❤️Being DIFFERENT: we "have many different gifts which [we] bring together to build a better world"
And then the 7 keys to Citizenship...
1. FREEDOM
Being a Citizen means being in control of your own life - able to make decisions, mistakes, make your own way...
***EVERYONE can be in control***
2. DIRECTION
Being a Citizen means having a life of meaning - your own meaning. When our lives don’t fit our passions, interests and abilities we are diminished - but if we can find a path that is right for us then we help other people to see us with respect.
3. MONEY
Money is important, but maybe not for the reason we all think. It is the means to be independent, to set our own course and to achieve our own goals. Too much is an obstacle to citizenship - but citizens do pay their own way.
[Hence his support for UBI]
4. HOME
We all need a place we can call home, not just a shelter, but a place where we have privacy, can be with those we love, where we belong.
🔥When we have no home we appear almost rootless - when we say someone has gone into ‘a home’ we mean they’ve lost their home🔥
5. HELP
We live in a world where we imagine that needing help is bad, even though we all need help everyday and the giving and receiving of help from others is the key to a good society.
***The challenge today is to get help without having to give up your citizenship.***
6. LIFE
It is by giving back to our community that we can really help others to understand our worth - in many more ways than we think: by just being there, by buying, by joining in, by working, by laughing, even by crying.
But we cannot contribute if we are absent.
7. LOVE
The beginning and end of Citizenship is found in love. Through meeting, working and joining in with other people we can form relationships, friendships, find lovers and make a family. Love is also the best guarantee of a new generation of citizens and a better world.
For clarity - all the words and the insight above are Simon's
Want to know how the Taiwanese government drew on ancient wisdom to increase trust levels from below 10% in 2015 to nearly 70% this year?
TLDR: they chose actively to trust - and therefore INVOLVE - the Taiwanese people.
🧵
At the heart of the story is @audreyt, whom I hosted in London this week.
Her deep understanding of trust has been at the heart of Taiwan’s whole approach to government, as a Cabinet Minister from 2016.
Audrey read Lao Tzu and the Tao Te Ching as a young child(!). This quote took hold.
She dropped out of junior high to research “swift trust” - how trust seems both to come and to go more easily in online environments - with researchers at Stanford and other US universities.
Here’s a v quick overview - it’s basically about separating out a democratic decision into phases - so you can then figure out HOW to invite WHOM to participate in each
The idea is to make the most of all the different tools and approaches
Let’s take those one by one
INPUT is really filling the funnel with ideas from everywhere
Making sure everyone who has a stake in a decision can express their view
Not every view will be incorporated - but they can all be heard
Around the time I finished writing the first edition of CITIZENS, @reenwilson and I were presented with an opportunity by @HelenMeech, a friend and former @NewCitProj colleague now working for @Natures_Voice...
Sir David Attenborough was in the process of filming what might well be his final ever documentary series, Wild Isles...
Even in the hectic media landscape of today, an Attenborough series always creates a cultural moment.
The big UK nature NGOs are coming together to crowdsource a “People’s Plan For Nature” - starting by gathering stories and ideas from all over the country and then using a randomly selected citizens’ assembly to digest all that, hear from experts, and produce recommendations
These recs will cover not just “asks” of national government, but of councils and business too - and also crucially what community groups can just get on and do