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Beste mensen,

Met deze nieuwsbrief informeren we jullie maandelijks over alle activiteiten die onlangs hebben plaatsgevonden in het kader van Economy for the Common Good (ECG) of in de nabije toekomst nog gaan plaatsvinden. De nieuwsbrief is bedoeld voor iedereen die direct of indirect betrokken is bij ECG in Nederland.

Met de Blik werpen we een blik op het ECG-proces, dat wil zeggen op bottom-up initiatieven van de ECG-beweging in Nederland en op de faciliteringsprocessen van de Nederlandse ECG-vereniging. Daarnaast belichten we verwante ontwikkelingen die in dienst staan van de transitie naar een nieuwe economie.

(>>>). 

Mede namens het bestuur van ECG Nederland wensen wij jullie veel leesplezier!

Fernando Suárez Müller & Evelyn Boksebeld

Felber & Bauwens in Pakhuis de Zwijger

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Het programma is nog druk in de maak, dus meer informatie volgt spoedig, maar de avond zal zich richten op de democratisering van onze economie, en in het bijzonder op de buurbudget pilots die nu in Amsterdam uitgevoerd worden. Naast Christian sluit daar hopelijk ook Michel Bauwens, Rutger Groot Wassink en Najah Aouaki bij aan.. Het programma is van 20-22 uur, vooraf is ook een diner vanaf 18:15u. 

ECG-consultancy Training in Londen

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Felber bij de Gemeente Amsterdam

Yes, Christian has an event confirmed for March 3rd (14:00-18:00) at the Royal Academy of Science in Amsterdam. He has been invited by Ellen Oetelmans. 

Findings Common Good Balance from pioneer company

We (the local ECG chapter Ware Winst Brabant in The Netherlands) are working with four pioneer companies in our area to create a Common Good Balance for each of them and put these to peer review on a stakeholder-by-stakeholder basis. The agreed stakeholder order is C-D-B-A-E.

The overall process is that the companies work their own way through the documentation provided by ECG and prepare the input for the review. The plan is to have the four Common Good Balances ready early 2020. The local chapter is there to assist, coordinate, translate to Dutch as far as necessary, to act as an intermediary with ECG. One of us has taken the consultancy training. Whether or not companies wish to put forward their balance for an audit and request a certificate is up to each of them, to be decided later.

Now one of the companies has presented a set of findings with regard to the process and the structure and content of the Common Good Balance. We would like to put that forward for discussion with relevant ECG bodies.

Positioning of the company

The company’s main process is to refurbish electronic equipment, on a contract basis for other companies. Thereby extending product life cycles, and lowering carbon foot print, lowering waste and use less scarce materials. The company structurally employs personnel with a “distance to the labor market”. The company classifies as a “social enterprise” and would hope to be rewarded for their sustainable approach by better conditions for capital and tenders.

Expectation of Economy for the Common Good

For sake of business continuity, it would be welcomed if a convincing assessment of their contribution to the common good would give them some of the predicted future advantages already now.

For instance, banks still require payback time of 3 to 5 years, whereas for this type of business a payback time in the order of 5 to 15 years would be more realistic.

Input from the company

Here are two pieces of input from the company to start with:

After first peer review session:

“Great meeting yesterday, good to exchange the experiences within the companies.

There is still some light between the design of a theoretical model and the practical implementation.

Good to pay attention to this from a Dutch perspective.”

In preparation for the second peer review session:

“We have gone through stakeholder D.

However, we see that the questions and assessment via the Compact Balance Calculator are lagging behind developments. In particular in relation to sustainability / Sustainable Development Goals / Social Enterprises etc.

The instrument is in line with companies that have yet to make the transition from a linear to a circular economy.

We have already realized this transition.

We are already PSO 30+ certified, are a social entrepreneur and affiliated with Social Enterprise NL and registered with Social Buy.

In addition, we consider including ourselves as a next step in the register of social enterprises in NL.

Including an assessment and in combination with the new bill with benefits for the new legal entity BV-M.

That does not mean that we already do everything perfectly. But we have a very different approach route than an average company.

We will complete the compact balance to get a good insight into the instrument. However, it only has added value for us with the findings of fellow companies.

