I’ve written about the Radical Agora in earlier posts and here I explore the idea in more depth.
The Radical Agora brings together the strands in this blog; community development, marketing and online presence.
I’ve been a community development worker for over thirty years. Apparently, the word community had over 150 definitions in the 1980s and whatever the number is now, it means our understanding of community is contested. In particular, the local economy rarely figures in assessments of what counts as community.
Agora is Greek for marketplace and I use it because neo-liberals have hijacked the word marketplace. They speak of the marketplace as something in the ether and they use it of transactions between corporations. Let’s dwell on this for a moment and try to understand what’s at stake.
The thing that distinguishes corporations from local businesses is ownership. Corporations belong to shareholders. This means their owners do not run the business. They appoint directors who usually employ a Chief Executive. Their sole task is to increase the value of investments for their shareholders. Profits go to shareholders and often they are tied up in stored wealth.
This is important because this model of ownership has become normative. The idea that the sole purpose of business is to generate profit does not allow businesses to have other purposes. Any business person who simply wants to make a living and would plough profit into some benefit for the community will be either suspected of being a secret grasping capitalist or, if they do live up to their declared intentions, they’re not a serious player.
Local businesses may have a variety of ownership models and their transactions are likely to support other local businesses. A greater proportion of their income is likely to be invested in staff. Paradoxically their small-scale brings greater benefit to the community than profit-generating corporations
I’m using Agora to distinguish between the marketplace based on transactions between bureaucrats that enrich the already rich and powerful and the traditional understanding of marketplace as primarily a place where community develops through financial and other transactions.
The word Radical derives is from radix that means roots. The roots of the marketplace agora are in community, in building relationships. The Radical Agora grows primarily through building relationships.
If the Radical Agora is funded through the local economy, it is sustainable.
Spirituality is important because it describes our presence in the marketplace. We are not there primarily as consumers but as participants in a specific community.
The marketplace provides space in which unstructured encounters can lead to relationships. It draws people in for all sorts of reasons and they make purchases as they go about their activities.
We all need to be present in these spaces for the benefit of all, assuming these spaces exist. To take part is not solely about financial transactions, although financial transactions are an important way of being present. All activities have an economic dimension and as they draw people into participation in the Agora, they build community and support its infrastructure.
We have been careless about what makes our communities live. We have allowed outsiders to invade and take away community in the name of consumerism. We are compelled to visit leisure centres full of shops on the outskirts of our cities, making purchases that mainly benefit those who own the centres and shops.
The challenge is how to re-build our communities. That will be the next theme after the Christmas break!