OntheWilderSide

We are told there is no alternative to the corporate global economy. Yet there is another way and the roots for it already exist. Go Local, our Winter 2007 issue of YES! Magazine, recognizes that humanized economies work best: local food, local energy, and local jobs make for better lives.

Creating a human-scale economy is not as strange as you may think. I myself live in one, an egalitarian community in Seattle which operates on a time-based economy. Each hour of labor is treated equally, regardless of the income it generates and we value our cooking, cleaning, and childcare on the same basis as paid work.

This is but one example of a myriad of local economies that are emerging in response to the profit-based globalization that is leading us towards the crises of peak oil, climate disruption, and currency meltdown.

Our Go Local issue shows how you can join the movement that represents all of our futures. We celebrate local, living economies and highlight people experiencing the benefits of cooperation, sustainability and freedom from the fear of dependency. Take a look at our sample articles online, or try us out with a Free Trial Issue.

Adam MacKinnon
Online Editor, YES! Magazine
www.yesmagazine.org

10 Ways to a Human-Scale Economy
We offer the YES! perspective on 10 great innovations that prove change is not only possible, but underway. Tired of feeling powerless? See how to bring your economy home.

Independence from the Corporate Global Economy
The human economy—gift, barter, cooperative, household—is the real basis for wealth.  We can earn a livelihood, gain freedom, and build community through cooperation.

Green-Collar Jobs for Urban America
With some unlikely allies Oakland’s progressive movement is prompting economic and social recovery by stimulating environment-friendly products and services.

Creating Real Prosperity
Are we abandoning the world’s poor if we go local? No, if anything they are showing the way: building local, living economies creates more jobs than multinationals

 _______________________________________

Editor’s note:  A good place to start in how to live more locally are these books by Michael Shuman:  The classic Going Local: Creating Self-Reliant Communities in a Global Age or the newly released The Small-Mart Revolution: How Local Businesses Are Beating the Global Competition

Going Local synopsis:

National drug chains squeeze local pharmacies out of business, while corporate downsizing ships jobs overseas. All across America, communities large and small are losing control of their economies to outside interests. Going Local shows how some cities and towns are fighting back. Refusing to be overcome by Wal-Marts and layoffs, they are taking over abandoned factories, switching to local produce and manufactured goods, and pushing banks to loan money to local citizens. Shuman details how dozens of communities are recapturing their own economies with these new strategies, investing not in outsiders but in locally owned businesses.

Small-Mart synopsis

Defenders of globalization, free markets, and free trade insist there’s no alternative to mega-stores like Wal-Mart. Shuman begs to differ. In this work, the author makes a compelling case for an alternative business model, one in which communities reap the benefits of “going local” in four key spending categories.

Offers an alternative model to the dominant view of economic development, a model that liberates and fosters the natural capacities of local businesses to grow and prosper. This book shows readers how easy and beneficial it is to “go local” in their four key spending categories: goods, services, energy and finance.

Outlines a range of practical strategies for fighting globalization through profit- and community-minded small business practices, addressing the needs of four key spending categories that communities can meet to create local resources and job opportunities.

Click here to find out more about these books.

Filed under: activism, Anti-War, Ballot issues, buy local, Corporations, cynthia mckinney, Ecology, Education, Food, health, Labor, local, media, Our Favorite Radio Stations, Peace, Political Websites, Press Release, reform, social & economic justice, sustainability, sustainable, US Politics Tagged: | book of the month, Childhood Obesity, Fluoride, obesity, Working Families Party