Syllabus on Civilizational History, Transition Dynamics and the Historical Role of the Commons by Michel Bauwens

Context

Lecturer: Michel Bauwens: PhDSeminar, P2P and Civilizational Transition

This is the syllabus for the seminars first held on Tuesdays 15-17, Aula Ovale, Dipartimento di Scienze Sociali, Vico Monte della Pietà 1.

• Original Context as provided by Adam Arvidsson:

"I would like you to send me a mini syllabus for your four PhD seminars: I imagine the first occasion could be a sort of introductory lecture where you can present your project, and the remaining three should be structured around short (10-30pp) readings that you feel are crucial to that specific part of the argument. Each seminar could be divided in a first hour when you 8and I) discuss the readings with the students and a second hour when you present the readings for the next occasion . So, four titles, three suggested readings and, if you like, a supplementary bibliography of text and sources that you find crucial: go for quality and economy over quantity. I would like to organize this as an Open PhD seminar directed not just at our students but also at those at the PhD school in Global History and Governance at the Scuola Normale Meridionale; the Orientale, as well as other nearby institutions"

Introduction

Before the course starts

To Browse: The Civilizational Analysis section of the P2P Foundation wiki.

https://wiki.p2pfoundation.net/Category:Civilizational_Analysis

This is a guide to start reading macro-historical works. It contains information about the authors and their books, and excerpts illustrating the frameworks they are using to understand history, such as ‘phases’ or ‘cycles’. Thread 1 deals with the cultural historians, Thread 4 with world-systems analysis, Thread 6 with Big History.

To Browse: The Multi-Evolutionism or Non-Linear Evolution Theory of the Russian world-systems / Big History synthesis by Leonid Grinin and Andrej Korotayev

https://wiki.p2pfoundation.net/Russian_World-Systems_Analysis_School

These publishers of a annual ‘Evolutionary Almanac’, are both continuing the neo-materialist/geopolitical tradition of world-systems analysis, and updating it with systems-theory, complexity science insights into common patterns in the evolution of matter, life and culture (i.e. Big History)

Session 1: Basic concepts from the Macrohistorians

Tuesday April, 2

In this session, we will review the basic concepts of macro-historians since the publication of The Decline of the West from Oswald Spengler.

We will distinguish three major waves of macro-history:

The first wave of culturalist (Toynbee, Quigley, Sorokin) and ‘spiritualist’ (De Chardin, Aurobindo) authors, which were published mostly in the post WWII period before the 60s.

The second wave of ‘neo-materialist’ (or neo-marxist) world-system analyst authors (Fernand Braudel, Immanuel Wallerstein), starting in the 60-70s.

A third wave of ‘Big History’ authors, which starts its narrative at the Big Bang, seeks common patterns of evolution and change based on systems theory, complexity science and cybernetics. The came of age in the 90s, replacing the hegemony of world-systems analysis in academia.

We will focus on operative concepts such as ‘instruments of expansion’ (Quigley), ‘challenge and response’ (Toynbee); ‘ideate vs sensate’ civilizational models (Sorokin), etc ..

The stress of this session will be on first wave authors, i.e.,the cultural historians, essentially Spengler, Toynbee, Sorokin, Quigley, and others.

Recommended readings:

Must-Read Text: Big Historical Foundations for Deep Future Speculations About Cosmic Evolution. Cadell Last. Synthesizes the latest Big History findings with 'transhumanist' speculations.

https://cadelllast.files.wordpress.com/2012/12/last-c-2015-big-historical-foundations-for-deep-future-speculations5.pdf

Many useful distinctions and periodizations, introducing the systems-based vocabulary of Big History authors, adding the authors own speculations about potential transhuman scenarios for the future.

To Browse: A annotated bibliography for civilizational research

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1RbKtmBBUOLwDPexm5g0kv_C1BSZ-lvTQHzaH8degwUw/edit

This list, a streamlined version, centered on the books by macro-historians, distills key learnings for each author and book.

