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"34,000 Trees cut down in GM" Making Manchester greener with Trees Not Cars

Manchester Green New Deal Podcast - Mon, 05/25/2020 - 03:00

Last year Manchester council declared a climate emergency to the adulation of the city and the environmental movement. Two days later they decided to build a brand new car park in the heart of the city, a stark slap in the face to that same declaration. This week we talk to Trees Not Cars on their efforts to make more green space in the city center, the affects on the already disastrous levels of pollution on our health and what we can do to fight back against a contradicting council.

https://www.treesnotcars.com/

Trees not cars fundraisers
https://www.gofundme.com/f/trees-not-cars-mcr


Defra pollution monitor and forecast

https://uk-air.defra.gov.uk/

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Categories: A2. Green Unionism

"corporate media is kinda shitty" exploring local environmental journalism

Manchester Green New Deal Podcast - Mon, 05/18/2020 - 04:00

It's very easy to concentrate on the national news cycle. Big flashy stories and scandals that drip from the teleprompters of Sky and the BBC. But underneath cocaine habits and duck islands, local government ticks over with a slither of the amount of coverage. With the perception it's just about bin collection and bus time tables, councils and local government have substantial power still on how we support our ecosystem and where money is invested.

This week we are joined on the Pod by investigative journalist  Andrea Sandor (@wordstoseeby). Andreas  coverage includes the stripping of cycling provision across the city, the gentrification of the Northern Quarter and  Manchesters pollution crisis. We discuss why local journalism is more important than ever, how philosphy is keeping people from cycling  and how the Manchester Meteor is building a truly independent media.


Shout outs
Nick hubble cycling activist.
https://nickhubble.bike/

Build back better campaign
@BuildBckBetter
https://www.buildbackbetteruk.org/

IPPR study on the furlough scheme
https://www.ippr.org/files/2020-05/1589291707_who-wins-and-who-pays-may20.pdf

Deansgate pedestrianisation
https://aboutmanchester.co.uk/deansgate-set-for-partial-pedestrianisation-from-this-weekend/

If you like the show tell your comrades!
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Categories: A2. Green Unionism

"Fiscal friction is what the rest of us call tax" Tax havens and Kleptocracy with Oliver Bullough

Manchester Green New Deal Podcast - Mon, 05/11/2020 - 03:00

The Green New Deal is a plan to vastly transform our society. Through bold economic and social change it's a plan to save the Earth from the destructive forces of capitalism. that is going to cost a lot of money to do, and as the age old attack on the Left goes "how are you gonna pay for it?". 7.8 Trillion Dollars is estimated to be in tax havens and offshore accounts worldwide. Sounds like a good start to me. Joining us this week is journalist and author Oliver Bullough (@OliverBullough) to discuss his most recent book “ Moneyland: the inside story of the Crooks and kleptocrats who rule the world and how to take it back


**Shout outs**
Catherine Belton Author of Putin's People @CatherineBelton

Kevin Anderson Professor of Energy and Climate Change for his work at the Tyndell Center advising Manchester council
@KevinClimate

Mentioned Links
South Dakotas Tax Haven
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/nov/14/the-great-american-tax-haven-why-the-super-rich-love-south-dakota-trust-laws

Treasure Islands by Nicholas Shaxson
https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/108/1085201/treasure-islands/9780099541721.html

Dark Money by Jane Mayer
https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/215462/dark-money-by-jane-mayer/

Democracy in Chains by Nancy Maclean
https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/533763/democracy-in-chains-by-nancy-maclean/

If you like the show tell your comrades!
Find us on all the socials
Twitter:@MCRGND_POD
Insta: Manchestergndpod
FB:MCRGNDPOD

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Categories: A2. Green Unionism

"Replace the Natural Monopolies" UBI & UBS with Will Stronge of Autonomy

Manchester Green New Deal Podcast - Sun, 05/03/2020 - 10:00

It's time for a moment of respite. With the planet in turmoil we must take a moment to envisage how it could be better. To have the imagination to design a more equitable world. How can we resolve the conflict between ourselves and the planet.

