This is a repository copy of Building transitions to post-capitalist urban commons.

White Rose Research Online URL for this paper:

Version: Accepted Version

Article:
Chatterton, P orcid.org/0000-0001-9281-2230 (2016) Building transitions to post-capitalist
urban commons. Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers, 41 (4). pp. 403-415.
ISSN 0020-2754

https://doi.org/10.1111/tran.12139

© 2016 Royal Geographical Society (with the Institute of British Geographers). This is the
peer reviewed version of the following article: Chatterton, P. (2016), Building transitions to
post-capitalist urban commons. Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers. ;
which has been published in final form at https://dx.doi.org/10.1111/tran.12139. This article
may be used for non-commercial purposes in accordance with the Wiley Terms and
Conditions for Self-Archiving.

Reuse
Items deposited in White Rose Research Online are protected by copyright, with all rights reserved unless
indicated otherwise. They may be downloaded and/or printed for private study, or other acts as permitted by
national copyright laws. The publisher or other rights holders may allow further reproduction and re-use of
the full text version. This is indicated by the licence information on the White Rose Research Online record
for the item.

Takedown
If you consider content in White Rose Research Online to be in breach of UK law, please notify us by
emailing [email protected] including the URL of the record and the reason for the withdrawal request.

[email protected]
https://eprints.whiterose.ac.uk/
 Accepted June 2016 in the Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers

Building transitions to post-capitalist urban commons

Abstract

This paper opens up a novel geographical research agenda on building transitions beyond the capitalist

present. It brings into conversation two previously disconnected areas of academic debate: socio-

technical transition studies and more radical work on post-capitalism. The paper offers empirical evidence

of real-life socio-spatial practices that build post-capitalist socio-technical transitions through a case study

of the daily experiences, motives and values of residents in a community-led cohousing project in the UK.

I begin by exploring definitions around post-capitalism and transition thinking, and then introduce the

notion of the urban commons to point towards the geographies of post-capitalist transitions and

illustrate the kinds of social and spatial relations that underpin them. The paper then provides empirical

substance for a geographical agenda around post-capitalist transitions through the case study,

highlighting themes of experimentation, transformation and direct democracy. The paper concludes with

some strategic future reflections and makes a claim for a geographical research agenda which elaborates

the possible radical geographies and place imaginaries of post-capitalist transitions in our teaching,

research and policy work. Unless geographers forge direct and necessary links between transitioning and

moving beyond capitalism, our ability to take decisive and meaningful action on the challenges that lie

ahead will be limited.

Keywords

Community housing, UK, transitions, post-capitalism, urban commons

1
Introduction

We live in an age marked by increasing commentary and anxiety on the growing array of problems facing

global and local society (see Homer-Dixon, 2006; Holmgren, 2009; Dator 2002; Giradet, 2008). Actors

including unspecified transnational elites and malevolent global corporations are identified as bringing

the world ever closer to financial and ecological catastrophe. In this, a range of transition pathways,

ranging from possible future collapse, radical transformation, business as usual, as well as technocratic-

led renewal are put forward. Contained within each of these are assumptions over competing social

relations, agencies and power structures, deployments of technologies, levels of corporate control,

institutional realignment, values and forms of governance, and community and behaviour change. Living

in an age awash with complexity and change it is difficult to get a sense of whether transitions point

towards reformist, escapist, ruptural or revolutionary outcomes. One aspect we need to know much

more about is the extent to which current transitions take us away from capitalism.

This paper sits in the middle of these debates, and emerges from something I have been particularly

struck by over the last few years. What remains under-developed in academic and activist debates is a

connection between socio-technical transitions studies on the one hand, and more radical work that

directly confronts capitalism on the other. One of the motivations of this paper is the limited capacity of

work on socio-technical and ecological transitions to capture the practices and motives of projects that

are committed to a future where features of capitalism are named, confronted and reversed. My aim in

this paper, then, is to reach out to both these debates to find and forge productive connections. I reclaim

and redirect the significant and useful body of work on socio-technical transitions as a framework for

exploring what transitions to post-capitalism might mean. In many ways, given that socio-technical

transitions studies are all about how niche innovations can transform wider regimes and landscapes,

there is more critical, perhaps even anti-capitalist, analysis bubbling just under the surface and struggling

to get out. But, there remains a reluctance to name and advocate for the more radical nature of

2
transitions that society needs to embark upon to address the huge challenges it faces. My analysis here is

more normative than evaluative, and is part of a scholarly tradition that advocates for how the world

ought to be (Sayer and Storper, 1997; Smith, 1997). In this sense, what remains unarticulated in

explorations of sustainability transitions is a concern about what the future actually holds if we do not

somehow move against and beyond the capitalist present.

For the purposes of this paper, I use the label post-capitalism to capture these sentiments (see Gibson-

Graham, 2005). While this is quite a nebulous term, it points to a desire to reinvent and reinvigorate the

revolutionary process away from older top-down, elite-led models of change. Many grassroots

sustainability projects align closely with this sentiment and draw upon a particular set of concepts

including social ecology, anarchism, ecological and climate justice and variants of neo-marxist calls for a

right to the city (Marshall, 1992; Schlosberg, 1997; Bond, 2010; Harvey 2012; Bookchin; 1992). Much of

this has been embodied through recent anti-capitalist movements which have promoted a range of

leitmotifs around horizontalism, direct democracy and autonomy and the wider quest for self-

management (see Angus, 2001; Albert, 2004; Solnit, 2004; Barber 1984; Featherstone, 2008, Holloway,

2010).

An important geographical research agenda emerges from this work, especially if critical and radical

geographers are to help articulate the social and spatial forms that point beyond the capitalist present. In

particular, geographers can deepen debates around post-capitalist transitions by returning to

longstanding critiques of our largely globalized and urban industrial society. Since the groundbreaking

work of Meadows (1972) and E.F. Schumacher(1972), a constellation of of ideas and actions have spread

across the globe (see Douthwaite, 1999; Jackson, 2009; New Economics Foundation, 2010; Simms and

Chowla, 2010; Schor, 2010; Bookchin, 1992; Sale, 2000; Mander and Goldsmith, 1997). This work presents

not only a sustained argument against recent neoliberal casino-capitalism, but also a broader de-growth

3
critique of the western development project and the schism between humans and the natural world.

What geographers can take from these debates is a renewed ability to articulate why, and how, to build

transitions beyond capitalist urbanization. Innovation, industrial or social systems which are more

sustainable or ecologically-focused are all well and good. But these are the low hanging fruit. The real,

and admittedly bewildering, challenge is to slow down and reverse the process of capitalist industrial

urbanization that is unfolding on a planetary level (Merrifield, 2013). Beyond mere transitions to more

low carbon variants of life under capitalism, there needs to be a geographical research agenda around

niche experiments that repoliticize debates over urban development and infrastructure provision,

highlight ongoing processes of uneven development and spatial inequalities, and “ (2009)

concerns about a turn towar . In sum, geographers need to re-engage with the

concept of transitions as a means of slowing and eroding mechanisms of capitalist commodification,

challenging existing capitalist social relations and uneven geographical outcomes, and focusing on issues

of redistribution rather than mere resilience (MacKinnon and Derickson, 2012).

