Michel Bauwens

Founder of the P2P Foundation (founded 2005) and one of the most influential theorists of the commons economy. Over three decades, he has mapped and supported communities around the globe that use peer-to-peer networks to create and share value collectively. Author of several landmark works on commons and peer production, and writes a newsletter called The Fourth Generation Civilization.

Bauwens introduces the concept of the “procession of the commons” — the historical cycle in which strong states and markets weaken commons-based solidarity, while periods of state decline revive the need for direct mutual aid. He proposes three geopolitical models shaping the future: the Western WEF model (multi-stakeholder without popular sovereignty), the BRICS civilizational-state model (popular sovereignty but authoritarian), and a third way — the “archipelago of regenerative villages” — grounded in cosmo-localism and translocal solidarity networks.

He introduces the concept of the “cosmo-local financing facility” — attracting floating capital toward regenerative community investment — and argues that entanglement (shared capital, shared identity, and mutual mobility) is the mechanism by which commons communities can build durable transnational networks. He believes blockchain has functioned, paradoxically, as a binding ideology for networked communities even when its technical implementations are imperfect.

Appears in: Ep 3: Culture, Coordination, and Trust