1 Apr 1998

Roots, Roots, Roots for the Home Team: Community-Owned Professional Sports

by | Date: 1 Apr 1998 | posted in: From the Desk of David Morris, governance, The Public Good | 0 Facebooktwitterredditmail

Community ownership of professional sports teams is an idea with decades of successful experience. The Green Bay Packers have been operating as a nonprofit corporation since 1923, during which time they have won three world championships and three Super Bowls, and have recently financed two stadium upgrades from retained earnings. Their ownership structure has generated unprecedented fan support while maintaining the fiscal discipline exhibited by corporations.  This report by David Morris and Daniel Kraker takes a closer look at the issues surrounding community owned sports. … Read More
1 Feb 1995

Lincoln Should Have Allowed the South to Secede

by | Date: 1 Feb 1995 | posted in: From the Desk of David Morris, governance, The Public Good | 0 Facebooktwitterredditmail

This time of the year we used to celebrate Abraham Lincoln’s birthday. Too bad we no longer do so. For this would be an excellent historical moment to reflect on whether Lincoln’s decision to keep the country intact was right. Personally, I think he made an enormous blunder.

Few would support Lincoln’s decision if he were making it today. Few Americans support Russia’s current war against its secessionist states. No one believes Ottawa has the right to send the Canadian army in to stop Quebec from seceding.

… Read More
5 Nov 1992

The Mondragon System: Cooperation at Work

by | Date: 5 Nov 1992 | posted in: From the Desk of David Morris, governance, The Public Good | 0 Facebooktwitterredditmail

This 1992 report by David Morris is a review of the Mondragon Cooperative in Spain. The report examines cooperative structure, management, education, finance, and banking.

The Mondragon Cooperative Corporation is a 35 year old experiment in building a comprehensive cooperative society in which labor plays the primary and dominant role. The Cooperative Group has amassed technical, managerial and financial resources comparable to those of a major corporation and used those resources to further social as well as economic goals that emphasize the importance of community and small and medium scale enterprise.

… Read More
1 Apr 1982

The New City-States

by | Date: 1 Apr 1982 | posted in: Energy, environment, From the Desk of David Morris, governance, The Public Good | 0 Facebooktwitterredditmail

"From the hills of Seattle to the flatlands of Davis, from the industrial city of Hartford to the universty town of Madison, cities are beginning to redefine their role in our society," begins this important essay.  For Morris the new role should should include inducing the widest distribution of productive capacity.  New technologies make possible a more self-conscious and organic city. Local self-reliance becomes a strategy that embraces economic, environmental, and political goals. Morris argues that we have had far too much government and far too little governance.  Government is bureaucratic. Governance is democratic.  Communities can design their future. The new city-state emerge.  … Read More

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