pioneering-solutions-to-long-standing-social-problems/feed/ 0