Day 3 - Plenary Panel on Democratic Public Ownership (English)

Democratic public ownership, community collaborations and reimagining the role of government Counter narratives to the evolving forces of neoliberalism and authoritarianism require imagining, proposing and developing new forms of public ownership and accountability, opening the door towards worker and resident participation and community-led initiatives and innovation within local, regional, and national governments. We need to question and transform the role of “the State” by organising for local to internationalist mass movements that call for democratic and participatory governments that genuinely share and co-create wealth and economic decisionmaking powers with working people and other rights-holders. At the same time, we need to fight both privatisation and growing repression and authoritarianism by strengthening and expanding public services as well as by building equitable public-community, public-public, and public-worker collaborations to ensure that all public services, enterprises, and assets are owned, organised and governed in the most democratic fashion. What have we learned about democratic public ownership and services since 2019, especially with regards to the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic? What can we learn from (Chilean and other) history as well as contemporary experiences with regards to democratising public ownership and services? What is the current status of key examples and cases from around the world? Which new or ongoing challenges should we be ready for? How can we force governments to share decision-making powers with communities and working people to jointly own, control and govern public services, assets and enterprises? What experiences of democratic public ownership (including public-community, public-public, and public-worker collaborations) are challenging neoliberal paradigms? Are there any new / exciting practices and proposals that have not received much attention so far? Keynote speakers: - Aderonke Ige, Associate Director, Corporate Accountability & Public Participation Africa - Anita Gurumurthy, Executive Director, IT for Change - Javier Marquez, Corporation Penca de Sábil - Alexander Panez Pinto, Assistant Professor at the University of Bio-Bio in Chile