The aim of this paper, then, is to offer some empirical evidence of real-life processes of that build socio-

technical transitions with a post-capitalist hue (Shove and Walker, 2010). To this end, I introduce the idea

of the urban commons to point to a parallel set of social and spatial relations and values alongside

traditional public and private ones to illustrate an emerging geography of post-capitalist transitions.

Here, I am interested in critically exploring how daily post-capitalist practices get built and how they can

embed an urban commons, especially those practices that go beyond the status quo of intense

individualism, corrosive consumerism and financial austerity.

The empirical basis for the paper is an in-depth engagement with the daily experiences, motives and

values of residents in a community-led housing project called Lilac in the UK. I have outlined the detail of

this project elsewhere (Chatterton 2015), but here I use this example to open up a new area of

4
conceptual and practical enquiry around post-capitalist transitions. While the empirical context for this

paper is a relatively small grassroots sustainability niche, it provides lessons for broader work on self-

managed and community housing which encompasses self-build and self-help housing, co-operatives,

land trusts, ecovillages, low impact dwellings, intentional communities as well as cohousing (see Bunker

et al, 2011; Durrett and McCamant, 2011; Field 2011; Jarvis, 2011; Peters et al., 2010; Pickerill and

Maxey, 2009; Sargisson, 2007; Scotthanson and Scotthanson, 2005; Sanguinetti, 2014; Williams, 2005).

These novel housing types contain more or less radical elements, but they all offer productive insights for

thinking through what post-capitalist transitions mean in practice and how they can embed an urban

common in areas such as governance, social relations, economic exchange and value, identity and

behavior change, land ownership, and the use of technologies.

This paper is structured in three main sections. First, I give some more detail on the meanings of the

terms I am using, specifically post-capitalism, and transition thinking. I then introduce the notion of the

urban commons to illustrate the kinds of social and spatial relations that a transition beyond life under

capitalism could represent. The second section reflects on in-depth engagement with the Lilac project to

explore the building of post-capitalist transitions in practice, and in what ways an urban commons can

underpin such transitions. The final section draws on my case study to provide some strategic reflections

on the geographical and political implications of transitioning to a post-capitalist urban commons. I

conclude by outlining the geographical research agenda that emerges from this work.

Post-capitalism and socio-technical transitions: joining up debates

This paper is grounded in the interconnected ideas of post-capitalism and transitions. Both these terms

are contested and thus I begin by briefly outlining them. First, the term post-capitalism is deliberatively

As soon as we begin to deal with what

comes next, we enter the terrain of speculation, conditionality and advocacy, as well as hope and

5
imagination (Roelvink et al., 2015). But this term does point to transformations that are in some way anti-

paradigmatic and in multiple ways pitch themselves against and beyond the status quo. Climatic,

energetic, environmental, social and economic crises are colliding in profound and dangerous ways

(Homer-Dixon; 2006) and underpin a desire to move beyond capitalism. In particular, since the 2008

global financial crisis a deeper structural crisis in capitalist economies has been exposed. The global

response of austerity measures can be seen as an elite response to reinstate control management and

devolve risk to the public (Panitch et al., 2010),

regarded as bankrupt it remains deeply entrenched. The overall direction of global development remains

oriented towards urban industrialization, pro-growth economics, corporate expansion, the penetration of

commodification, marketization and individualization into more spheres of life, along with tendencies

towards centralized bureaucratic structures.

By using the idea of post-capitalism, I focus on those activities which critically intervene in and attempt to

solve societal crises but in ways that foreground equality, openness and social justice. Society is running

of multiple crises. We need to be critically aware of experiments which actually deepen and reinforce

capitalist neoliberal policies, reboot or re-embed new forms of capital accumulation, value production

and commodification. T -

theoretical traditions, and policy implications. It falls into what Geels (2010) calls a conflict/power

ontology where the causal agents of transitions are collective actors, social movements and the

contestation that emerges from a context full of power. This ontology is different to that mobilized by

socio-technical transitions where, for example, organized technocrats deploy smart technologies on an

ordered citizenry with the intent of making urban life more efficient and low carbon, floating free from

oppression, poverty, power, corporate control or the deep social and spatial inequalities underpinning

capital accumulation. The shift in emphasis towards post-capitalism that I introduce in this paper comes

6
from my own life experience based on social movement participation over the last fifteen years, as well

as an academic commitment to the practices of radical geography, and the relevance I see in neo-marxist,

anarchist, and autonomous thinking (Chatterton 2010b; Chatterton and Pickerell, 2010). This is a practical

and conceptual approach that is more urgently needed than ever given the depth of the crises, and

inadequacy of responses. Where has the sense of urgency and outrage gone from our analysis?

Building on the work of Wright (2010) and Holloway (2010), it is important to note that we are not

dealing with a term that represents a meta-narrative or strategy about how the future could or should

unfold. Rather, it embraces those who envision ruptures against capitalism, a multitude of possibilities of

what could come after, as well as building daily competences to leverage social change. Thus, many

aspects might agitate against current state and market relationsand attempt to usher in radically

different social deals. Some are more reformist seeking incremental change and working symbiotically

within existing structures, while taking a longer and incrementalist view on change. Others are more

utopian, attempting to opt out on the basis of principle or frustration, and creating interstitial or

prefigurative examples of the future in the present.

Two important points can be taken from this work. The first is that these are not disconnected

tendencies, but pragmatic and strategic choices that build upon and give momentum to each other. This

brings new levels of complexity to discussions about niche transitions. For example, working inside the

system symbiotically can open up post-capitalist cracks to develop more interstitial practices, or indeed

build capacity for ruptural change. But the key point is that a longer strategic focus on building

momentum beyond capitalism is retained. The second is that there are no clearly bounded, pure

territories outside of capitalism that can be defended or expanded. Rather, what might come after

capitalism can only be built from where we stand, using the multiple and messy resources and capacities

that present themselves. This shifts strategy away from merely scaling-up niches towards a multiplicity of

7
ways to corrode the overall regime and landscape through more networked forms and distributed social

relations (see Mason, 2015).

Given their unknown and incomplete character, then, what we are dealing with in terms of post-

capitalism is something quite provisional that proceeds through experimentation, prototyping and taking

risks. It is a set of practices that are contentious, messy and deliberative. This is quite different to

experiments to explore causal relationships in controlled environments.i Indeed, urban community

settings offer fertile ground for something more akin to open field experiments, where the aim is not to

control variables, but to intervene and test ideas and possible outcomes (Evans, 2011). Elements include

horizontal and collective approaches to institutional and governance forms, a focus on process as much

as content, attention to difference and conflict resolution, as well as building strong interpersonal

relations based on trust and solidarity.

The second conceptual driver of this paper is transition thinking which has gained prominence over the

last few years. It is an important device for thinking through how change can occur, and hence the task in

this paper is to open up opportunities to expand its use, especially in less instrumental and depoliticised

ways. Transition is used as a concept across many subdisciplines including population studies, chemistry,

evolutionary/biological studies, environmental, political and social sciences. Given this diversity of uses

there is no clear agreement in terms of meaning (Bailey et al., 2009). The word transition signifies some

kind of movement from one place, state or condition (for which there is discontent) to another (for which

there is a more favourable outlook). But it implies more than movement, suggesting that these passings

also represent transformation and adjustment. Transitions also contain a sense of conditionality in terms

of something yet to emerge.