In addition, we are facing considerable time problems for the coming period in connection with the preparation of opening new branches first in Utrecht and then in Amsterdam.”

Meeting for clarification

After receiving this input, we decided to organize a meeting where the company could further elaborate on their findings and we as a local chapter could ask questions and give feedback. This was a fruitful meeting with good exchange of information. The following chapters summarize the conclusions.

The content and structure of the Common Good Balance

One statement made by the company was: “The philosophy behind ECG is fine, but the implementation and the conceived instrument are not well applicable for frontrunners in the circular economy.”.

But what does that mean? Can we somehow change “the instrument” to protect “the philosophy”?

Much was said about the fact that compulsory indicators seem to be inappropriate for this type of business (circular, social) and seem to be better fit for a traditional linear industry where a product or service is created from basic input and sold to the public.

Here are some examples where specifically this company doesn’t feel done justice.

• The Common Good Balance asks for money and hours spent on marketing, for example through advertising investments. This circular company does not work like this. This makes it very difficult for leaders in the circular economy to fill the balance and get satisfactory results.
• Not asked: how much carbon reduction is being realized? A good question would be: how high does the company score on the Ladder of Lansink.
• You only reach a higher step for stakeholder “staff” if you make fruit baskets available. The company does not do that, but it does provide coaching on mental and physical well-being.
• There are also no questions about the number of employees with a disability, but it is a strategic objective of this company to employ people with “distance to the labor market”.

The result is disappointment about the level of reward for the true and intuitive contribution to the common good by this business. How flexible is the Common Good Balance in this sense? Can new indicators be added, and by whom?

The current model is structured such that if there is no (sufficient) achievement on a particular sub-question, then other related achievements are not taken into account at all. This seems unfair and does not do justice to the real achievements.

Missing connection with other standards and evaluation models

A major problem is that insufficient connection is sought with other internationally recognized norms and values, which in turn creates a new / different conceptual framework.

It would be good to seek a direct link with the Sustainable Development Goals and the universal human and child rights by the UN and international treaties respectively.

These standards would therefore be directly reflected in the mandatory questions of the Common Good Balance.

The scores in the Common Good Balance should be adjusted to that, to as to arrive at a uniform set of norms, values ​​and concepts.

For example, the various legal, financial, environmental and social criteria must be brought into balance with each other and about which a company is fully accountable to the environment / community. Instead of now mostly purely on financial grounds.

Flexibility re. type of business

Also is there a difference in appreciation between small and large companies, where multinationals seem to have much more options than SMEs.

Legitimacy of Common Good Balance

Another remark was about the legitimacy of the requirements of the common good balance.  The assumption is that these represent the norms and values of the sovereign people, emerging from a democratic assessment. But for that to be valid world-wide, this would require a statistically much larger number of people and than currently involved. And apart from that, this set of requirements will not be cast in stone, but evolve, so it has to be regularly or continuously adopted. The question is whether ECG is in a position and has the resources required to execute such a complex process?

About the process to build a Common Good Balance

Looking at the intended ECG processes, there was the feeling that maybe the company was skipping important steps, going straight to indicators, scores, the calculator, and taking ECG as yet another reporting tool. Thereby potentially missing the opportunity to internalize the “good philosophy” into the company’s DNA and to use it to feed the business strategic development.

To clarify the intended processes, we found this in the ECG provided report template:

“A Common Good Report consists of meaningful descriptions for each theme, which should be written in complete sentences. These descriptions should be clear and comprehensible to the target audience, the interested members of the public. The company can decide for themselves what information and how much detail to include.

For a report to be audited, the company should provide answers to the Questions for compiling the report, and the Compulsory indicators.”

The company doesn’t find it an attractive idea to start writing such a story. For whom to read? In fact, they already have gone through this process and have formulated a publicly shared mission statement to this end. The opinion is that this is already known and well documented, so it doesn't help to write it out once again.

Will stakeholders be willing to listen and take the time to digest the significance of the same content in yet another format?

A condition for create a Common Good Balance is full transparency and objectifiable full and correct provision of knowledge and information by the companies and the auditors.

It is important to develop an instrument that, in addition to a verbal explanation, also has an honest and logical valuation proportional to the social return of the company.

