#10 theses: Background
Ever since 2022, ECOLISE has been in conversation with members and partners during a consultation process around the 10 theses towards transformative community-led local development.
The aim of the #10 theses campaign is to:
- position community-led initiatives towards the European Green Deal,
- trigger deep conversations,
- strengthen our collective muscle for social imagination – and
- arrive at a shared policy position on transformative local development policies with communities at the heart.
So far, the #10theses process has attracted 30+ process partners and 400+ participants from 35 countries and 130+ organisations.
Deepening Phase: the idea
Between May-September 2023, ECOLISE completed the Deepening Phase, a structured consultation phase that aimed to dive deeper into a few of the 10 theses, exploring key political demands and arguments with a focus on the European Green Deal. The main outcomes of this process are outlined in the #10 theses manifesto, which will be published at ECOLISE´s Main Policy Event, taking place on November 7th, 2023 in cooperation with ICLEI & hosted by the European Economic and Social Committee EESC. The aim of this document is to target EU policies in order to strengthen community-led initiatives on local levels and harness their power to localise – and improve! – the European Green Deal.
Deepening Phase: the process
The deepening phase took place within overall 4 online zoom meetings (2 in June, 2 in September, each à 2 hours). The aim was to provide deep exchanges within a small and diverse working group at each meeting which will contribute to the outcome, the #10theses Manifesto. The Deepening phase calls where planned to answer key questions and invite deep conversations on specific issues:
First call: Support networks for community-led initiatives: Resourcing CLIs
#10theses in focus: Thesis 2: changed human-nature systems l Thesis 3: alternative economic systems as preconditions for transformative change l Thesis 10: support networks (incl. LEADER/ CLLD)
The questions posed were: What do we need resourcing for? How can alternative economic models be supported? How does resourcing need to be designed?
The call’s objective was to synthesise key policy asks on resourcing CLIs and developing alternative economic models.
You can find the call’s presentation here and the harvesting on the miro board here
Second call: Deep Democracy
#10theses in focus: theses 7 on Multi-Level Governance, inclusive governance and bioregions, localisation and collective action, and thesis 9 on participatory democracy, EU regulations that enable CLIs.
The question posed was: What are the key leverage points on EU levels of policy to realise transformative, community-led local development and thus localize the European Green Deal?
The call’s objective was to collect key policy demands on CLIs’ engagement with EU politics and policies, such as the European Green Deal as well as on establishing strong connections between local and European levels of governance, including binding local plans for socio-ecological transformation.
You can find the call’s presentation here and the harvesting on the miro board here
Third call: Key Narratives
#10theses in focus: Thesis 1,2,3: on the need for radical behaviour change, collective action, social change and changed worldviews, human-nature relationships in quest for transformative change, Thesis 8 on alternative concepts of development & the concept of “a good life” Theses 4,5,6 on the impact of CLI’s and their importance for society at large
The call’s objective was to collaboratively select key narratives that will frame the #10theses manifesto.
You can find the call’s presentation here & the harvesting on the miro board
Fourth call: Integrating workshop
The integrating workshop focused on the potential building blocks of the #10theses manifesto, concentrating 6 – 8 key ideas with supporting arguments which were already identified in the preceding 3 deepening calls. Both key policy asks and key narratives that were extracted from previous calls were assessed and evaluated, highlighting the priorities to be included in the manifesto.
You can find the call’s presentation here & the harvesting on the miro board
Science-Policy Board
The science-policy board accompanied the consultation phase, harvesting participants’ responses and giving inputs from an academic view. The board , characterised by its interdisciplinary nature and its strong research engagement at the interface of community-led initiatives and policy, contributed research input and assessed the outcomes of every call.
You can find the Science policy report on the deepening phase here and on the Narrative call here.
Editorial Board
ECOLISE members’ steering committee for the consultation process of the #10theses manifesto, the Editorial board, helped create a strong participation in the #10theses consultation process, acting as a sounding board for a creative exchange between ECOLISE members and external partners throughout the deepening phase (June – September 2023). The editorial board made contributions to the identification, formulation and integration of key arguments, political demands and messages which are discussed in the “deepening phase” of the consultation process.
Two editorial board meetings on 18 and 27 September were dedicated to consenting on the main messages of the #10theses manifesto 2023.
You can find the key narratives and policy asks in this Google Drive folder in jpeg or PDF format, and you can find the notes of these meetings here.
Deepening Phase: what’s next?
ECOLISE’s #advocate domain is currently concluding with the deepening phase of the #10theses and working on a #10theses Manifesto. The manifesto is planned to be published at ECOLISE’s main policy event on 7 November (hybrid/ Brussels) in order to launch a wider call for content partners, with the aim of building a strong alliance of partners for the ensuing #10theses advocacy campaign (targeting the elections for the European Parliament on 9 June 2024, running from 2023 – 2024).
Join the consultation
🌱Register here for ECOLISE’s Main policy event
Date: Tuesday 7 November 2023, 14:30 – 18:00 CET
Hybrid (online & at the EESC in Brussels, Belgium)
in cooperation with ICLEI – local governments for sustainability
hosted by the European Economic and Social Committee/ EESC
You can find more information on the “deepening phase” here and here (blog post on the process/ mid-term review in July)