8
I focus specifically on the substantial body of work around socio-technical transitions, which is interested

in the co-evolution of social and technological phenomena and the dynamics by which fundamental

change between these occurs. Debates on socio-technical transitions draw together various areas of

inquiry including evolutionary economics, Science and Technology Studies (STS), Innovation Studies and

multilevel governance (Geels, 2005). It has also recently become heavily associated with the Multi Level

Perspective (MLP) framework. MLP examines how socio-technical systems are organized, transformed,

and reproduced by multiple actors and institutions at three different levels: niches where innovation

and learning occur; regimes where rules and relationships shape daily practices and use of technologies

and frame what is possible; and the overall longer-term regime landscape comprised of wider cultural,

political and economic influences (for a sample see Smith et al., 2005; Geels, 2010; Smith et al., 2010;

Bulkeley, 2005; Bulkeley et al. 2011; Hopkins, 2009; Mol, 2009; Middlemiss and Parrish, 2010; Seyfang

and Smith, 2007; Seyfang, 2009). In such a complex and multilevel arena, the idea of transition

management comes into play where transition teams steer the process through establishing drivers of

change, pathways, scenarios, milestones and back/forwardcasting (Shove and Walker, 2007). Most of the

work to date has explored how socio-technical transitions are emerging in areas of infrastructure

provision such as water, transport and energy. Usefully for this paper, there is emerging critical

commentary on low carbon and community housing as niche transitions (see Killip, 2103; Gibbs, and

O N l, 2015; Horne and Dalton 2014). Here I push this analysis further to highlight the radical potential

of community (eco)housing to point to post-capitalist transitions and the social and spatial practices of

the urban commons.

A widespread disillusionment with elite and nation-state politics is leading to renewed interest in radical

transition grassroots experiments (see Spratt and Sutton 2008; Moulaert et al., 2010). The more intense

the patterns of marginalization from state restructuring

capitalism (Mason, 2015), the greater the need for post-capitalist transition experiments. But what is

9
striking about the socio-technical transitions literature is the lack of discussion about capitalism, and

especially anti-capitalism, as niche, regime, landscape or otherwise.ii Geels (2011) points out that work on

sustainability transitions is goal-orientated or purposive in that it attempts to address societal challenges

such as climate change adaptation and mitigation, environmental degradation, infrastructure renewal

and social participation. The key issue we still need to address is what kinds of goals, and more

importantly means, are we aiming for? The idea of transition is used so extensively that it is often used

interchangeably with social change or indeed rupture, rebellion or revolution. There remains, then, a

considerable gap in terms of language, practice and concepts between many aspects of the transition

literature and those interested in post-capitalist politics. Work on socio-technical transitions is reluctant

to take a normative stance and name the kind of transitions needed given the scale and nature of the

challenges faced. Given the current context of global capitalist crisis and the now well-rehearsed links

between capital accumulation and climate change (Klein, 2014), this needs addressing. How we

transition, and where we think we are transitioning to, are central issues. If we are committed to greater

social and environmental justice, as well as challenging further capital accumulation, what does this mean

in terms of transitions? For those interested in post-capitalist transitions, it means that socio-technical

transitions that lack an ability to confront the mechanisms that perpetuate capitalism at a daily level are

not transitions worth making. They could create - to weak gains in terms of emission reductions

and social justice outcomes as well as submission to techno-fixes and the extension of commodification

into more areas of our lives. With these come a host of problems including exploitation, isolation,

competition, anxiety and powerlessness.

Promisingly, there is a growing interest in exploring the more radical meanings and practicalities of

transitioning. Critical political research is emerging around issues of social justice, an ethics of care,

networked politics and rejections of naïve localism and post-political discourses (Mason and Whitehead,

2012; North, 2011; Aiken 2012; Bailey et al., 2009; Lutz and Schachinger 2013; Kaika and Karaliotas,

10
2014). There is also an identifiable strand of work which stresses the role of community practices,

capacities and identities in shaping transitions (Seyfang and Smith, 2007 Seyfang and Haxeltine. 2012;

Middlemiss, 2012), as well as hybrid and bottom-link approaches which highlight the contribution of

counter-hegemonic social innovations to multilevel governance (Eizaguirre et al., 2012). And there is a

recognition that for the full potential of socio-technical transition studies to be realized, it needs to

become less elite and technological focused, account more for the role of urban power and politics, and

consider how to destabilize power in existing regimes through disruptive innovation (Rutherford, 2014;

Rutherford and Coutard, 2014; Lawhon and Murphy, 2011; Shove and Walker, 2007, 2008; Scrase and

Smith, 2009; Geels, 2014; Moss, 2014; Radywyl and Biggs, 2013). Usefully for this current paper, Geels

(2011) outlines revolutionary pathways for socio-technical transitions, including what is labelled

come from below (see also Dahle, 2012), and Cretney and Bond (2014) outline how grassroots groups are

using activism to implement post-capitalist visions following disaster events. What we need to know is

how post-capitalist niches actually emerge and function, how post-capitalist regime diffusion works, and

how long-term landscape changes beyond capitalism can be embedded. In essence then, the time is ripe

for further critical research and action around post-capitalist socio-technical transitions.

The geography of post-capitalist transitions: the urban commons

There is growing interest in understanding the spatiality and place politics of socio-technical transitions

L M G ON Truffer and Coenen, 2011). What we still lack,

however, is a spatial vocabulary for socio-technical transitions beyond the capitalist present. I propose

the concept of the urban commons to illustrate the geography of post-capitalist transitions. The

commons is an idea that has been mobilized by a range of actors for a variety of ends. It has long been

used for the better management of common pool resources or the brokering of international agreements

for global resources (see Ostrom 1990). What I stress here is the significant potential the commons offers

11
for thinking through social and spatial relations beyond capitalism (De Angelis, 2007; Dyer-Witheford,

2001; Hardt and Negri 2009; Linebaugh, 2008; Midnight Notes, 1991). I focus specifically on the urban, as

it is here that radical new potentials are being formed where experiments with life beyond capitalism can

unfold through networks of city-based experiments (see Mason, 2015).

As I have discussed elsewhere (Chatterton, 2010a), the commons is a widely understood spatial motif,

evoking bounded entities, which exist to nurture and sustain particular groups. In this simple historical

form, the common (the fields, the village greens and the forests) are geographical entities governed by

those who depend upon them - the commoners. However, it refers to much more than simple bounded

territories: it also encompasses physical attributes of air, water, soil and plants, as well as socially

reproduced goods such as knowledge, languages, codes and information. The shared attribute is that

these entities are collectively owned and managed. It is also important to look beyond these basic

physical attributes and regard commons as complex organisms and webs of connections which combine

to articulate particular spatial practices, social relationships and forms of governance that produce and

reproduce them. The common, then, is made real through the practice of commoning. They are complex,

relational and dynamic rather than bounded, defensive or highly localized and thus weave together a rich

tapestry of different times, spaces and struggles. Thus, we should not position the common as something

always subjugated or in response to the more dynamic practices of capital accumulation. The commons

are full of productive moments that continually emerge and create new vocabularies, solidarities, social

and spatial practices and repertoires of resistance that can be used against capitalism. The important

point to note for the empirical focus of this paper is that commons are always partial, coexisting with a

myriad of other public and private forms of ownership and governance. They emerge through

experimentation and risk taking in terms of embedding other values and social relations beyond

capitalism.