This week we are joined by Will Stronge the director of Autonomy, a progressive think thank researching how we can change the world of work. We take on two big ideas that can reshape the world ; Universal Basic Income and Universal Basic Services.

https://autonomy.work/

Mentioned links
Watch the documentary about the Mincome Trail
https://www.bigexperience.org/film

UCL Report on UBS
https://www.ucl.ac.uk/bartlett/igp/sites/bartlett/files/universal_basic_services_-_the_institute_for_global_prosperity_.pdf

campaign for public ownership
https://weownit.org.uk/

shout outs

Rob Palmer at Tax Justice UK
https://www.taxjustice.uk/
@robertnpalmer

everyone involved in pushing back on the GM councils planning committee suspension
Andrea Sandor
@wordstoseeby

Greater Manchester housing action
@gmhousingaction

Manchester Bee sanctuary with Highfiel Country Mark
https://twitter.com/HighfieldCP_Lev

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Categories: A2. Green Unionism

"It's a really complicated Chicken" Retrofitting housing to battle climate change with Charlie Baker

Manchester Green New Deal Podcast - Mon, 04/27/2020 - 04:00

Even with a pandemic, the climate crisis rages on. In a time when it feels like so much is out of our control what can we do to fight against the ticking down of the U.K's Carbon Budget?

This week we talk to Charlie baker the founder of Red Co-op. A organisation putting the agency back into peoples hands in the fight against climate change. We discover the immense potential of retrofitting the 25 million homes in the UK in tackling climate breakdown and what are the challenges with doing so.

What to get involved with the show? Fill out the Manchester Labour GND survey below  to join us
https://bit.ly/2SaTI2i

If you wanna get in touch with Charlie to learn more on retrofitting contact him at charlie@red.coop

discussed links
2050 Carbon pathway calculator
https://bit.ly/2W3farb

Homes as energy systems
https://retrofitworks.co.uk/haes/
https://bit.ly/3aDUsn7

Retrofitworks
https://retrofitworks.co.uk/

**Shout outs**
Tyndall center for Climate Change
https://tyndall.ac.uk/

B4box contractors
https://b4box.co.uk/

Manchester friends of the earth
https://www.manchesterfoe.org.uk/
Annette wright Labour Hulme councilor
@AnnetteWright

Jon Burke Labour Hackney councilor
@jonburkeUK

If you like the show tell your comrades!
Find us on 
Twitter:@MCRGND_POD
Insta: Manchestergndpod
FB:MCRGNDPOD

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Categories: A2. Green Unionism

"Climate education is not a tick box" Teaching Climate Breakdown.

Manchester Green New Deal Podcast - Mon, 04/20/2020 - 03:00

Education, Education, Education! It's as true now as it was then the only way to take on the biggest challenges in the world is through empowering our future generations to tackle the problems ahead of us. This week we are joined by Lydia Meryll from Manchester Environmental Education Network (MEEN) and Fi a primary school teacher from South Manchester to discuss how schools are coping with COVID-19, How the children are educated on climate change and we speculate at what Rebecca long Bailey will now do in her shadow education role.

If you like the show tell your comrades!
Find us on all the socials
 Twitter:@MCRGND_POD
Insta: Manchestergndpod
FB:MCRGNDPOD


https://www.meen.org.uk/

**Shout out Links**

my mini maths
https://myminimaths.co.uk/

The Writing Squad
http://www.writingsquad.com/

Greater Manchester Community Renewables
https://www.gmcr.org.uk/

The Kindling Trust
https://kindling.org.uk/

Pesticide Action Network UK
https://www.pan-uk.org/

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Categories: A2. Green Unionism

"Socialism and Degrowth aren't the same thing" The Degrowth movement with Mark Burton

Manchester Green New Deal Podcast - Mon, 04/13/2020 - 07:00

The pandemic gripping the world has put Capitalism back into one of it's classic cardiac arrests. With economies slowing to a sclerotic trundle across the globe and great recessions on the horizon is there a better way to organize ourselves? We are joined by Mark Burton from Steady State Manchester to discuss the limits of Growth, how Climate Breakdown and Growth interlock and how Degrowth can save us from disaster capitalism.


If you like the show tell your comrades!
Find us on all the socials
 Twitter:@MCRGND_POD
Insta: Manchestergndpod
FB:MCRGNDPOD

**Links**
Degrowth UK
https://degrowthuk.org/

Steady State Manchester
https://steadystatemanchester.net/

Degrowth VS the Green New Deal
https://steadystatemanchester.net/2019/09/12/six-problems-for-green-deals/

Degrowth Conference 2020
http://www.confercare.manchester.ac.uk/events/degrowth2020/


*Extra reading**
Viable economy
https://steadystatemanchester.files.wordpress.com/2020/02/the-viable-economy-revision-for-2nd-edn-v2.4-final.pdf
Labour and Degrowth
http://renewal.org.uk/articles/degrowth-the-realistic-alternative-for-labour

Steady State Critique of The Greater Manchester Spatial Framework
https://steadystatemanchester.net/2020/03/12/imagining-an-alternative-future-for-greater-manchester/



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Categories: A2. Green Unionism

GND mini: Bernt Out.