The promises of ECG are that overall contribution to the common good can be simply captured in a single number (max 1000), or at least a simple matrix of numbers, so it can be easily communicated to drive favorable decisions of stakeholders.

About the peer review

A comment about the peer review approach is that this is only useful for real peers, so from the same type of business, to prevent a comparison between apples and pears. Peers should be of the same type (linear versus circular), from the same sector of industry, and have comparable size.

Overall conclusion

A good instrument has added value and does not become a paper tiger or a capital and energy-consuming exercise.

Training ECG-consultancy

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Kick-Off Planet Finance bij NBA

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Kick-Off Planet Finance bij NBA

Verslag 18 januari, LSA, op de website van LSA.

PPT Workshop Ware Winst Brabant en van mijzelf op de website.

https://www.lsabewoners.nl/event/bewoners-werken-samen-aan-een-duurzame-wereld/

Groet!

Elly

Elly Rijnierse

Spelavond ECG? in Utrecht

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Netwerkopbouw ECG-Utrecht

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Heb jij nog gesproken met onze nestor, Harry Kunneman (gloria claret)? Ik ben benieuwd naar zijn bevindingen en zijn ideeën betreffende OTRA. Hoe staat het met het organiseren van het symposium, met GI en ECG? Heb je al plannen? Hulp nodig? Ik ben zeer geïnteresseerd geraakt in jullie methodiek. Ik moet nog héééél veel leren maar deze oprechte leek is benieuwd naar de mogelijkheden. Mocht je nog tijd hebben, loop maar binnen bij 0.14 (Ma. Di. Vrij, ochtend) of de receptie (Woe. Do.). Grote kans dat je Monique ook ontmoet.

International Ontwikkelingen

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Bedrijven

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ECG conferentie

Bijgaand is een voorstel dat ik in Bremen heb gedaan, waar ik gelijk steun voor kreeg bij Professor Günter Koch.

Ik heb het ook nog even netjes uitgewerkt. Beide documenten staan voor hetzelfde.

De aanleiding:

Anna Deparnay – Grunenberg van het Europees Parlement was aanwezig. Zij liet weten dat Ursula von der Leyen, voorzitter van de Europese Commissie een proces in gang zal zetten voor een ‘Europa – brede’ consultatie voor de richting van Europa voor de Toekomst.

Europa heeft op dit moment geen ‘verhaal’.

Naar aanleiding van de presentatie van Professor Silja Graupe: “Common Sense and Public Good” en mijn eigen presentatie kwam ik op het idee om vanuit de ECG  (in combinatie met de Commons beweging in brede zin, en de SDGs) een voorstel uit te werken:

A New Narrative for Europe: Leading by Example

Uitgaande van het model van Professor Graupe over de wisselwerking tussen wetenschap en maatschappij (denk aan de kritiek op de wetenschap van Christian Felber) kunnen we als beweging een prachtige voorzet doen.

Host van dit project zou misschien het World Future Council kunnen zijn, ook aanwezig op de conferentie in Bremen.

Phase 1: Preparation Project

Phase 2: Launch Project at the ECG NL Conference 2020

Phase 3: Adoption new narrative by EU Parliament / Commission through integration in Ursula Von Der Leyen initiative for consultation EU.

Ik licht het graag toe.

Groet!

ECG en Extinction Rebellion

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Ethisch perspectief op diitalisering

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Verenigingen

Vacancy – Member of the FMT of the ECG International Movement

Dear ECG Activists,

The Federation Management Team is recruiting a new member of the team. Please share the following information with your networks.

The Federation Management Team (FMT) is a body which supports the Federation Members Council. It acts together with the International Coordination Team (ICT) as the ECG management team (EMT).

Current members of the FMT are Manfred Jotter and Bridget Knapper. As Pedro Olazabel is leaving the FMT, his position will be vacant at the end of March 2020.

This is a paid position (currently reduced to € 500 - per month incl. taxes but will probably rise again to € 750). He/she is a contractor of the International Federation. This job takes 8-10 hours per week, meetings of the EMT take place generally on week-ends (approx. 5 meetings per year). This position reports to the Federation Members Council.

