The power of moving assets into the commons
An interview with Derek Razo and Chelsea Robinson, co-authors of "Assets in Common"
Two powerful ideas—shared ownership and steward ownership—are driving a radically different way of thinking about assets these days. The first is the domain of worker co-ops, ESOPs, and community land trusts, for example.
The second is a strategy—still better known in Europe than in the U.S.—by which a company preserves its purpose by using a trust to separate governance from economic interests.
These two powerful frameworks meet in a new book jointly published and just out today from Infrastructure for Shared Ownership (sharedownership.us), Common Trust (common-trust.com), and the Purpose Foundation (purpose-us.com). Its authors are Charity May, Jay Standish, Chelsea Robinson, Zoe Schlag, and Derek Razo.
In this video, I interview Derek and Chelsea about the thinking behind the project and more.
The book—much of it an anthology of striking case studies—is called Assets in Common: Stories of Business and Community Leaders Remaking the Economy from the Ground Up.
Some of the amazing companies profiled here include the Industrial Commons, Enspiral, Mondragon Corporation, Obran Cooperative, Goodworks Evergreen, Saradex, Sumitomo Group, Clegg Auto, and Calvert Community Investment.
One of the most intriguing aspects of the book is its discussion of what will be for many readers wholly new business models:
Employee-owned holding companies
Cross shareholding between banks and businesses
Business-to-business marketplaces and currencies
Municipal strategies for assets holdings
Non-profit ownership of business networks
Here’s the website where you can find copies of the book, plus a wealth of educational blogs and podcast episodes of related content.
And if you receive this issue in time, you can catch the book launch and discussion today (June 4) at 4 PM EST.
Here’s the zoom link.
See you next time—peace.