A Brief Reflection on the ReIMAGINE Scale Learning Journey
By Cate Fox, Ambitio US Program Director, and Leeann Wallett, Ambitio US Program Officer
One of the most common questions funders raise with Ambitio US and with organizations in the Movement for localized and empowering culturally rooted economic systems is how these hyper-local efforts will scale. This question implies progress! We do not have to justify why these alternatives exist in the first place; instead, the inquirer is trying to understand how this system might benefit more people. The timing for this question is finally right, as Movement leaders are exploring these same issues.
During September, a group of Economic Trailblazer grantees, academics, funders, and staff went to Emilia-Romagna, a region in Italy with a robust cooperative sector that is decentralized and decades old, and Bilbao in the Basque Country in Spain, which is a region that has a highly centralized, established cooperative economic system. During the ten-day journey, we saw firsthand that even after significant political and cultural upheaval, when people come together, they can have more control over their livelihoods. Cooperatives in both countries were not only economically successful, but they also fostered deep social connections between people and communities. We saw that in practice at Kaxilda , a cooperative project in San Sebastian, Spain, that employs 10 people. It is a bookstore, restaurant, and event space for cultural programming, and one of many examples that takes an interconnected approach to systemic issues such as work, health, social cohesion, housing, safety, and food access. And while it took decades of steady growth and persistence to establish these systems in Italy and Spain, this learning journey showed us that scale is achievable in the United States.
We intend to bring our more in-depth observations, questions, and learnings back to the United States to engage the broader mutualistic economic community in imagining what is possible and how to build it. We view this both as information gathering and another opportunity to infuse joy and strengthen the ties between people in the Movement who share the goals of paradigm change but inhabit different roles. We look forward to sharing the learnings from this Ambitio US trip by bringing the conversations (and questions) to broader alternative economic movement spaces. Sign up for the bi-monthly Ambitio US newsletter
This article was originally published on Medium. Read it on Medium →