Video: John David Ebert on Cultural Immune Systems

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kM8T6CPh974

This is a flowing 3-hour interview with John David Ebert introducing many of the themes around comparative civilizational inquiry, in conversation with Brandon Van Dyck of The Mill Series:

Session 2: The Pulsation of the Commons hypothesis

Tuesday, April 9

In this session, we will present a hypothesis that there is a counter-cyclical ‘pulsation of the commons’, which affects societal and civilizational cycles. In short, in the ascending civilizational cycles in which market and state institutions perform relatively well for core populations of a system, commons practices and institutions tend to weaken, while in descending cycles, they tend to revive, playing remarkable functions in the dark ages that intermittently occur between civilizational cycles. We will give examples from medieval Japan and post-Roman Europe.

The key question that will be addressed is: what happens to the commons in a planetarizing system, and especially: what happens to the revival of commoning when such a planetary system is in a phase of relative decline.

I will mention as case studies, see the bibliography:

The transition in 16th cy Japan towards the Shogunate,

(for another account see Mark Whitaker’s book, Ecological Revolution, mentioned below)

https://wiki.p2pfoundation.net/Togukawa_Period_in_Japan_as_an_Example_of_Ecologically_Stable_and_Carrying_Capacity-Led_Population_Dynamic )

Role of mutualized ‘instruments of expansion’ in the European post-Roman ‘dark age’, based on Quigley’s notion of ‘instruments of expansion’, see Richard Moore’s First European Revolution.

Recommended readings:

Must-Read Text on the Pulsation of the Commons: Placing the Commons in a Temporal Framework: The Commons as a Planetary Regeneration Mechanism. By Michel Bauwens and Jose Ramos.

https://wiki.p2pfoundation.net/Pulsation_of_the_Commons

Must-Read Text: Capitalism and the Commons. By Adam Arvidsson.Theory, Culture & Society, 2019

https://www.academia.edu/40231280/CAPITALISM_AND_THE_COMMONS?

Adam Arvidsson focuses on the linkage between thriving commons and emergent markets, with focus on European Middle Ages.

Text: (browse or read as supplement):

• The Silent Revolution: A New Perspective on the Emergence of Commons, Guilds, and Other Forms of Corporate Collective Action in Western Europe. By TINE DE MOOR. IRSH 53 (2008), Supplement, pp. 179–212

https://www.ris.uu.nl/ws/files/20096187/_PUB_SilentRevolution_IRSH_53_Suppl.pdf

On the explosion of guilds and commons in the 11th-12th cy.

Browse or Read: Ecological Revolution: The Political Origins of Environmental Degradation and the Environmental Origins of Axial Religions; China, Japan, Europe. by Mark D. Whitaker. Cologne, Germany: Lambert Academic Publishing, AG. , 2009

https://wiki.p2pfoundation.net/Political_Origins_of_Environmental_Degradation_and_the_Environmental_Origins_of_Axial_Religions ; https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Mark_Whitaker3/publication/296486001_Ecological_Revolution_The_Political_Origins_of_Environmental_Degradation_and_the_Environmental_Origins_of_Axial_Religions_and_Scientific_Advance_China_Japan_Europe/links/56d5f7ea08aee1aa5f730ee4.pdf?origin=publication_list

See the detailed ToC for the many case studies. My interpretation of the role of monastic institutions, both the Benedictines/Cistercensiers for Europe and Pure Land / Zen Buddhism for Japan, is originally inspired by these cases.

Browse or Read: R. I. Moore. The First European Revolution, c. 970-1215. Oxford and New York: Blackwell Publishers, 2000

https://wiki.p2pfoundation.net/First_European_Revolution

This book has a treatment of the role of the Cluny-headquartered monastic institutions in establishing the new social contract of the ‘Peace of God’ charters, which facilitated the transition towards the high medieval period from the 11th to the 13th century.

Session 3: P2P and the Commons

Tuesday April 16

This session will introduce the basic concepts on the p2p theory approach, and the history of research at the P2P Foundation.

After introducing the key concepts of P2P Theory and guide students through the use of the wiki of the P2P Foundation, we will review the research undertaken by affiliated researchers, as published in P2P Foundation reports:

The logic of studying open source movements and peer production, governmental transitions at the city and nation-state level, and thinking through commons-based global governance.

