Practical Radicalism: Community Wealth Building with Neil McInroy ByColin Bruce Anthes
June 29, 2023 One of the few working-class movements scoring victories, democratizing ownership, and gaining momentum is the method of economic development called Community Wealth Building (CWB).
Transcript: https://theanalysis.news/practical-radicalism-community-wealth-building-with-neil-mcinroy/?cmid=f9d7ffae-71d3-47d1-95e1-5b8b21d84a35 wealth controls the very nature of how many of us, where we work, what we do, and how we nurture the planet with that wealth.,,,community wealth building is a concept, but also a practical way of chipping away at neoliberalism and the questions of power and wealth.
community wealth building is a concept, but also a practical way of chipping away at neoliberalism and the questions of power and wealth.
What we need to do is democratize our economy. That doesn’t just mean the state controlled. It means control partly by the state. In certain instances, it might be fit for purpose; this could deal with railways or whatever it may be. But it’s also that wider democratization of ownership, that plural forms of democratization...
the individual who may have some spare capital in their bank account. Most people don’t give it a second thought. They just sit it in the bank and it incurs interest, be it an ethical bank or whatnot. Where is the opportunities for them to invest in community shares or a local project, which may also bring a return, perhaps an equal return, maybe even more of a return? So the options are not there. I think that the important thing about community wealth-building strategies and links to economic strategy is to raise the bar on how one uses the capital that is in a place, the finance that is in the place, and what we as individuals do in that locality.
Increasingly, certain sectors in different parts of the world, you can see it lend itself to particular forms of democratic ownership, either railways or perhaps state-owned railways. When it comes to things like childcare or some forms of everyday retail, this might lend itself to workers’ co-op or other forms of democratic ownership.
Colin Bruce Anthes