12
The analysis that now follows in this paper is based on in-depth engagement with members of the Lilac

community-led cohousing project. The author is a resident-cofounder of this project based around 20

homes and a shared common house built from straw and timber using a cohousing design approach. This

case represents a highly engaged form of fieldwork based upon intimate and insider information. It is part

of a tradition of militant co-inquiry (Holdren and Touza, 2005) which was undertaken alongside fellow

residents and neighbours. The reflections in this paper draw upon a number of sources: in-depth

codesigned qualitative interviews with eight households which were used to build up a collective

understanding of the aims, aspirations and motives of residents, engaged participation drawing upon

daily life in the community in a range of formal and informal settings such as meetings, shared meals or

which the author is a member. In the section below, I outline the daily practices in Lilac that build post-

capitalist transitions and how these place based niche practices can sketch out urban commons.

The daily building of post-capitalist transitions: experimentation, transformation and direct democracy

The first aspect relates to experimentation, risk and security. The development of Lilac took six years and

was led by a group of community activists who ultimately acted as clients, developers and residents. They

were largely led by the need to respond to three challenges: climate change, the affordable housing crisis

and the lack of strong communities at the local level. Lilac was values-led and intentionally-driven and the

project concept L I L A C

experiment with radically different ways of living that were low impact, affordable and strengthened local

community bonds. It was a classic niche prototype project that emerged from the grassroots. The

embedding of risk and experimentation into this transition experiment is reflected in the following quote

by one resident:

13
 I to be a real

A I

L Sometimes you just say oh sod it it s worth taking a risk and seeing what

What the above stresses is the openness to risk taking and a view that early and risky experimentation

could pay dividends given future potential societal challenges, with many residents noting greater global

insecurity as a catalyst for seeking out alternatives, even if they are riskier. In particular, there is a sense

that the initial risk would be overcome through collective behaviour which would lead to greater security

in the longer term.

Part of this de-risking emerges through the formal cooperative structure at Lilac. Lilac is registered under

English law as a bone fide cooperative society for the benefit of its members. This kind of legal form is

embedded in the idea of mutualism, a rich historical tradition based on common ownership and a

commitment to association and how interdependence can benefit wellbeing (Sennett, 2013). It outlines

how people can conduct relationships based on free and equal contracts of reciprocal exchange. iii Like all

co-operatives it has to subscribe to the seven principles of the International Co-operative Alliance (ICA)

which stress voluntary membership, member control and economic equality.iv In the case of Lilac, there

was a desire to use a legal co-operative framework to embed common ownership and avoid asset

stripping or the accumulation of private wealth or resources. The structured interactions through social

events, meetings and informal community support create commoning practices that are more durable

and legible in the everyday. They create opportunities for discussing risk and developing solutions to

better manage it. Interestingly, this gives confidence to participants to experiment more radically with

change.

14
In particular, a model called a Mutual Home Ownership Society (MHOS) was adopted to financially

innovate beyond the status quo and embed a financial commons which could decouple housing from

commodified and speculative housing markets. The MHOS model was first developed by the New

Economics Foundation and London-based Co-operative Development Services with the specific aim of

promoting radical changes in terms of land ownership and tenure types within the UK housing market. In

this model a charge is levied on residents set at 35 percent of net income. These payments accrue equity

for each household which, after additions and deductions, represent capital that can be withdrawn.

Equity is linked to an index national wages rather than local house prices and this has the effect of

constraining speculation, dampening house price increase and promoting greater affordability for

successive households. Setting payments in this way gives households longer term ability to plan

household finances. The use of the MHOS model creates a novel relationship to housing tenure, and

attempts to foster a sense of common rather than private ownership. Linking housing value to national

earnings rather than house prices, erodes housing as a speculative commodity that can be bought and

sold according to the vagaries of market conditions. This is a significant shift, as it points towards a

housing commons that can increase stability in housing markets and reduce volatile local economies.

While money certainly does still circulate within Lilac and the project depends on debt financing, it has

attempted to embed less marketised forms of financial and social interactions, and a mutual approach to

monetary value which is shared across the whole membership.

The second aspect refers to a broad commitment to transformation. Daily activities in Lilac offer

opportunities for behavior change in broader ways beyond individualized and solely environmental

responses.. Overall, members of the project express a commitment to a step change in terms of their

environmental impact, and also in terms of the kinds of relations they have with other people and the

wider community. The communal context of the project is regarded as a catalyst to experiment with

broader shifts in behaviour change entailing more structural rather than incremental changes in behavior.

15
One resident expressed how co-operative cohousing projects encourage responses at the level of the

community and could guard against the individualisation of responses:

O her bottle and wondering does it

help?

Importantly, Lilac supports and rewards changes in individual and group behaviour. One of the overall

visions of the project is to act as an inspiration for change. From the outset, residents articulated that the

project responded to three challenges tackling climate change, housing affordability and community

breakdown. I s impact to be

framed in a transformative way. Regular open days and learning events have been used to reinforce these

messages and spotlight how other groups can take practical action to implement their own projects. This

is also achieved through consensually negotiated community agreements covering different areas of life

including pets, shared food, and the use of shared space.

The design of Lilac helps shape this transformation. Lilac was specifically designed to offer an intimate

village-style feel within a large city context. One of the intentions of a cohousing design approach is to

specifically lock-in as much natural surveillance and face-to-face interaction as possible. This is not a

trivial issue. As I explore elsewhere (Chatterton 2016), cohousing recognises that localities can be

designed to allow novel forms of social interaction beyond everyday public encounters. This is seen

through numerous micro-interactions, such as collecting mail or doing laundry, greeting neighbours,

chance encounters in hallways or entrances, or talking about business matters. Moreover, the central

placing of community facilities within the design, creates a dense mosaic of connections, opportunities

for greater levels of social interaction, as well as an enhanced sense of well-being and security. This is

16
principally achieved through the common house, a centrally located building which contains laundrymail

dining and meeting facilities, office and tool space. These additions could also be made through retrofit

approaches to existing neighbourhoods through integrating gardens, creating home zones and

designating buildings into communal facilities. These kinds of micro-interactions, rather than large scale

tehno-fixes, can create broader and longer lasting environmental and social change.

What is evident at Lilac, then, is an experiment with the spatial form of the commons. Residents take on

roles as commoners, moderating and laying down principles for interactions, sharing resources and

negotiating boundaries and spaces between private homes, shared spaces and the external public realm.

One aspect of this negotiation relates to openness and availability in public spaces. The site has been

designed to increase natural surveillance and neighbourly encounters, and therefore residents have to set

their own boundaries and tactics for moderating levels of interaction with neighbours and visitors.

Moreover, the boundary of the site represents the gateway to the broader public realm where access

with the general public has to be mediated. While the grounds of Lilac are private, the general public are

not discouraged from entering, which blurs a traditional boundary between public and private, and sets it

apart from the rapid growth of privatised housing enclaves.