Manchester Green New Deal Podcast - Fri, 04/10/2020 - 00:00

We are once more asking for your.... well nothing. Our brother from another continent Bernie Sanders has suspended his presidential campaign. We decided to feel the Bern one last time.

You can watch Bernie's speech here:
https://youtu.be/TnRivUNrobA?t=1332

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Categories: A2. Green Unionism

"You've got to be social to be Socialist" Interview with Dr Lucy Burke

Manchester Green New Deal Podcast - Mon, 04/06/2020 - 04:00

We are all still in lock-down but the pod goes on! The results of the Labour leadership election are in, how will this affect the the Green New Deal? We are also joined by Dr Lucy Burke to discuss how critical care in the UK has been impacted by Covid-19, how people with disabilities have been affected by this crisis and the subsequent Government response.

We also discuss the short comings of the environmental movement and how it can be more inclusive of the disabled.

If you like the show tell your comrades!
Find us on all the socials
 Twitter:@MCRGND_POD
Insta: Manchestergndpod
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***LINKS***
Guidance from NICE (National Institute for Health and Care Excellence)

Critical care in Adults
https://www.nice.org.uk/guidance/ng159

Managing symptoms (Including at the end of life) in the community https://www.nice.org.uk/guidance/ng163/chapter/1-Communicating-with-patients-and-minimising-risk

Corona Virus Act legislation
http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2020/7/contents/enacted/data.htm

*Shout Outs*
Preswitch Village Green Co-op
https://www.village-greens-coop.co.uk/

Trees Not Cars
https://www.treesnotcars.com/

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Categories: A2. Green Unionism

"Fair judgement on potential a***holes" Covid-19 Crisis

Manchester Green New Deal Podcast - Thu, 03/26/2020 - 04:00

Covid-19 has taken the world by storm, with 20,000 deaths worldwide due to the virus. We sat down (at least 2 meters apart) to talk through this crisis. Discussing the governments response, the citizens response and how this is all going to play out down the line.

The UK is a wash with amazing acts of solidarity in this incredibly stressful time, here are some links for how you can help out others during the pandemic.

Acorn tenants Union- defending renters
https://acorntheunion.org.uk/corona/

Community support around Rochdale, Oldham and Tamside
https://www.actiontogether.org.uk/mutual-aid

Find some local help with this national table of volunteer groups
https://bit.ly/39lynJr

Here's how you can volunteer for the NHS
https://www.goodsamapp.org/

If you want to support the show leave us a review on Itunes or share the the podcast with your friends.

Support the show
Categories: A2. Green Unionism

"Fair judgement on potential a***holes" Covid-19 Crisis

Manchester Green New Deal Podcast - Thu, 03/26/2020 - 04:00

Covid-19 has taken the world by storm, with 20,000 deaths worldwide due to the virus. We sat down (at least 2 meters apart) to talk through this crisis. Discussing the governments response, the citizens response and how this is all going to play out down the line.

The UK is a wash with amazing acts of solidarity in this incredibly stressful time, here are some links for how you can help out others during the pandemic.

Acorn tenants Union- defending renters
https://acorntheunion.org.uk/corona/

Community support around Rochdale, Oldham and Tamside
https://www.actiontogether.org.uk/mutual-aid

Find some local help with this national table of volunteer groups
https://bit.ly/39lynJr

Here's how you can volunteer for the NHS
https://www.goodsamapp.org/

If you want to support the show leave us a review on Itunes or share the the podcast with your friends.

Support the show
Categories: A2. Green Unionism

"#Proper Trees" Getting the Green New Deal through labour conference.

Manchester Green New Deal Podcast - Sat, 03/07/2020 - 13:00

Our inaugural episode!

The dust has settled after the 2019 General Election and we face five more years of a climate denialist Conservative government. Yet, while locked out of power nationally, there are ways to take direction action locally and regionally to prevent climate catastrophe. But first, where did this all start?


 We sat down with Angie Brown to discuss how the Green New Deal made it through Labour Party conference.




