As part of our series of posts about local FairCoop experiences, here is another very interesting place: Greece. Due to recent events that have taken place in this country since the Troika blackmailed its goverment and people to get them to accept more cuts, there has been a lot of activity. This has given a boost to activity related to FairCoop, mainly in Athens and Crete, where there are many projects and experiences under development.
In this post we will focus on Heraklion where there are a lot of interesting things happening.
Recent news from Heraklion Local Node, Crete
Our experience of FairCoop’s infrastructure and wider network is fairly recent. We had the chance to host the International FairCoop Summer Camp in 2015 and to get into practicing using a global alternative economy tool during the promotion period of FairCoin in our town. Since then, little by little, we keep on exploring the structure of FairCoop as a whole, as well as trying to introduce it to the local community.
Additionally, along with the Local Node of Athens, Thessaloniki and other networks, we took part in the 1st gathering of the Solidarity Economy and Integral Cooperativism, an event that took place from the 5th to the 8th of May in Mouzaki, Karditsa. There we had the opportunity to discuss topics relating to Integral Revolution and make a first step towards cooperation and networking between us. In this way, we are able to promote our ideas and practices to more people, empower local initiatives as well as create a more complete system that can be effective at a national level.
As a result of all the above, during the last few months at the level of Heraklion, local political groups, initiatives and collectives have been forming a common assembly, to create a practical plan towards Integral Cooperativism that would put together common needs into the context of a political framework. It has been until now a process of refining our texts and public profile, which were eventually presented in an open event in the center of the town. In this event we practised in an autonomous open-space exchange market and a collective kitchen, as well as introducing people into our new integral economy model, through the use of FairCoin and mutual currency implemented with the integralCES platform.
acheter du viagra pour homme.coop/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/heraklion-post2-300×198.jpg 300w, /wp-content/uploads/2016/06/heraklion-post2-100×66.jpg 100w, /wp-content/uploads/2016/06/heraklion-post2.jpg 640w” sizes=”(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px” />The two fields we are focusing on during this period are, firstly, the agricultural matter: working to get people to trust each other, promoting our preference towards respectful and natural ways of farming, but also using collective decision making in designing a fair production-to-consumer network. The second is to access and make use of disobedient economy tools, which are very much needed in Greece, in order to support peoples’ needs. Apart from the alternative currencies mentioned before, we also started testing a local legal form as a practical disobedient tool to help local collectives extend their operation. Complementary, in a wider level throughout the country, we are highly motivated towards the integration of immigrants and refugees, and towards implementing alternative education projects in the territory.
Furthermore, as a FairCoop Local Node, we visited two other main towns on the island to share our interest in FairCoops’ tools and spread the idea of Integral Cooperativism in a more close and personal way. There was an initial interest from their side and our plan in the near future is, as the Heraklion initiative evolves, to develop a more close relationship and cooperation with them.
Lastly, apart from the local actions, we are trying to keep up and follow FairCoop’s development at the global scale as well. We strongly believe in local-to-global bidirectional connection, thus participating actively in the Open Global Assemblies and trying to co-shape our common strategic path. Also, from a practical point of view, this means that we are collaborating in different working groups, while translating all new information and tools into Greek so that they are easily available publicly to a wider audience. We are looking forward to participating in all the new tools designed by FairCoop community and its committed members, like FairMarket and FreedomCoop, strengthening and broadening our commonly shared vision for a decentralised and truly fair economy of the people.
To know more about the Greece local node you can find them in the Fairnetwork.
If you want to get involved in the activities going on in your local area, just register on the Faircoop website and join the Fairnetwork, search in the groups area for your nearest local node and join. If there is no local node near you, you can start one!