The goal of The Social Commons: Transformational Thinking on Social Solidarity for the 21st Century is to engage young leaders, policy-makers and policy advocates, academics and researchers, community activists and the interested public in a discussion on what a care-based approach to the social commons would be in Canada.
This event will be held in memory of Marvyn Novick, a leading thinker and contributor to social policy in Canada, who in the final months of his life envisaged the core values of a social commons approach:
The public lecture on November 14, 2019 will feature Dr. Francine Mestrum as the keynote speaker.
“To reframe our thinking about how the economy and our social relations should work,” Dr. Francine Mestrum advocates for a “shift from social protection to social commons”[3] (p. 4). She holds that
“Certain basic principles of our current social protection will have to be preserved, such as respect for universal rights, the non-commoditization of social service, the horizontal solidarity of all with all” (p. 4).
This is the starting point for a “democratic and participative approach” to design and monitor our social systems (p. 5). It is not a matter of “correcting” the existing social and economic systems but rather entirely reframing our thinking from a profit-making, market-driven economic system to an economy that is “at the service of societies” in terms of both human and environmental needs and wants” (p. 5).
Social Commons arose from World Social Forum in 2013 as a framework for re-thinking social policies in a transformative and participative way to achieve social and environmental justice. Social Commons is grounded in a critique of the existing international social and economic order:
- that is driven by market forces giving primacy to economic growth and corporate profit at expense of social solidarity and environmental health (neo-liberalism);
- that has narrowed social protection and security to targeted and individualistic approaches for the poor, thus undermining commitment to universal policies for the benefit of all;
- that has suppressed collective action and solidarity systems (e.g. social insurance programs, labour rights), which previously joined people at all income levels to a shared standard of decency in everyday life;
- that has emphasized the importance of income with minimal cash transfer “guarantees” in the commodification of human needs while abandoning any commitment to the provision of universal, high quality public services in health, education, and other essential forms of social care; and
- that has enlisted progressive elements of society in a more limited agenda focusing on minimalist protections for the poorest and most marginalized rather than on the social and economic rights of all citizens.