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Categories: A2. Green Unionism

Avery Books: Report Back from MST Intensive in Sao Paolo

Grassroots Global Justice Alliance - Tue, 08/25/2015 - 21:58

This past spring I was part of a two person delegation of GGJ members to the first ever International English Language Course on Political Training for Political Educators outside of Sao Paolo, Brazil. The 6-week course was coordinated by the Landless Workers Movement (Movimento dos Trabalhadores Rurais Sem Terra [the MST]) at their national school for political education, Escola Nacional Florestan Fernandes (ENFF). I came as a representative of the Vermont Workers’ Center, and was among 60 participants from 47 organizations and 17 countries. Most organizations were members of La Via Campesina, an international organization primarily dedicated to the issues of peasant movements around the world and food sovereignty (GGJ is a member).  Organizations ranges from small farmer movements in Zimbabwe to organizations that work with adavasi (indigenous) movements in India to South African trade unionists to members of the Kurdish liberation struggle to a leftwing Mexican youth organization.

ENFF is the flagship school of the MST. Since their founding 31 years ago, the MST has been committed to political education (or formação in Portuguese). They have schools dedicated to political education in all 23 Brazilian states where they have a presence. ENFF was built 11 years with the volunteer labor of over 1,000 MST members and many other supporters of the movement. It is a gorgeous campus, populated with vibrant flowers, inspiring revolutionary murals made by each class that had passed through there, beautiful architecture, small plots of food productions, and a design that emphasized communal space (a small plaza in the middle of a cluster of dormitories, with benches and a gazebo; the courtyard where we held our daily misticas; the open verandas where we had cultural nights, celebrations, etc., on both stories of the building that held the kitchen, cafeteria, and a small store with MST products). There was also an incredible library that held thousands of books on various subjects, from the history of revolutionary struggles around the world to social theory to agroecology (mostly in Portuguese and Spanish). The MST leaders at the school described ENFF as the “patrimony of the international working class.”

The school was coordinated and “staffed” by a brigade of 40 MST members who took 4 month shifts to help run the logistics and programming of the school. Like all groupings in the MST, they had a name and slogan: “Apolônio de Carvalho,” named after an important Brazilian socialist. To facilitate the functioning of the school, all students were expected to do “militant work,” volunteer labor to support the day-to-day needs of the school community. I was on the coffee team that set up and cleaned up for the multiple coffee breaks through the “school day.” Other militant work ranged from the production team that helped produce and harvest the food grown on campus; a childcare team; a cultural team that helped plan the “cultural nights,” helped with the programming for the campus radio station; collective laundry; cleaning up after meals. Militant work is a central part of the pedagogy of the MST, partly around wanting to put intellectual labor alongside other forms of labor and also as part of creating new social relations, where labor is about meeting collective needs and is not performed because of coercion.

We had classes 6 days per week. Every day began with a 10-20 minute long “mistica,” planned by each of us in our small groups (“nucleos do base” [NB’s]) and by other NB. Mistica both describes a particular activity and a broader concept. The activity is usually a short “performance” that tells a particular story about a particular struggle, while projecting a vision of the future. I put “performance” in quotes because the MST is emphatic that it is not “theater,” but rather an expression of reality as we experience it. Mistica incorporates symbols, music, art, movement, “acting,” participation by “spectators.” One of the misticas my NB planned conveyed the intersection of patriarchy, dispossession, and capitalism. One of the ones that Daryl (the other GGJ representative) and his group prepared conveyed the patterns of state violence around the world and their link to imperialism.

Many MST movement elders attribute mistica as the primary reason they’re still in the movement. It’s spiritual and intellectual sustenance, and stretches minds and hearts in preparation for the activity of the day, Mistica also described the overall “spirit” or “expression” of a group of people, the outward expression of collective revolutionary spirit.

An MST member riding with me and another classmate to the airport at the end of the program commented that our class seemed to have a very beautiful mistica. There were songs that were our songs (some people brought from their movements, others that were brand new and composed spontaneously); chants that were ours; countless manifestations of a profound camaraderie formed through intense, emotional learning together, sharing and hearing each other’s stories, working together, traveling together during the intensive “field week,” celebrating together during various cultural nights and late night festivities.

The coursework itself was incredible. The MST sees left theory as a living body of theory, and draws heavily from the Marxist Leninist tradition. Some of the more interesting courses were on the history and development of imperialism, the reproduction of capital in agriculture, a great session on gender, political organization, and popular education. There was quite a lot of healthy debate on organizational form, the role of the state, the legacy of colonialism and the persistence of racism, the dynamics between the old hegemonic imperial nations and the newly industrializing “BRICS” countries that increasingly play out imperial relations on a more regional level.

