Gus Speth, 79, has been on the frontlines of environmental advocacy since the 1970s, and he saw, firsthand, much of the story he tells in his latest book, They Knew: The U.S. Federal Government’s Fifty-Year Role in Causing the Climate Crisis, which was published last month by the MIT Press. “My book

Carla Skandier, manager of the climate and energy program at the Democracy Collaborative, says groups like hers are now researching ways to end the cycle of harm through nationalizing segments of the fossil fuel industry. In the simplest terms, the process would involve the federal government buying

The resolution by Reps. Cori Bush and Jamaal Bowman shows how we can replace the privatized, fossil-fueled, and racist energy system that we live with today with a public and community-controlled energy system that is rooted in justice.

Building public renewables, the resolution text contends, could be a way to establish “high-road labor standards” in the clean energy sector rather than simply outsourcing contracts for wind and solar to largely non-union, third party developers, as is now common. “We could make clear decisions

NEWS RELEASE: The New York State Build Public Renewables Act would make the New York Power Authority a major developer of renewable energy in the state and a key consumer energy provider.

Public power campaigns are striking at the heart of the fossil-fueled energy system and taking on upholders of the status quo. A four-page pamphlet tells the story.

Some climate-focused investors say they have dumped shares of ExxonMobil as they purge fossil fuel companies from their portfolios. Others are staying with Exxon, hoping to reverse the course of the U.S. oil giant. A few years ago, The Democracy Collaborative’s Carla Skandier suggested a “51 Percent

Texas residents will be spending the next few months recovering from one of the country’s most catastrophic collisions of extreme weather and extreme hubris. Not only was the state hit by a massive polar vortex created by fossil-fueled climate change, but by a meltdown and near-collapse of an

Different parts of the U.S. are facing increasing damaging weather, and their infrastructure is vulnerable to different kinds of extreme weather. Each region, though, also has different strengths when it comes to generating power. There’s a way to bring all those assets together to boost energy

“To achieve a clean and just energy transition Congress must invest in communities that are most vulnerable to the climate emergency, experience the highest energy burden, and have had their energy shut off during the pandemic,” said Johanna Bozuwa, co-manager of the Climate and Energy Program at

We are rapidly approaching—if we haven’t already passed—climate tipping points with reinforcing feedback loops that would lead to an unrecognizable and terrifying world. Even if the climate crisis were somehow brought under control, our current growth-oriented economic juggernaut will bring us face

In a Jacobin piece, author Thomas Hanna lays out a brief history of nationalization in the U.S and asserts that democratizing industry is as American as apple pie. Beginning in World War I, with the nationalization of arms manufacturers and telephone and railroad companies, public ownership of

“[T]here is a growing consensus that the institutional framework that underpins the Green New Deal must be democratic. Common Wealth has argued for the creation of a Green New Deal commission that could bring together ‘communities at the sharp end of environmental and industrial change as well as

We cannot return to business as usual and we must resist at all costs a doubling down on neoliberalism that has pushed us beyond ecological limits and led us down a path of wealth extraction, inequality, poverty and precariousness. The on-the-ground solutions and experiments around bold alternatives

With so many firms already begging for bailouts, governments could simply demand equity in exchange for aid, making full use of the powers that the Obama administration wilfully abandoned when it bailed out the auto industry in 2009. Especially for the US, even buying up a 51% stake in the country’s

“The Federal Reserve is the country’s central banking system, and it has “not only the responsibility but the tools to turn climate action into reality,” Carla Skandier, co-manager of the climate and energy program of the Next System Project, said. […] [Skandier] noted that the government has

The Healthcare Anchor Network (HAN) convened the “Anchoring Resilience: Aligning Supply Chains and Impact Purchasing for Community Health” summit to spark collaboration in the healthcare sector around onshoring and localizing production of PPE and other supplies, with an emphasis on equity, sustainability, and supply chain resilience.

Biden’s list of policies is gargantuan compared to the time he’ll have for actual policymaking on day one. But environmental advocates and clean-energy boosters don’t expect a Biden administration to shunt energy and climate issues to the sidelines, even in a pandemic. “I don’t think climate can be

“As we plan for a process of rebuilding our society and restarting our economies post-COVID-19, we must try to make this the starting point for a profound transformation of our economic system to one that—by design—fosters community, democracy, sustainability, health and wellbeing. The actions we

Dawson suggests something like the strategy outlined the Democracy Collaborative for bringing the oil and gas sector into public ownership. Governments would prepare the way for socialisation by undermining the sector’s market value through the removal of the subsidies it currently receives, and

Hospitals are often major employers, and they command large budgets for services such as catering and laundry. But too often, that spending benefits national corporations rather than the hospital’s neighbors. In the depths of the Great Recession, The Democracy Collaborative co-founder Ted Howard set

“Moving forward on Scotland’s path to recovery will prove challenging and require bold action, as we navigate this multitude of intertwined crises. Out of this crisis, a new economic vision is needed to build a more equitable, sustainable, and democratic system. As the Scottish Government prepares

Johanna Bozuwa, co-manager of the climate and energy program at The Democracy Collaborative, discussed the recent leak of the DNC platform on climate with Dharna Noor. “It is good to see commitments from the DNC platform to unionized jobs, investment in public and affordable housing, and commitments

The Democracy Collaborative’s Johanna Bozuwa and Thomas Hanna write about how the Global Green New Deal could herald a new era of international cooperation to curb the climate crisis. Last September, 6 million people joined youth-led climate protests all around the world, from New Zealand to

Five policy proposals to tackle an extractive economy.

Across the world, communities have initiated campaigns to shift from investor-owned utilities to publicly owned and operated utilities, increasingly taking on the perspective and language of energy democracy.

The challenge of mounting an adequate response to climate change has to be understood within the context of the larger systemic crisis facing the United States. The 1972 Limits to Growth, published when environmental movements were forming in this country, emphatically explained that our economic

When the Global Climate Action Summit convenes in San Francisco on September 12, 2018, one goal will be to affirm that the world beyond the Trumpian miasma is “still in” the Paris Accords. But the Summit seeks also to “demonstrate that stronger commitments are necessary, desirable and achievable.”

Energy democracy—a new idea from the ranks of community organizers, labor, and renewable energy advocates who see our current energy system as broken and destructive—seeks to take on the political and economic change needed to tackle the energy transition holistically.

The United States can wield its sovereign monetary power to shift majority control of fossil fuel reserves away from profit-driven, short-minded shareholders to the public interest.

For over forty years we have known that avoiding disastrous climate change requires breaking fossil fuels’ hold on our economy and way of life. Yet, throughout all that time, debate, negotiations, and actions have fallen short in triggering, never mind managing, an energy transition. At this pivotal

Ted Howard’s remarks to the Environmental Funders Network in Cambridge, England, on February 2nd, 2018. These prepared remarks have been lightly edited for publication. Good afternoon. I want to begin by thanking the conference organizers for extending an invitation to address you during your

Systemic Crisis and Systemic Change in the United States in the 21st Century This new working paper from The Next System Project was prepared as an invited contribution to the “After Fossil Fuels: The New Economy” conference taking place in Oberlin, Ohio from October 6-8, 2016. In the paper, Next

“In all likelihood there will be well over 400 million people living in the United States in 2050, and possibly as many as one billion people by the year 2100. Where will those people live? And how can a nation of that size live in a sustainable manner, given that the United States already has a