Remaking the Economy: Owning Our Future

How is an economy built in which ownership is truly shared and in which we all co-own the future? To addresses this question and many others, four authors from NPQ’s summer 2022 economic justice magazine issue on “Owning Our Economy, Owning Our Future,” build on the articles they wrote and challenge viewers to rethink the future of our economy—touching on a range of themes from restructuring ownership in business, at the level of culture, in the nonprofit sector, and at the workplace.

The panelists participating in this wide-ranging conversation are:

Kamuela Enos, who is director of the Office of Indigenous Innovation at the University of Hawai’i, of mixed-race Hawaiian heritage, and a longtime activist in the Indigenous rights movement in Hawai’i.
Rodney Foxworth is CEO of Common Future, an organization that supports a network of leaders who are building a more equitable economy in over 100 low-income communities and communities of color across the country.
Emily Kawano is codirector of the Wellspring Cooperative, based in Springfield, Massachusetts, and is a cofounder of the US Solidarity Economic Network.
Esteban Kelly is executive director of the U.S. Federation of Worker Cooperatives, which represents the nation’s estimated 1,000 worker co-ops, and is a longtime leader in the solidarity economy and co-op movements.

Click here to download accompanying slides

Among the many questions explored in this webinar are the following:

What is ownership? How must ownership rights be restructured to create a more equitable economy?
What does the future of economic justice look like?
What are concrete action steps that people can take to advance a democratic economic vision?
How can nonprofits and community groups leverage their own economic activity to promote a more equitable and democratic economy?
How can a kinship-based model of ownership support the revival of Indigenous communities and promote equitable regeneration?
How do you decolonize the economy?
How do worker co-ops democratize ownership? What role can policy play?
What does a broader vision of democratic ownership that sustains us—at work, on the land, in communities, and at home—look, taste, and feel like?

Resources:

Steve Dubb and Emily Kawano, “Beyond Capitalism: Owning Our Economy, Owning Our Future,” NPQ, July 13, 2022.

Kamuela Enos and Miwa Tamanaha, Ownership as Kinship: Restoring the Abundance of Our Ancestors, NPQ September 7, 2022.

Rodney Foxworth, “Building Community Institutions of Our Own,” NPQ, July 20, 2022.

Melissa Hoover and Esteban Kelly, “Future Horizons: Visions toward Democratizing Our Economy,” NPQ, July 27, 2022.

Webinar sponsored by:

About the authors

Steve Dubb

Steve Dubb is senior editor of economic justice at NPQ, where he writes articles (including NPQ’s Economy Remix column), moderates Remaking the Economy webinars, and works to cultivate voices from the field and help them reach a broader audience. Prior to coming to NPQ in 2017, Steve worked with cooperatives and nonprofits for over two decades, including twelve years at The Democracy Collaborative and three years as executive director of NASCO (North American Students of Cooperation). In his work, Steve has authored, co-authored, and edited numerous reports; participated in and facilitated learning cohorts; designed community building strategies; and helped build the field of community wealth building. Steve is the lead author of Building Wealth: The Asset-Based Approach to Solving Social and Economic Problems (Aspen 2005) and coauthor (with Rita Hodges) of The Road Half Traveled: University Engagement at a Crossroads, published by MSU Press in 2012. In 2016, Steve curated and authored Conversations on Community Wealth Building, a collection of interviews of community builders that Steve had conducted over the previous decade.

Kamuela Enos

Kamuela Enos is the director of the Office of Indigenous Innovation at the University of Hawai'i. Enos is a mixed-race Native Hawaiian, cis male, raised in the community of Wai'anae within the context of the Hawaiian Renaissance of the 1970s and 1980s—an Indigenous rights movement that continues today. He holds degrees in Hawaiian studies and urban and regional planning from the University of Hawai'i.

Rodney Foxworth

Rodney Foxworth is CEO of Common Future (formerly the Business Alliance for Local Living Economies [BALLE]), an organization based in Oakland, California, that works with foundations and nonprofit practitioners across North America to foster greater business ownership and wealth building in low-income communities and communities of color.

Emily Kawano

Emily Kawano is a founder and co-coordinator of the US Solidarity Economy Network and has served on the board of RIPESS (the Intercontinental Network for the Social Solidarity Economy) for almost a decade. She is codirector of the Wellspring Cooperative, which is developing a network of worker cooperatives and solidarity economy initiatives in Springfield, MA. Previously, Kawano was director of the Center for Popular Economics, has taught economics at Smith College, and has worked as the national economic justice representative for the American Friends Service Committee.

Esteban Kelly

Esteban Kelly is the executive director for the U.S. Federation of Worker Cooperatives, founding president of the freelancer co-op Guilded, and a worker-owner and cofounder of AORTA (Anti-Oppression Resource & Training Alliance). He is a Ford Global Fellow and was a founding board member of the US Solidarity Economy Network, the Democracy At Work Institute, and the cross-sector Philadelphia Area Cooperative Alliance. He currently serves on the boards of the National Cooperative Business Association, CLUSA International, Climate + Community Project, and the international worker co-op association known as CICOPA.

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