visions and transition towards a multilocal society Ezio Manzini INDACO, Politecnico di Milano

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visions and transition( towards a multi-local
society? ) Ezio Manzini INDACO, Politecnico
di Milano
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transition(s).
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• transition 1
• the on-going big change

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globalisation virtualization fluidity
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the emerging effect of the increasing
connectivity
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pollution climate changes loss in
biodiversity
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the discovery of the limits of the Planet
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a kind of natural event no clear vision of the
new world that is emerging
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billions of people in the Planet have entered
(or are entering) in the industrial economy,
culture and behaviour main-stream
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pulled by a vision (the idea of wellbeing
consuming more) that, extended at the large
scale, is an environmental and social catastrophe.
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• transition 2
• changing the change

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the transition towards sustainability
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to learn how to live better reducing our
environmental footprint and regenerating the
social fabric
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• gt billions of people have to re-orient their
  behaviors
• gt mainstream ideas on economy and wellbeing have
  to be changed
• gt world-wide infrastructures have to be re-shaped

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• these transformations ask for
• drivers that have to be as
• powerful as the ones that, at
• the same time, are pulling
• towards a catastrophic future

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we need technological, economic, cultural
drivers a vision (to give them a converging
direction).
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• the image of
• sustainability.

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• what comes in our mind
• when we think to a
• sustainable society?

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• (?)

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• a black out in our
• imagination

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• a social learning process.

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• gt to experiment, to listen and to learn form the
  experience. And to be able to change

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• gt to re-orient the driving forces of the
  Transition1 in the direction of the Transition 2,
  i.e. towards sustainability.

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• gt to build shared visions on where we would like
  to go (and on what to do and how to do it).

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visions.
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images that can drive actions
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shared visions
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socially built images that can drive converging
actions
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where do shared visions come from?
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a social conversation that links and compares
different materials and individual visions
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vision makers
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writers, painters, film makers, architects and
designers
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designers as vision makers?
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to generate visions of possible worlds
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possible worlds
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visions that have to be possible, acceptable and
discussable
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emerging visions?
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contradictory signals
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BAD NEWS.
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increasing environmental problems . war .
terrorism . fear . inequalities . poverty .
un-responsible profits . hyper-individualistic
behaviors . everyday life marketisation . no
vision of the future .
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no vision of the future.
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GOOD NEWS.
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good ideas out of the main-stream . the
perspective of the distributed economy . the
success of non-hierarchical forms of
organizations (peer-to-peer and open models) .
the new creative communities
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is a new vision emerging?
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emerging ideas
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distributed economies.
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search for flexibility . industrial districts .
industrial symbiosis . changes in consumers
attitudes and behaviors . new producer-consumers
relationships . new forms of localized,
cooperative organization . distributed
generation of energy . economy of scale . economy
of the net
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distributed economies regions where a diverse
range of activities are organized in the form of
the small scale, flexible units that are
synergistically connected with each other and
prioritize quality in their production
(Distribute Economy Labs, Lund University)

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flexibility as strong driver (inside the
mainstream economical model), economy of the
network as emerging driver (inside the emerging
models)
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a stronger link with places and local communities
as a potential driver for localized sustainable
systems
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collaborative organizations.
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trading goods and services EBay 120 millions
people registered . developing free software
Linux 120.000 registered developers . new ways of
conceiving games The Sims thousands of users
contribute to the contents . mass developed
astronomic research hundred of thousands of
dedicated amateurs are involved . the
overwhelming success of the Wikipedia project .
the rise of the open-welfare concept
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co-creation models mass peer-to-peer
organizations. Large scale, highly distributed
systems which combine many players to carry out
complex tasks without requiring burdensome,
top-down hierarchical organization
(RED, Design Council, UK)
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co-creation of new forms of organization (that
permit a sustainable use of local resources) and
of new forms of social knowledge (from Free
software, to Creative Commons and Wikipedia)
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creative communities.
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innovative housing, co-housing initiatives,
laundry-cafés, local tele-cottages . cities
vitalization, neighborhood social centers, local
cultural events, urban vegetal gardens . caring
for kids and elderly, micro-crèches, living
together initiatives . facilitated barters and
exchanges, LETS (Local Economy Trade Systems),
innovative second-hand shops . effective
mobility, car sharing and car pooling, foot-bus
and bike-bus initiatives .
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new food networks, Slow food associations,
advanced organic food chains, new farmers markets
in town . direct links between the city and the
country side, adopt a sheep initiatives,
vegetal subscriptions . new craftsmanship
valorization of living traditions . fair
relationships between the North and the South of
the world, Fair Trade organizations, Fair
Tourism organizations
(in progress)
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creative communities groups of people that
organize themselves to solve a problem or to open
a new possibility ( EMUDE-Creative
Communites, European Research)
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no radical innovation towards sustainability
without these active and creative people
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creative communities are the drivers of all the
other drivers!
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which vision might keep together these different
events?
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a cosmopolitan localism . information flows are
mainly horizontal . a new sense of place and new
forms of communities appear . living traditions
and creativity are considered as resources .
tolerance and democracy are the needed background
. ecology of economies . distributed economy .
power, knowledge and value stay where they are
produced . access and knowledge are fairly
distributed .
(in progress)
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A MULTI-LOCAL SOCIETY.
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small is not small !
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today the small is (or might be) a local knot
of a global web.
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a vision of society as horizontal integration of
a multiplicity of places/communities
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key words
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new commons.
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collective knowledge, public spaces, accessible
technologies.
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enabling.
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people as part of the solution, and not only of
the problem.
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bottom-up.
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local-global partnerships, with the leadership at
the local side.
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peer-to-peer.
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( poor-to-poor )
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enhance horizontal flows of information and
experiences.
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open.
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share the goal, share the work and share the
results.
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error friendly.
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errors as normal possibilities in the human
actions.
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visible.
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make the invisible visible, to enhance the social
conversation.
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see you at www.indaco.polimi.it/Emude www.sustai
nable-everyday.net
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THANKS!