A stylized history of commoning

Sources of P2P Theory and recommended literature on the Commons

Then we review the P2P Foundation reports and their findings:

Recommended readings:

Must-watch video: Introduction to peer to peer and the commons, By Michel Bauwens. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=glRE-J9xFbQ

Flipped classroom module. Please watch it before the course.

P2P Foundation reports:

The study of Value, https://p2pfoundation.net/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/value_in_the_commons_economy.pdf

P2P Accounting for Planetary Survival, https://p2pfoundation.net/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/AccountingForPlanetarySurvival_def.pdf

The thermo-dynamics of Peer Production, Vol I. , https://p2pfoundation.net/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/Report-P2P-Thermodynamics-VOL_1-web_2.0.pdf ; Vol. II. , https://p2pfoundation.net/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/Report-P2P-Thermodynamics-VOL_2-web_2.0.pdf

Book: The Cosmo-Local Reader. Ed. José Ramos, Sharon Ede, Michel Bauwens and Gien Wong. P2P Foundation, 2021, https://clreader.net/ free pdf

Session 4: The next system, what can we know ?

Tuesday April 23.

In this session, based on the material reviewed in the 3 first sessions, we will present a number of scenarios based on the operative concepts developed by the P2P Foundation. After a review of various cycles documented in the macro-historical literature, we will review concepts such as:

1. Commons-Based Peer Production and the Value Crisis
2. The Contributive Economy
3. The Partner State
4. Cosmo-Localis
5. Magisteria of the Commons

We will present various scenarios, including our own four-fold scenario, on the future deployment of the commons in the context of an evolving meta-crisis.

We will ask students to evaluate such scenarios and eventually suggest their own, as well as inquire into strategies for social change in that context.

Suggested: Intervention of Prof. Adam Arviddson on the Value Crisis

Recommended readings:

To Browse: The P2P Foundation section on historical cycles

https://wiki.p2pfoundation.net/Category:P2P_Cycles

Check for the concepts in the search box of the wiki, top right

To Browse: We have collected various future-oriented scenarios here at

https://wiki.p2pfoundation.net/Category:P2P_Futures

Appendix: Some extra resources

• Summary of Spengler’s main ideas, https://spergler.substack.com/p/an-introduction-to-spenglers-decline

• The 'pulsation of the commons' as a historical reality: The role of Christian Monasticism and Bioregionalism as Historical Social-Ecological Movements

https://wiki.p2pfoundation.net/Christian_Monasticism_and_Bioregionalism_as_Historical_Social-Ecological_Movements

Sing Chew is the author of a trilogy on the role of climate in civilizational transitions, and how regenerative social movements emerge in these periods. Dark Ages he says, were in fact 'Bright Ages' as pollen count and other physical measures about the state of nature shows they were regenerative.

This is of course a confirmation of sorts of what I have called the 'Pulsation of the Commons':

* Article: Historical Social Movements, Ecological Crisis and ‘Other’ World Views. By Sing C. Chew. Journal of Developing Societies,Volume 24, Issue 1 .

"This article examines the rise of two social movements that have emerged during different periods of world history when the world system was/is in crisis: Christian monasticism and Bioregionalism. Besides viewing Christian monasticism as a religious movement that arose in reaction to the turbulent conditions towards the end of the Roman Empire, I want to argue that Christian monasticism can also be conceived as a social institution formed in reaction to the excessive consumption, economic exploitation and ecological crisis that occurred prior to and during the Dark Ages of Antiquity. Almost 1,700 years later, our current era of socioeconomic, political and ecological crises has also sparked movements expounding alternative world-views and lifestyle options. One such anti-systemic movement is Bioregionalism which is a direct contrast to our contemporary world-view that underscores the themes of globalization, technologization of life and hyper consumption. Therefore, along a similar vein to early Christian monasticism's reaction to institutionalized religion then, Bioregionalism as a life-practice also plays a similar role in the contemporary crisis era."

• Nikolas Berdyaev on the Five Historical Periods of Humanity, as Related to Nature and Technology

How Berdyaev Foresaw Our Reliance on Machines. By Alexei Anisin. Cosmos and History: The Journal of Natural and Social Philosophy, vol. 17, no. 3, 2021

https://cosmosandhistory.org/index.php/journal/article/view/916/1646