Figure 1. The Lilac site: private homes set in a shared landscape.

Source: Modcell

The final aspect relates to a commitment to direct democracy and how this can underpin the social

relations of commoning. Cooperative and community self-governance is at the heart of Lilac where

members have equal democratic rights. In particular, direct democracy is deepened through a

commitment two aspects. First, consensus based decision-making is used formally at meetings to agree

proposals in a dialogue between equals. A number of deliberative steps such as discussion evenings,

17
working groups, clear templates for proposals and training facilitators, are taken to ensure that decisions

are not rushed, and that outcomes can be owned by everyone. What consensus tries to do is unlock

whole community decision-making (Starhawk, 2011). Second, members receive formal training in non-

violent communication (NVC), an approach developed by Marshall Rosenberg in the 1960s, and the aim is

to help improve communication practices within the community. There is a focus on self-empathy (tuning

into one's own experience), empathy (listening to others with compassion), and self-expression (allowing

individuals to express themselves authentically to inspire compassion in others) (Rosenberg, 2003).

The commitment to deeper democracy at Lilac depends on previous work aimed at instilling a common

purpose. While this requires significant effort it has longer lasting effects as it can create behavior shifts

from individualised owner-occupiers to self governing resident-members. This dedication to direct

democracy is also built up through a commitment to friendship and respect. Indeed, the member

controlled nature of the co-operative instils in residents a stronger sense of control over their housing

and day to day lives. Through dedicated operational task teams, bimonthly decision making meetings

where proposals are discussed and ratified by consensus, as well as community agreements on various

aspects of community life, members act as commoners who set their own framework for community self-

governance.

One notable aspect of community governance is a commitment to good processes, rather than merely

written procedures,. Rrather than merely laying down policies in advance, governance is underpinned by

trust and deliberation. As one resident commented: When things go wrong if all you do is open a rule

(see Chatterton, 2016). Foregrounding direct democracy within a

community setting also means accepting conflict and difference. Where problems do occur, there are

clear agreements on how they are addressed and they are used productively as learning opportunities..

18
Community direct democracy is also evidenced through a commitment to learning and reflection, both

within the neighbourhood, and in terms of its relationship with the outside world. Internal learning

through discussion evenings on issues that have been identified as potential sticking points, workshops

and skill shares on topics ranging from facilitation to large-group cooking helps members to focus on

learning from each other, especially in terms of working through, and learning from, differences. Many

informal forms of social interaction, such as cleaning, cooking or gardening together are central to

building strong bonds of trust and solidarity which allow the project to learn collectively and strong

relations to flourish. The kinds of learning that emerge in this context are more akin to the longer

traditions of popular education (see Horton and Freire, 1990; Freire, 1979; hooks, 2004) focused on the

practices of (re)building community. In sum then, these novel daily interactions based around consensus,

nonviolence, a commitment to process politics and learning, all embed social relations of commoning that

can help to embed and give life to urban commons.

Transitioning to post-capitalist urban commons: some strategic reflections

When dealing with niche experiments question looms large. In this concluding section, I

draw on my case study to explore the geographical and political implications of scaling up socio-technical

transitions and sketch out three areas of broader strategic significance in terms of what these

characteristics mean for post-capitalist urban commons. First, there is the issue of spatiality (see Truffer

and Coenen, 2012; Lawhon and Murphy, 2011) and what a post-capitalist geography actually looks like.

The Lilac case is only a single place based experiment, and its ability to point towards broader spatial

trends is limited. Moreover, the impact of place-based niche transition experiments has to be understood

within wider trends. The whole process of transitioning can be associated with neoliberalisation and here

Gonzalez and Oosterlynck (2013) highlight that the recent global financial crisis, whilst promising to open

up new post neoliberal possibilities, actually served to reinforce ongoing neoliberal urban restructuring

(see also, Evans et al., 2009). In relation to housing, certain innovations currently point toward niche

19
innovations which support corporate-led growth through a new focus on custom build and smart and

low-carbon technologies, reinforcing corporate and private ownership. Moreover, what still needs further

exploration is the difficult relationship between gated communities and community-led housing and how

these commons spaces overlay with private and public space. The Lilac case is instructive through an

intent to be an open, externally facing, accessible community through mechanisms like the absence of

gates, site tours, coffee mornings and activities with the wider local community. Moreover, its mutual

legal structure provides a safeguard against privatization.

If any future spatial trends can be gleaned from place-based niches such as Lilac, it is in terms of a more

diffuse and networked spatiality, where non-contiguous projects, ideas and people are strongly

connected through counter topographical networks (Katz, 2001) that create islands of post-capitalist

commons. These are more akin to the rhizomatic structures discussed by Deleuze and Guattari (1989),

those unregulated non-hierarchical networks that can connect horizontally. Conceptualised as such, we

depart from the idea of actually scaling up, and shift emphasis towards a networked micropolitics that

can spread mimetically and virally through decentralized swarming, networking and infiltrating,

countering and corroding the dominant regime as they connect (Scott-Cato and Hillier, 2011).

Experimental commons such as Lilac can begin to embed forms of post-capitalist association that can act

as a bulwark against the centralization and hierarchy that are often embedded in traditional upscaling

political strategies of states, trade unions and larger social movements. Their effects can be discerned far

beyond the quantitative number of projects, and this is where we need to expand our thinking (see

Bulkeley and Castan Broto, 2013). Impact can be underestimated when they are assessed in terms of their

visible, numerical and institutional impact. What Lilac highlights is that attention to qualitative issues such

as caring, nurturing, solidarity as well as the risky and process-based approaches to transitions can be

overlooked, but they are at the heart of post-capitalist transitions.

20
The second point which follows from this relates to issues of institutional form, governance and

management. What Lilac highlights is the need to be attentive to a wider range of actors and tactics

beyond established stakeholders that promote placed based niche innovation (Shove and Walker, 2007).

This is a transition process that inevitably includes groups with uncomfortable and disruptive values and

aims, and those who wish to forcefully undermine the status quo and capitalist social relations. What is

important to consider here is the extent to which such micro efforts can create alliances and networks to

form novel meso-level institutions to deepen the institutional form of post-capitalist urban commons (see

Albert, 2004; Moyer, 2001). The Lilac case shows that this is not just a bottom up process. It is also

middle-out or bottom-linking (Janda and Parag, 2014; Hamann and April, 2013; Eizaguirre et al., 2014)

where disruptive social innovations scale vertically and horizontally seeking upward influence amongst

stakeholders and institutions as well as reaching out to multiply projects at the grassroots. To explore this

in practice, individuals in Lilac have joined with other grassroots providers to form a co-operative

Community Land Trust called Leeds Community Homes to support and replicate more community led

housing. This kind of strategy is built on a combination of iterative experimentation to aid networking, the

prototyping of micro-examples, and a commitment to clear values to avoid co-optation. Statutory

agencies have a role as intermediary enablers of institutional frameworks that can underpin the growth

of a wider urban commons, but ultimately this means devolving and relinquishing control (Zibechi, 2012).

Together all this can lead to significant socio-technical reconfigurations, but more work needs to be done

to outline the regime practices and rules that would embed and extend a city wide commons.

