NEWSLETTER The Planetocracy Cometh, So Wear Your White Hats

Also: Impact Investing Against Democracy; Sub-Saharan Local Covenant; Cat-Mayor-Martyr

Welcome to the monthly newsletter of Democracy Local, a planetary publication of stories, ideas, data, scholarship, and events about everyday people governing themselves.

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ARE YOU READY FOR PLANETOCRACY?

Is it time for the planetocracy?

Writing at Moth (More than Human Life, at New York University Law School), Frederik Hanusch, a professor of planetary change and politics at Justus Liebig University Glessen, makes the case for a new style of democracy in which people don’t govern the planet.

Instead they govern with the planet, and its flows, forces, and living things.

Hanusch describes “a reimagined democracy accountable to human publics and responsive to planetary agencies. Planetocracy is not about extending rights to every stone or satellite but instead prioritizes cultivating the institutional capacity to interpret signals of planetary agencies and act on them to preserve freedom and shared flourishing with a dynamic Earth.”

What’s your vision of planetocracy? And how does it include the local? Democracy Local would love to read and publish your ideas—please send to joe@democracylocal.com

THE WHITE HATS

Mayors have long been targets of those who wish to subject people through fear. And assassinations of mayors in Mexico have been all too common.

But the assassination of Mayor Carlos Manzo of Urupuan, a city in Michoacan, could change that.

Manzo was an outspoken challenger to cartel control and violence. He also was well-known for wearing white, wide-brimmed sombreros. After he was killed at a Day of the Day celebration on November 1, people from his community and around the region took to the streets, wearing white sombreros.

Within days, the protests went national. Manzo had challenged Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum to do more to protect his constituents, especially avocado growers in Urupuan being extorted by cartels. So, in Mexico City, protestors in white hats went to the Zócalo, in front of the presidential palace, to demand action.

“We Are All Carlos Manzo,” their banners read.

In these times, local officials need security support—or even better, the money and authority to provide security for their communities themselves. Here’s hoping these protests grow, and go international.

It’s a good sign that impunity has not prevailed in this case. A man with ties to the Jalisco New Generation Cartel was arrested last month in Manzo’s assassination.

Long Live Carlos Manzo! Long Live the White Hats!

WARNING: IMPACT INVESTING IS ANTI-DEMOCRATIC

The Solonian Democracy Institute, a global leader in evaluating democratic processes and software, takes on impact investing.

In its newsletter, the institute writes:

Impact investing describes a new type of philanthropy that differs widely from conventional ideas of giving. Impact investors are typically extremely wealthy individuals who make targeted investments in both for-profit and non-profit enterprises with the explicit goal of forcing societal change by starving 'undesirable' activities of capital, while simultaneously providing 'desirable' activities with unrealistic levels of capital that could never be raised on the open market.

This profoundly anti-democratic approach has caused a severe skewing or market distortion, not just of the economy, but also of 'civil society'. By our estimates, ca. 80% of NGOs overall and 95% of NGOs cited in media are funded by 'impact investors'. These organizations often lack member support and are largely staffed by employees.

NGOs, thinktanks and 'experts' in the area of democracy are no exception to this rule, and this has had a disruptive impact on our work (much as impact investors promised it would). The chief root of this disruption has been the fact that funding for many democracy organizations comes almost exclusively from sources that themselves take extreme stances on partisan politics (often American), with funders often also donating to political parties.

At SDI, we are therefore changing our criteria for judging software to reflect whether or not it truly supports democracy or is merely a cover for the imposition of pre-decided outcomes.

MILESTONES

The Covenant of Mayors in Sub-Saharan Africa has just signed up its 400 local governments across 41 countries. The 400^th signatory is Brazzaville, the first city from the Republic of the Congo to sign on. The covenant is focused on “unlocking” finance for climate projects thin these cities, and around the planet.

EASY LISTENING

Democracy Next leader Claudia Chwalisz and author David Van Reybrouck “discuss how we might move from an age of enlightenment to an age of entanglement - one that recognises our deep interdependence with the planet.” Listen here.

How to reclaim democracy in the U.S. Daniel Hunter, director of Choose Democracy and a scholar of authoritarianism and resistance, explains here.

LOCAL SNAPSHOTS

In our regular feature, we capture brief excerpts of interviews and talks with local officials and engaged residents from all over the world, including::

Olena Sydorenko, mayor of Orzhytsia, Ukraine, in the Poltava region, on how war makes local openness essential.

Quezon City, Philippines Mayor Joy Belmonte on how participation at the smallest unit of local government—the barangay—can help check corruption..

Tehran Mayor Alireza Zakani on how local participation and democracy can help his city escape a water crisis.

WHERE IN THE WORLD IS BRUNO KAUFMANN?

The globe-trotting Democracy Local contributor and Swiss Broadcasting global democracy correspondent checked in from Gothenburg, Basel, and Moshupa Village, Botswana.

WATCHING

Democracy Local joined Democracy International’s event on big city struggles with democracy. With reports from Lagos, Los Angeles, Mexico City, Bangalore, and Chennai.

The University of Canberra Center for Deliberative Democracy and Global Governance has an excellent conversation on how non-humans have political agency.

PHOTO GALLERIES

Photos from Tijuana, Mexico, of the places whre migrants live now that the U.S. has effectively closed the border.

Photos from the Asia Democracy Network gathering in Thailand this fall.

DEAD CAT-MAYOR CALLS FOR LOCAL AI GOVERNANCE

Writing from Cat Heaven (where all the milk is creamy and all the mice are slow), San Francisco’s “Mayor of 16^thStreet,” the brown tabby known as KitKat, discusses the local democratic lessons of his being killed by a Waymo robotaxi. (Cat was assisted with his piece by Joe Mathews)

ASIA DEMOCRACY CHRONICLES

Our friends at Asia Democracy Chronicles published more outstanding journalism on local democracy, with reports about a classh between geothermal energy and the people of Flores Island, Indonesia, and the struggles of fishing nomads who live and work in and around the coastal village of Lahathat, Bangladesh.

READINGS

Nicolas Berggruen on Universal Basic Capital.

Clip and save the Participation Playbook, highly useful for anyone trying to bring more democracy into schools.

People in Chennai, India, have a plan for more power and agency for local communities.

Top 5 takeaways from the SmartCitiesWorld Climate Action Summit.

When strangers had dinner with their mayor.

Belgrade finally gets its subway.

Islands of integrity? How to stop local corruption, Uzbekistan style.

German municipalities are in fiscal trouble, with bankruptcy on the horizon. Here’s why.

WE WIN!

The Democracy Local family congratulates our hosts Democracy International, and Caroline Vernaillen, for winning a worldwide award for civic engagement for its Global Forum on Modern Direct Democracy.

EVENTS