Shared Spaces as Urban Commons

* Report: URBAN COMMONS SHARED SPACES: A research project and report by Commons Network & raumlaborberlin, November 2018

URL = http://www.commonsnetwork.org/wpcontent/uploads/2018/11/SharedSpacesCommonsNetwork.pdf

Description

""Commons Network released the latest publication called ‘Urban Commons Shared Spaces’. The paper is a research project and report, based on 2 years of research in the cities of Berlin and Amsterdam. The paper was co-created with our friends at raumlaborberlin.

‘Shared Spaces’ features many concrete policy ideas for municipal leaders and lawmakers, as well as strategies and tips for urban commons pioneers. It was written by Jens Kimmel, Sophie Bloemen and Till Gentsch and designed by raumlaborberlin. The authors state:

We believe we need to actively protect and strengthen commons initiatives in European cities and build and promote a commons sector by transforming cities’ institutional and policy frameworks. Commons in the city involve people managing urban resources – such as space – together through which economic and, more importantly, social value is created. It is crucial to protect that value as it sustains the very social fabric of our cities. Urban commons strengthen existing communities and bring people together into new ones, they herald the era of pro-active citizenship and encourage participatory and democratic governance." (https://www.commonslabantwerpen.org/publicaties/2018/12/5/shared-spaces-new-paper-on-urban-commons-by-commons-network)

Discussion

"This paper is about commons in the urban environment and is based on research done in Amsterdam and in Berlin over the last 2 years. We believe we need to actively protect and strengthen commons initiatives in European cities and build and promote a commons sector by transforming cities’ institutional and policy frameworks. Commons in the city involve people managing urban resources – such as space – together through which economic and, more importantly, social value is created. It is crucial to protect that value as it sustains the very social fabric of our cities. Urban commons strengthen existing communities and bring people together into new ones, they herald the era of pro-active citizenship and encourage participatory and democratic governance.

This paper focuses on shared city space as

1) space is the number one condition for commons initiatives to flourish and

2) European urban environments have generally become more hostile to a commons-based use of space through heavy, international, market speculation on land, subsequent soaring real estate prices and the willingness of municipalities to sell off public property.

Hence the task of protecting communities, active citizens and through them and their activities, the commons, is now more urgent than ever.

The next sections will explain what the commons are,

• why they are important

and how the urban context in which they are embedded is developing (section 1),

• give a brief overview of the

‘commons histories’ and recent policy developments in Amsterdam (section 2)

• and Berlin (section 3),

• discuss our methodology and findings (section 4),

• and, finally, provide concrete and partly

already in-use strategies and policies for protecting and strengthening the commons sharing city spaces (section 5).

This paper is meant as an inspiration and tool for those involved or interested in the commons movement, as an urgent reminder for policymakers, as an invitation for politicians to think more concretely about the commons sector in their cities, and as the starting point for a constructive discussion about improving our cities by protecting and strengthening the commons in the urban environment.

Clearly the experiences and needs of Amsterdam and Berlin, both in NorthWest of Europe, do not apply to all European cities. There are vast socialeconomic and political differences to cities located more in the South and East. We let ourselves be inspired by policy initiatives and experiments in cities such as Barcelona, Madrid and Bologna, and list these experiments as examples and potential models for policy. We are confident that the general principles and some of the models and policy proposals presented here could be relevant for cities across Europe."