Third, there is the issue of intent. Bulkeley et al. (2014) point to a constellation of competing transition

experiments in cities, some of which promote capital accumulation and some of which engender conflict

and challenge the status quo. Moreover, Brunori et al. (2010) stress the difference between more radical

novelties and more conventional niches. To explore this further it is useful to return to Ho work

(2010) and explore transition experiments as a spatial politics of being simultaneously in, against and

21
beyond life under capitalism. Experiments like Lilac exist in the reality of daily life under capitalism, but

are aware of the need to break from it, and ultimately exceed this condition. Important questions arise.

Which practical interventions create further openings, and which lock-in co-optation? How do groups

keep focused on bigger issues of transformation in the daily grind of paperwork and compromise? How

can groups be alive to falling into naïve utopianism or dilution of radical visions? (see Evans, 2011;

Karvonen and Heur, 2014).

Drawing on the language of the multi-level perspective (MLP), the Lilac case points towards a transition

process less interested in breakthrough, but more in break-out. Daily practices and discourses at Lilac are

not simply about scaling-up to influence the mainstream there is a desire to work beyond niche and

mainstream (see Shove and Walker, 2010). What happens when we reconceptualise the niche diffusion

process as a corrosion of the dominant regime, attempting to weave together cracks that can

purposefully crack the capitalist system? Which kinds of diffusion are acceptable and which are not?

What happens when niche experiments entail mass civil disobedience, direct action, land occupations and

solidarity with resisting displaced peoples? What needs to be recognized are the highly uneven outcomes

for those trying to put down markers against the status quo. There is no flat, pluralist world (Smith, 2005)

which would unproblematically see transitions rolling out through well-crafted technocratic

arrangements or simple perseverance and ingenuity. More sinister tendencies can also thwart

transitioning. These can take many forms such as bureaucratic stalling, infiltration by police informers or

political opponents (Lewis, 2013), or, in the global south, violence from military or paramilitary agents.

The point for projects such as Lilac is not to adopt divisive categories such as bad versus good project, but

to adopt a broader sense of solidarity and support across spatially diffuse and diverse projects attempting

to transition beyond the status quo. There are no easy answers here for groups such as Lilac; but co-

operative legal forms and consensus based democracy can ensure equal and open debate.

22
To conclude, I want to return to the distinctive geographical research agenda that emerges from this work

on building post-capitalist transitions. First, through the idea of the urban commons, and the commoners

that underpin them, this work represents further elaboration on the possible radical geographies and

place imaginaries of post-capitalism. Further geographical work would do well to focus on the novel social

and spatial commoning practices to gain more insights in terms of how decommodification, mutualism

and self-management play out, as well as their limits and potentials. This can be applied to a range of

issues central to geographical enquiry: the future nature of the economy, place making and architecture,

transport, energy and food. Second, post-capitalist transitioning is a disruptive challenge that takes us

into terra incognita for geographical teaching and research. This involves a range of issues including

where and what we teach, as well as what research agendas we validate and pursue. There are specific

ways that we can build post-capitalist activities into our discipline. This could be through collaborative

writing and teaching, a commitment to action research and coproducing teaching and research especially

connecting with groups who are actively building commons, actively resisting and implementing

alternatives to the creeping metricisation and commodification of university life, and even reorganising

our departments and disciplinary networks based upon more direct democratic forms. Moreover, careful

consideration is needed in terms of the policy and practice that we, as geographers, advocate for in the

public realm. Arguments need to gain leverage and provide bridgeheads between the world as it is and

the world we would like. Because of the pluralistic and often heretical nature of our discipline,

geographers are ideally placed to take on these radical agendas. But unless we make continued effort

forge the direct and necessary links between transitioning beyond capitalism and what its geographies

might look and feel like, there will be limited, and perhaps tokenistic, ability to take decisive and

meaningful action on the challenges that lay ahead.

23
References

Aiken G 2012 Community Transitions to Low Carbon Futures in the Transition Towns Network (TTN)

Geography Compass 6 89-99

Albert M 2004 Life after capitalism Verso, London

Alexander C, Ishikawa S and Silverstein M 1977 A Pattern Language: Towns, Buildings, Construction New

York, Oxford University Press

Angus I ed 2001 The Global Fight for Climate Justice Resistance Books, San Francisco

Bailey I, Hopkins R and Wilson G 2009 Some things old, some things new: The spatial representations and

politics of change of the peak oil relocalisation movement Geoforum 41 595-605

Bamford G 2005 Cohousing for older people: housing innovation in the Netherlands and Denmark

Australasian Journal of Ageing 24 44-6

Barber B 1984 Strong Democracy: Participatory Politics for a New Age San Francisco, California Press

Bond P 2010 Climate Justice Politics Across Space and Scale Human Geography 3 2 49-62

Bond P and Durban Group for Climate Justice 2010 Climate justice, climate debt, and anti-capitalism: An

interview with Patrick Bond (http://www.durbanclimatejustice.org/articles/climate-justice-climate-

debt-and-anti-capitalism-an-interview-with-patrick-bond.html) Accessed 26 September 2014

Bookchin M 1992 Urbanisation without Cities: The Rise and Decline of Citizenship Black Rose Books,

Montréal

Bos J, Brown R and Farrelly M 2013 A design framework for creating social learning situations Global

Environmental Change 23 398-412

Brunori G Rossi A and Malandrin V 2010 Co-producing transition: Innovation processes in farms adhering

to solidarity-based purchase groups (GAS) in Tuscany Italy International Journal of Social Agriculture and

Food 18 28 53

Bulkeley H 2005 Reconfiguring environmental governance: towards a politics of scales and networks

Political Geography 24 875-902

24
Bulkeley H and Castán Broto V 2013 Government by experiment? Global cities and the governing of

climate change Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers 38 361 375

Bulkeley H Castan Broto V and Maassen A 2014 Low-carbon Transitions and the Reconfiguration of

Urban Infrastructure Urban Studies 51 1471-1486

Bulkeley H, Castan-Broto V, Hodson M and Marvin S 2011 Cities and Low Carbon Transitions London,

Routledge

Bunker S Coates C Field M and How J eds 2011 Cohousing in Britain Today Diggers and Dreamers

Publications, London

Chatterton, P 2016 The Rocky Road of Post-Capitalist Grassroots Experimentation In Dastbaz M and

Gorse C (eds) Sustainable Ecological Engineering Design. Springer International Publishing, London

Chatterton P 2010a Seeking the urban common: Furthering the debate on spatial justice City 14 625-628

Chatterton P 2010b So what does it mean to be anti-capitalist? Conversations with activists from urban

social centres Urban Studies 47 1205 1224

Chatterton P and Pickerell J 2010 Everyday activism and transitions towards post-capitalist worlds

Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers 35 475 490

Chatterton P 2015 Low Impact Living: A Field Guide for Affordable, Ecological Community Building

Earthscan, London

Cretney R and Bond S B G -roots autonomous activism in shaping

discourses of resilience and transformation following disaster Resilience 2 1 401 16

Dahle K 2007 When do transformative initiatives really transform? A typology of different paths for

transition to a sustainable society Futures 39 487 504

Dator J 2002 Ed Advancing Futures: Futures Studies in Higher Education Praeger, Westport

