A commons may need state protection because within a a capital-driven culture and society commons are vulnerable to enclosure and cooptation by market forces. By providing a sense of security to commoners - commons have a right to be in the first place - through a legal backup, state law can protect commoners, commoning and vernacular law. This encourages people to invest their energies in complex, mid-term processes. However, protecting and guaranteeing the right to self-organization may require new types of law that go beyond conventional law for property, contracts, organizations and procedures.
specific functions
# Protect commoners and decriminalize non-violent resistance to enclosures ... through legal standing for communities; EXAMPLE: [DB: Not sure what you have in mind, Silke -> just took it from what was there! but to me, honestly, it is not necessary, bc if the state does all the rest, commoners will automatically be "decriminalized" -> DELETE!)] # Privilege sharing and cooperation ... as in in seed-sharing or software code also through using them in public institutions. [DB: ??? -> What is your question? If you use free software in all public schools instead of microsoft-software you bring "free software skills" into being and this will make free software thrive. Just an example] Using means protecting. ADD AN EXAMPLE/ CONCRETE MEASURE INSTEAD OF GENERAL STATEMENT. This will shrink the scope of copyright, patents and trademarks. In general: a new balance between collective rights of action against private property and investor rights needs to be found.
# Co-develop new types of organizational structures ... with commoners. All sorts of organizations, networks and platform that foster cooperation and the federation of commons. Examples: platform cooperatives or open cooperatives, stakeholder trusts such as the Alaska Permanent Fund, digital guilds such as Enspiral, digital autonomous organizations, DAOs - ADD MORE. DB: This list is a muddle of incommensurate TYPES of commons, some of which are entirely self-organized, some of which require serious state action or authorization. Unclear who the key actor is in co-developing these new forms -- the state? SH: list taken from your initial proposal :-). So - if its new forms, it#s all sorts of new forms, as we need experimentation, right? And why would we need to state who is the "key"actor in co-development?
# Elaborate new modes of law Namely, legal foundations that recognize custom, vernacular practices and indigenous commons; Examples: ejidos or comunidades agrarias in Mexico, THERE ARE QUITE A FEW I GUESS;ALREADY EXISTING; WE SHOULD HAVE A LOOK AT INDIA; GREAT LAKE REGION; LATINAMERICA
# others
to be discussed :
- deleted "value-accounting networks such as Sensorica" because I cannot see a new legal form here, it is a network of enterprises - a and b belong together "decriminalize and protect" - I haven't found an argument so far, where "smart contracts" might be useful for the commons; to me it seems to be the blind trust in "no need for human negotiation anymore; algorithm will do the job for us) -the mindset of these "smart contract" adepts is so very anarchocapitalist or even neoliberal. DB: While tech libertarians, etc. may be the driving force behind many "smart contract" systems, their applications are potentially far broader and cooperative. Just as written law is an instrument for expanding the way that law can function and be enforced, so "smart contracts" could be used by co-operative communities to "encode" in digital form their shared agreements, and then have their computing systems automatically enact them. Ditto for the blockchain, which has potential cooperative applications. - this was part of d) - but I think it belongs somewhere else - my problem with e) is that "coastal fishery commons" is not a "form of governance", it's a realm of commons. I guess: the idea you describe here rather belongs to the intro of the whole "state functions" issue - I've put it there; and yes, we need to answer the question: Interesting point of discussion.