I learned an incredible amount about social movements in Brazil and around the world. From the MST, we learned about their incredible dynamic relationship between organizational form, strategy, and tactics. Their process of land takeovers entailed setting up an incredibly cooperative mini-society of several hundred families, a “movement baptism” that created the conditions for embodying radical new forms of human relations. The MST doesn’t actually legally exist in Brazil, and many of the movements represented there were very suspicious of the growth of World Bank and foundation-funded Non-Governmental Organizations and Non Profit Organization (seeing with incredibly clarity the ways in which they coopt movements and movement leaders).

One of the profound lessons for me was on the meaning of true internationalism and solidarity. The MST is in a very challenging moment in Brazil’s political and economic history: the ruling Workers Party has betrayed many of its original principles to the whims of international finance capital; the right wing is mobilizing larger crowds than have been seen in decades. Yet, instead of turning inwards, they continue to launch programs like this training, have helped started countless other movements around the Brazil, and remain committed to the development of an international revolutionary social force. In fact, I believe that’s exactly what see as necessary in this context, rather than turning inwards.

It’s hard to some up any one main takeaway from that 6 weeks. I’m incredibly inspired to be personally connected 60 people fighting in inspiration liberation struggles around the world. I’m inspired by the deep and broad commitment to political education and leadership development. I’m deeply moved by the way in which the MST both fights for total social transformation while building the new social right now. And I’m so impressed with the many examples of the ways in which strategy flows from a profound and sharp assessment of the objective and subjective conditions during this phase of advanced capitalism.

Great Companies Needed

Freakonomics - Wed, 02/11/2015 - 10:06

My good friend and colleague John List has very ambitious summer plans.

We’ve both believed for a long time that the combination of creative economic thinking and randomized experiments has the potential to revolutionize business and the non-profit sector. John and I have worked to foment that revolution through both  academic partnerships with firms as well as a project of John’s called the Science of Philanthropy Initiative (SPI), whose mission is “evidence-based research on charitable giving.”

This summer, John is committed to taking that mission to a whole new level with the first annual University of Chicago Summer Institute on Field Experiments.  The idea is to bring together for one week top economists, business leaders, and NGOs with the goal of developing powerful, creative solutions to the toughest problems faced by firms, whether for-profit or not-for-profit.

In addition to lots of brainstorming and work focused on firms’ problems, there will be presentations by John, me, and other leading scholars. Knowing John, I’m sure there will also be plenty of after-hours activities.

Here’s how the website describes the sort of people we are looking for:

The Summer Institute is looking for practitioner partners who are open to new and bold ideas that will revolutionize the way they develop policy, do business, or provide charitable programming. Practitioner partners should be willing to work closely with researchers to field-test solutions, and must be willing to allow research publications to come from the partnership. We expect the Institute to serve as a catalyst for field-experiment research and strong researcher-practitioner partnerships.

So if you or someone you know might be a good candidate, please apply!  You can find the details on the Institute website.

We can’t wait to meet you and get started!

The post Great Companies Needed appeared first on Freakonomics.

Lend Your Voice to Freakonomics Radio

Freakonomics - Wed, 02/11/2015 - 07:13

We’re working on an episode about behavior change — essentially, how to get yourself to do the things you should be doing but often don’t. It revolves around the fascinating research of Katy Milkman at Penn. For example, she and her colleagues have noted a “Fresh Start Effect”:

The popularity of New Year’s resolutions suggests that people are more likely to tackle their goals immediately following salient temporal landmarks. … We propose that these landmarks demarcate the passage of time, creating many new mental accounting periods each year, which relegate past imperfections to a previous period, induce people to take a big-picture view of their lives, and thus motivate aspirational behaviors.

What we’re looking for are your examples of fresh starts — whether it’s a new timeframe, job, relationship, living situation, etc. — and how it may have motivated some aspirational behaviors of your own.

Use your iPhone, Android, or other recording device to make a short audio recording of your answer and e-mail the file to radio@freakonomics.com. Tell us your name, where you live,  what you do — and, most important, your Fresh Start story. We’ll pick through the best, weirdest examples and make them a part of our show. If you’re too shy to record your voice, give us a shout on Twitter, on our Facebook page, or in the comments below. But audio is what we’re really after.

Many thanks!

The post Lend Your Voice to Freakonomics Radio appeared first on Freakonomics.

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