Reports

In answering the following research question: What design features allow for both comfort and mobility in the hot city, and what design features detract from this? What climate-resilient social practices are these features enabling and disabling? this report develops a new approach to understanding and designing cool cities: cool commons. The report sets out the new conceptual approach of Cool Commons. It moves beyond current technocentric approaches to cool urban futures, recognising that a combination of material, social and institutional strategies are required to support climate adaptation, including community-led adaptive practices. ‘Cool commons’ view the city not as a collection of private spaces, but as an environment for convivial social life.

After five years of the consolidation, Mutual Support-Rekülüwun can be seen as part of a repertoire of creative responses by Mapuche families to the monetization of their rural economies in southern Chile, which has accelerated notoriously in the last decade. The project was set out in 2012 by the Mapuche-Lafkenche community of Llaguepulli and MAPLE, to create a member-owned institution while abiding to an indigenous cultural context and community protocols. 

Community Economies News: Crypto-knitting, Blockchain and Cryptocurrencies.

This report is based on in-depth research with ten manufacturers. It finds that along with operating dynamic and viable businesses these manufacturers are fostering a culture of just and sustainable manufacturing that is helping to tackle the social and environmental challenges of the 21st century.

The manufacturers include public corporations and cooperatives, and range from the privately-owned engineering firm, Varley Group, which is headquartered in the Hunter region and has been operating since 1886 to the not-for-profit social enterprise and clothing manufacturer, The Social Outfit, which was established in Newtown in Sydney in 2014.

This is the summary report on Phase 1 of the Redrawing the Economy project. The report was prepared for the for the Scholar-Activist Project Award from the Antipode Foundation.

Following this phase of the project, the Redrawing the Economy website was produced by Kathrin Böhm. More information about the project is also available by clicking here.

This report details the workshops conducted in Colombia as part of the Redrawing the Economy project. The workshops were conducted by one of the authors of Take Back the Economy, the translators of the Spanish version of Take Back the Economy, artists, and members of community economy initiatives from across Colombia.

Workshops were also conducted in Finland and South Korea, and there is a summary report for the Scholar-Activist Project Award from the Antipode Foundation.

This report details the workshops conducted in South Korea as part of the Redrawing the Economy project. The workshops were conducted by one of the authors of Take Back the Economy, the translators of the Korean version of Take Back the Economy, artists, and members of community economy initiatives from across South Korea.

Workshops were also conducted in Colombia and Finland, and there is a summary report for the Scholar-Activist Project Award from the Antipode Foundation.

This document provides insights into current social procurement policy and practice within the public sector in Australia. It draws from interviews with representatives of three State Government departments, and from resource materials previously produced.

The report includes case studies which provide snapshots of different ways that government entities are utilising both direct and indirect social procurement strategies to support the implementation of local economic development policies and programs. Through harnessing and targeting their purchasing power they are engaging residents and supporting local small enterprise growth and stability, fostering the economic capacity of a local area so as to improve quality of life for local residents.

This pilot study provides initial insights into how residents living in Western Sydney keep cool during the hottest parts of the year and how they would like to see their living environments, at home and out and about, modified to improve wellbeing in a climate changing world.

A booklet outlining some of the major impacts of the 7-day work roster on families and communities from the perspective of women in four coal-mining communities in Central Queensland, Australia.

Based on action research conducted in 1991, the study raises some of the issues encountered by women, men and families after the introduction of the 7-day roster. It highlights the need to consider factors broader than increased pay arrangements and men's leisure time.

The booklet is illustrated with cartoons by Gaynor Cardew.