To apply for the position of member of the FMT, please send a CV and a supporting statement addressing the person specification and describing why you are suitable for this role to federation@ecogood.org by Friday 28th February, 2020. The Federation Members Council has mandated the EMT to recommend a candidate and the FMC takes the final decision and will elect a candidate at its next meeting on 3rd & 4th April, 2020.

Role description

General responsibilities:

• assuring fluent operations in the movement, in such a way that employees and volunteers can work together in order to achieve the movement goals.
• developing lean processes that assist volunteers and employees, reducing workload and facilitating the achievement of their goals.
• eliminating duplication of work and overlaps.
• The position is designed for the international movement.
• The staff person will uphold the ECG Code of Conduct, the collection of decisions from the Delegates Assemblies("Policy", "Regelwerk") and decisions made by the International Coordination Team (ICT).

Specific responsibilities

Project Portfolio Management (PPM)

• Reception of international project ideas, prepare decision making process, evaluation of them and send them to finance to look for funding in case of approval.
• Coordination of PPM team.
• Maintain the project database and make it transparent in wiki.
• Follow-up of approved projects

Service Portfolio Management (SPM)

• Reception of international service ideas, prepare decision making process, evaluation of them and send them to finance to look for funding in case of approval.
• Coordination of SPM team.
• Maintain the service database and make it transparent in wiki.
• Follow-up the implementation of services

Note: the main difference between a service and a project is that a project has a start and an end and the service is provided each year. For example: the newsletter is a service provided to the movement, but the translation of the handbook into English would be a project.

IT

• As it is an important service, it is stated here separately
• Assessment of IT needs and look for alternatives to fulfil them.
• Coordination of the cooperation between IT - Hub and IT Employees.
• Assure that IT tools help the movement to perform its tasks in an easy way.
• Assure that everyone in the movement can use the tools and understand them.

The tasks of the management team members may be redefined by the team according to individual competences. The candidate should be flexible and open to new challenges.

Person Specification

• At least 3 years experience as an active member in the ECG movement
• Experience of working in an international context within the ECG movement
• Ability to work in an international team in a complex and rapidly changing environment
• Excellent inter-personal and communication skills
• Self-organisation and flexibility
• Good standard of written and spoken English
• Other languages desirable

Inschrijving DA

Dear ECG Activists,

The ECG Delegates Assembly 2020 will take place in Skåne Tranås, Sweden from May 8th to 10th, 2020. Registration is open until Feb. 14th, 2020. Please remind your local chapters and hubs that they need to vote for a delegate. Delegates and guests need to register here: https://da.ecogood.world/registration/

We are looking for two facilitators to moderate the event.

Tasks include

• Facilitating the event during these times: May 8th 10:00 - 17:30, May 9th 9:00 - 17:00 and May 10th 9:00 to 12:30.
• Moderating discussions in the plenary sessions
• Moderating the voting process with systemic consensus in the plenary sessions
• Support in preparing the agenda for Delegates Assembly

Prerequisites

• Active involvement in ECG
• Experience in systemic consensus
• Fluent written and spoken English

You can find out more about the Delegates Assembly and also register here: https://da.ecogood.world/.

Please submit your application including a quote of your estimated fee (including VAT, travel costs and accommodation cost) to gus.hagelberg@ecogood.org by Feb. 20th
, 2020.

Sincerely,


Gus Hagelberg

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Voor de groei en bloei van een nieuwe economie zijn we aangewezen op de inzet van vrijwilligers, de betalingen van leden en de donaties van vrienden en partners.

Doe mee!

• We verwelkomen iedereen die echt actief wil worden. Word actief!
• Als lid help je ons financieel vooruit en beslis je mee. Word lid!
• Voor ons als  Non-Profit-Organisatie zijn donaties van groot belang voor het mogelijk maken van projecten. Word sponsor!

Informatie over de veiligheid van je gegevens

Je hebt de Blik ontvangen omdat je je in het verleden hebt aangemeld of interesse hebt getoond in de activiteiten van ECG Nederland.
Voor de nieuwsbrief gebruiken we alleen je e-mailadres en geen andere privégegevens.
Nadere informatie over de omgang met je persoonsgegevens door ECG vind je hier.
Mocht je deze nieuwsbrief niet meer willen ontvangen, dan kun je je hier afmelden of schrijf ons een mail

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