Social movements
Socialization needs a movement to carry it
Questions of ownership are decided where people organize. Whether it is rent madness, the nursing crisis or climate catastrophe: behind the conflicts of the 21st century there is always the question of who owns the economy — and who gets to decide about it.
That is why communia has worked with social movements, trade unions, researchers and politicians from the very beginning. We create moments that connect a movement — conferences, camps, workshops — and bring to them what campaigns need: concept development, legal groundwork, strategic advice.
Out of this area of work came the two socialization conferences, the programme at the System Change Camp, and years of cooperation with campaigns such as RWE & Co enteignen, Deutsche Wohnen & Co enteignen and many more.
Conferences, camps and advice
Socialization Conference 2022
7–9 October 2022, TU Berlin. Under the motto “Socialization: strategies for a democratic economy”, almost 1,500 participants and more than 100 speakers came together — activists, researchers, trade unionists and politicians. Organized by a large, entirely voluntary team. The conference was the starting shot for a whole ecosystem of initiatives that pose the question of ownership anew.
Let’s Socialize! 2024
15–17 March 2024, Werbellinsee. The second conference was aimed specifically at pioneers of practice. In the energy, agriculture, care work and mobility sectors, participants jointly developed project ideas and campaigns. The ambition: to carry the debate about socialization from the panels onto the streets and into the workplaces.
System Change Camp 2025
At this activist summer camp, communia ran a week-long programme in which selected initiatives spent an intensive working week developing strategies and expertise together — from analysing their own campaign through to concrete next steps.
Advising campaigns and movements
Since 2019 communia has worked closely with various political campaigns, supporting them with concept development and legal groundwork. Beyond that we advise social movements on water, Big Tech and the mobility transition, and we are widely connected across these and other fields.
Teaching
At the Hochschule für Gesellschaftsgestaltung in Koblenz we have taught regular courses for bachelor’s and master’s students on economics, power and politics, and on public luxury and democratic public services. At the centre of the seminar is the question that textbook economics systematically leaves out: what are the sources of economic power — and what role does ownership play in it?