De Angelis M 2007 The beginning of history London, Pluto

Deleuze G and Guattari F 1987 A Thousand Plateaus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia University of

Minnesota Press, Minneapolis

25
Douthwaite R 1999 The Growth Illusion: How Economic Growth Has Enriched the Few, Impoverished the

Many and Endangered the Planet New Society, Gabriola Island Canada

Durrett C and McCamant K 2011 Creating Cohousing: Building Sustainable Communities New Society,

Gabriola Island Canada

Dyer-Witheford N 2001 The new combinations: Revolt of the global value-subjects New Centennial

Review 1 155-200

Eizaguirre S Marc Pradel Albert Terrones Xavier Martinez-Celorrio and Marisol García 2012 Multilevel

Governance and Social Cohesion: Bringing Back Conflict in Citizenship Practices Urban Studies 49 1999-

2016

Evans J 2011 Resilience ecology and adaptation in the experimental city Transactions of the Institute of

British Geographers 36 223 237

Evans J and Karvonen A G I Urban

laboratories and the governance of low-carbon futures International Journal of Urban and Regional

Research 38 413 430

Evans J, Jones P and Krueger R 2009 Organic regeneration and sustainability or can the credit crunch save

our cities? Local Environment 14 683 98

Featherstone D 2008 Resistance Space and Political Identities: The Making of Counter-Global Networks

Wiley-Blackwell, Oxford

Field M 2011 Housing co-operatives and other mutual housing bodies Institute for Urban Affairs,

University of Nottingham

Freire P 1979 Pedagogy of the oppressed London, Penguin

Geels F W 2011 The multi-level perspective on sustainability transitions: Responses to seven criticisms

Environmental Innovation Social Transitions 1 24 40

Geels F W 2014 Regime Resistance against Low-Carbon Transitions: Introducing Politics and Power into

the Multi-Level Perspective Theory Culture and Society 31 5 21-40

26
Geels FW 2005 Technological Transitions and System Innovations: A Coevolutionary and Socio-Technical

Analysis Edward Elgar, Cheltenham

Geels FW 2010 Ontologies, socio-technical transitions to sustainability and the multi-level perspective

Research Policy 39 495-510

G DC ON KJ The green economy sustainability transitions and transition regions: a

case study of Boston Geografiska Annaler Series B 96 3 201-216

G DC ON K J 2015 Building a green economy? Sustainability transitions in the UK building

sector Geoforum 59 133 141

Gibson-Graham JK 2006 A post-capitalist politics University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis

Hamann R and Kurt A 2013 On the role and capabilities of collaborative intermediary organisations in

urban sustainability transitions Journal of Cleaner Production 50 112-21

Giradet H 2008 Surviving the century Earthscan, London

Hardt M and Negri A 2009 Commonwealth Harvard University Press, Cambridge Massachussetts

Harvey D 2012 Rebel Cities: From the Right to the City to the Urban Revolution Verso London

Hawkins R, Hunt C, Holmes T and Helweg-Larsen T 2008 Climate code red Public Interest Research

Centre, Machynlleth

Hodson M and Marvin S U A International Journal

of Urban and Regional Research 33 193 215

Hodson M and Marvin S 2010 Can cities shape socio-technical transitions and how would we know if they

were? Research Policy 39 4477-485

Holdren N and Touza S 2005 Introduction to Colectivo Situaciones Ephemera 5 4 595-601

Holloway J 2010 Crack Capitalism Pluto Press, London

Holmgren D 2009 Future Scenarios: How Communities Can Adapt to Peak Oil and Climate Change Chelsea

Green, London

27
Homer-Dixon T 2006 The upside of down: catastrophe creativity and the renewal of civilisation Souvenir

Press, London

hooks b 2004 Teaching community: A pedagogy of hope Routledge, London

Hopkins R 2008 The Transition Handbook Green Books, Cambridge

Horne R and Dalton T 2014 Transition to low carbon? An analysis of socio-technical change in housing

renovation Urban Studies 51 16 3445-3458

Horton M and Freire P 1990 We make the road by walking: conversations on education and social change

Temple University Press, Philadelphia

Jackson T 2009 Prosperity without Growth: Economics for a Finite Planet Earthscan, London

Jarvis H 2011 Saving space sharing time: integrated infrastructures of daily life in cohousing Environment

and Planning A 433 560-577

Kaika, M and Karaliotas L 2014 The spatialization of democratic politics: Insights from Indignant Squares

European Urban and Regional Studies May 1-15

Karvonen A and van Heur B 2014 Urban laboratories: Experiments in reworking cities International

Journal of Urban and Regional Research 38 379 392

Katz C 2001 On the grounds of globalization: A topography for feminist political engagement Signs 26

1213 1234

Killip G 2013 Transition management using a market transformation approach: lessons for theory

research and practice from the case of low-carbon housing refurbishment in the UK Environment and

Planning C 31 5 876-892

Klein N 2014 This Changes Everything: Capitalism vs. the Climate Simon & Schuster, New York

Lawhon M and Murphy J T 2011 Socio-technical regimes and sustainability transitions: Insights from

political ecology Progress in Human Geography 36 3 354-378

Lees L, Slater T and Wyly E 2008 Gentrification Routledge, New York

Lewis P 2013 Undercover: The True Story of Britain's Secret Police Faber and Faber, London

28
Linebaugh P 2008 The magna carta manifesto: Liberties and commons for all Verso, London

Lutz J and Schachinger J 2013 Do Local Food Networks Foster Socio-Ecological Transitions towards Food

Sovereignty? Learning from Real Place Experiences Sustainability 2013 5 4778-4796

MacKinnon D and Derickson K 2013 From resilience to resourcefulness: A critique of resilience policy and

activism Progress in Human Geography 37 253-270

Mander J and Goldsmith E 1997 The Case against the Global Economy and for a Turn to the Local Sierra

Club Books, San Francisco

Marshall P 1992 Demanding the impossible. A history of anarchism Harper Collins, London

Mason K and Whitehead M 2012 Transition urbanism and the contested politics of ethical place making

Antipode 44 493 516

Mason P 2015 Postcapitalism. A guide to our future Allen Lane, London

Meadows D et al 1972 The Limits to Growth : A Report for the Club of Rome's Project on the Predicament

of Mankind Earth Island, London

Merrifield A 2013 The Politics of the Encounter: Urban Theory and Protest Under Planetary Urbanization

University of Georgia Press, Athens Georgia

Middlemiss L and Parrish B 2010 Building capacity for low-carbon communities: The role of grassroots

initiatives Energy Policy 38 7559-7566

Midnight Notes 1991 The new enclosures Autonomedia, New York

Mol A, Sonnenfeld D and Spaargaren G eds 2009 The Ecological Modernisation Reader: Environmental

Reform in Theory and Practice Routledge, London

Moss T 2014 Socio-technical Change and the Politics of Urban Infrastructure: Managing Energy in Berlin

between Dictatorship and Democracy Urban Studies 51 1432-1448

Moulaert F, Martinelli F, Swyngedouw E and Gonzalez S 2010 Can neighbourhoods save the city?

