What the figure makes clear, first and foremost is that the cultural ecology includes the commons as a third aspect alongside the state and the market. It also says that there are relationships between these aspects and the people and networks active within them. They connect, overlap and depend on each other. The three aspects of the creative cultural ecosystem are distinguishable in broad terms, but they are not separable. They are interacting features within a more cohesive whole and it is in the relationships and commonalities that we are able to see the abundance that’s here. The scarcity of resources that are currently being invested to enable the creative cultural ecosystem is a choice not a condition. But it’s a choice made with a limited view. If we change the view then the choices can be different.
and short-term systems. They also encourage cultural leading by people who are capable of thinking and acting both for individual needs and for the common good; people who are capable of building a bridge between a dominant culture in decline to one that is emerging in response to the transformation needed.
Our Cultural Commons set out to change perceptions and to open out possibilities that are informed by noticing and uncovering the potential that is already there. We have sought to dig where we stand, turning over the ground to open up new furrows. As a result we are beginning to articulate, with colleagues involved in an open network which has emerged from this work - the Coalition for the Cultural Commons72 - some of the positive shifts of which cultural commoning is suggestive. Shifts that can encourage a different set of choices when it comes to sustaining our shared cultural life more appropriately:
“In the ecological commons a multitude of different individuals and diverse species stand in various relationships to one another - competition and cooperation, partnership and predatory hostility, productivity and destruction. All those relations, however, follow one higher principle: Only behaviour that allows for the productivity of the whole ecosystem over the long term and that does not interrupt its capacities of self-production, will survive and expand. The individual is able to realise itself only if the whole can realise itself. Ecological freedom obeys this basic necessity.”
• From centralised hierarchical governance structures to more distributed ones
Our cultural freedom is relational. It depends upon and draws from lively interconnection with others, meaningful and deep experiences that bind us together as humans. Our ability to exercise this freedom responsibly will depend on how well we relate to others and how well we create and govern together for the common good. What Our Cultural Commons is beginning to reveal is that we have grounds for hope in the present. Our cultural future will always be shared, and therefore we have everything we need today to build it together.
• From rigid, transactional relationships to those that are more collaborative and enabling. • From fragmented and individualised plans to shared purposes and outcomes. • From a focus on short-term, project-based activity to developing longer-term cultural ‘assets’.
The future to which this cultural commoning is pointing is a vibrant democracy in which people have the freedom to participate in and shape the cultural life that is best for them and society. This future requires enabling systems that support people in their making of versions of culture. And it also recognises our responsibilities. As Andreas Weber writes:
• From homogenous cultural products to shared cultural processes and experiences as distinctive as the people who make them and the places where they are made. • From passive acceptance of a damaging status quo - ecological, social, economic - to offering constructive, democratic challenge and speaking truth to power Our Cultural Commons is showing that many creative citizens, organisations, projects and initiatives are already modelling these shifts in diverse contexts. Their actions are potentially transformative and when looked at together are suggestive of a broad movement for change away from our current highly competitive, fragmented
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