As with many countries, the United States has experienced swings of public and private operation of its water services for more than 150 years. Most water services in the country began as private enterprises in the 1800s but were municipalized from the late 19th century into the 1930s.
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CLTs are nonprofit organizations that acquire and steward land in a “trust” for the permanent benefit of low-income communities. This video explains what they can achieve.
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Resident-owned communities (ROCs)—manufactured housing neighborhoods in which the land is community-owned and managed–are one of the leading sources of affordable housing in the U.S. This video explains their benefits.
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A limited equity housing cooperative is a residential development owned and managed by a democratically governed, nonprofit cooperative corporation, such as a tenants’ union. This video show how they help keep housing affordable over the long term.
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In this video, Next System Project Co-chair Gar Alperovitz sketches the major institutions of a systemic alternative based in plural forms of democratic ownership, orientated around community at various scales—what he calls “The Pluralist Commonwealth.”
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As the nation’s housing crisis deepens during the COVID-19 pandemic, we urgently need new approaches and institutions that center permanent affordability, community ownership and control, and the long-term goal of decommodification.
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In facing up to the many profound crises of our time, we face a conundrum that has no easy resolution: how are we to imagine and build a radically different system while living within the constraints of an incumbent system that aggressively resists transformational change?
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