Routledge, Oxon

29
Moyer B 2001 Doing Democracy: The MAP Model for Organizing Social Movements New Society

Publishers, New York

Nevens F, Frantzeskaki N, Gorissen L and Loorbach D 2013 Urban Transition Labs: co-creating

transformative action for sustainable cities Journal of Cleaner Production 50 1111-1122

New Economics Foundation 2010 Good Foundations: towards a low carbon high well-being built

environment New Economics Foundation, London

North P 2011 The politics of climate activism in the UK: a social movement analysis Environment and

Planning A 43 1581 1598

ON D 2011 Measuring progress in the degrowth transition to a steady state economy Ecological

Economics Ecological Economics 84 221-231

ON KJ G D C 2014 Towards a sustainable economy? Socio-technical transitions in the green

building sector Local Environment 19 6 572-590

Oosterlynck S and González S D O

experimentation International Journal of Urban and Regional Research 37 1075 1082

Ostrom, E 1990 Governing the commons: the evolution of institutions for collective action Cambridge

University Press, Cambridge

Painter J 2012 The politics of the neighbour Environment and Planning D: Society and Space 303 515 533

Panitch L Albo G, Chibber V and Leys C 2010 The Crisis This Time Merlin Press, London

Parag Y and Janda K 2014 More than filler: Middle actors and socio-technical change in the energy

- Energy Research and Social Science 3 102-112

Peters M, Fudge S and Jackson T eds 2010 Low Carbon Communities: Imaginative Approaches to

Combating Climate Change Locally Edward Elgar, Cheltenham

Pickerill J and Maxey L 2009 Geographies of sustainability: Low Impact Developments and spaces of

innovation Geography Compass 3 1515-1539

30
Radywyl N and Biggs C 2013 Reclaiming the commons for urban transformation Journal of Cleaner

Production 50 1159-170

Roelvink G St. Martin K and Gibson-Graham, JK eds 2015 Making other worlds possible: performing

diverse economies University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis.

Rosenberg M 2003 Nonviolent communication: A language of life Puddledancer Press, Encinitas

Rutherford J and Coutard O 2014 Urban Energy Transitions: Places Processes and Politics of Socio-

technical Change Urban Studies 51 1353-1377

Rutherford J 2014 The Vicissitudes of Energy and Climate Policy in Stockholm: Politics Materiality and

Transition Urban Studies 51 1449-1470

Sale K 2000 Dwellers in the land: The bioregional vision University of Georgia Press, Athens Georgia

Sanguinetti A T E

community and nature Journal of Environmental Psychology 40 86-96

Sargisson L 2007 Imperfect utopias: Green intentional communities Ecopolitics 11 1-24

Sayer A and Storper M 1997 Ethics unbound: for a normative turn in social theory. Environment and

Planning D: Society and Space 15. 1-17

Schlosberg D 2007 Defining Environmental Justice: Theories, Movements and Nature. Oxford: Oxford

University Press

Schor J 2010 Plenitude: The New Economics of True Wealth Penguin Press, New York

Schumacher EF 1973 Small Is Beautiful: A Study of Economics as if People Mattered Blond and Briggs,

London

Scott-Cato K and Hillier J 2011 How could we study climate-related social innovation? Applying

Deleuzean philosophy to Transition Towns Environmental Politics 19 869-887

Scotthanson C and Scotthanson K 2005 The cohousing handbook: Building a place for community New

Society Publishers, Gabriola Island Canada

31
Scrase I and Smith A 2009 The non-politics of managing low carbon socio-technical transitions

Environmental Politics 18 5 707-726

Sennett R 2013 Together: The Rituals, Pleasures and Politics of Cooperation Penguin, London

Seyfang G and Haxeltine A 2012 Growing grassroots innovations: Exploring the role of community based

initiatives in governing sustainable energy transitions Government Policy 30 381 400

Seyfang G 2009 Community action for sustainable housing: Building a low carbon future Energy Policy 38

7624-7633

Seyfang G and Smith A G

Environmental Politics 164 584-603

Shove E and Walker G 2010 Governing transitions in the sustainability of everyday life Research Policy 39

4 471-476

Shove E Walker G 2008 Transition Management TM and the politics of shape shifting Environment and

Planning A 40 4 1012-1014

Shove E and Walker G 2007 CAUTION! Transitions ahead: Politics, practice and sustainable transition

management Environment and Planning A 394 763 770

Simms A Johnson V and Chowla P 2010 Growth Isn't Possible: Why Rich Countries Need a New Economic

Direction Earthscan, London

Smith A and Stirling A 2010 The politics of social-ecological resilience and sustainable socio-technical

transitions Ecology and Society 15 1: 11.

Smith A Stirling A and Berkhout F 2005 The governance of sustainable socio-technical transitions

Research Policy 34 10 1491-1510

Smith A Voß JP and Grin J 2010 Innovation studies and sustainability transitions: The allure of the multi-

level perspective and its challenges Research Policy 39 4 435-448

Smith D 1997 Back to the good life: towards an enlarged conception of social justice Environment and

Planning D: Society and Space 15 19-35

32
Smith N 2005 Neo-critical geography, or, the flat pluralist world of business class Antipode 37 887 899

Solnit D 2004 Globalise Liberation: How to Uproot the System and Build a Better World City Lights Books,

San Francisco

Spratt D and Sutton P 2008 Climate Code Red: The Case for Emergency Action Scribe Publications, New

York

Starhawk 2011 The Empowerment Manual: A Guide for Collaborative Groups New Society Publishers, San

Francisco

Swyngedouw E 2009 The antinomies of the postpolitical city: In search of a democratic politics of

environmental production International Journal of Urban and Regional Research 333 601 20

Thaler R and Sunstein C 2008 Nudge: Improving Decisions about Health Wealth and Happiness Yale

University Press, New Haven Connecticut

Trapese Collective 2008 Do It Yourself: A Handbook for Changing Our World Pluto Press, London

Trapese Collective 2009 A Rocky Road to a Real Transition (booklet)

(http://trapese.clearerchannel.org/resources/rocky-road-a5-web.pdf) Accessed 26 September 2014

Truffer B and Coenen L 2011 Environmental Innovation and Sustainability Transitions in Regional Studies

Regional Studies 46 1 1-21

While A Jonas AEG and Gibbs D 2010 From sustainable development to carbon control: eco-state

restructuring and the politics of urban and regional development Transactions of the Institute of British

Geographers 351 76 93

Williams J 2005 Designing neighbourhoods for social interaction the case of cohousing Journal of Urban

Design 10 195-227

Wright EO 2010 Envisioning Real Utopias Verso, London

Zibechi R 2012 Territories in resistance AK Press, London

i
However, the largely socially constructed nature of laboratory conditions is now well established. Experiments are in fact highly
contingent, open and negotiated spaces, far from immune to external pressures and indelibly mixed up with the outside world
(Evans and Karvonen, 2013).
33
ii
A bibliographic search returns 44 peer- - O
on the energy sector, and there is no single mention to the work capitalism in any of these articles.
iii
From the nineteenth century onwards, guided by a growing cooperative movement, mutualism provided a strong intellectual
bulwark against the rampant individualism of the fast-expanding free-market capitalist economy.
iv
See: http://ica.coop/en/whats-co-op/co-operative-identity-values-principles.

34