Digital commons; Sustainability transition; Niches; Self-organization; Innovation

Abstract: The distributed nature of the internet offers plenty of opportunities for grassroots initiatives to prosper and pioneer innovative forms of collective action towards sustainability. Online initiatives aiming to provide information-based tools for local sustainability are mushrooming. First this presentation will present an inventory of those grassroots initiatives that focus on enabling information commons. Influenced by the work of Elinor Ostrom, this presentation proposes to analyze these initiatives as self-organized enablers of information commons. It suggests applying the Institutional Analysis and Development Framework that has decades of track record in analyzing institutions related to common-pool resources. Eventually, it is argued that understanding the factors of success and obstacles in the development of self-organized information commons in the digital age, brings new insights to transition management. Such grassroots digital commons are radical innovations that form niches. Such niches may form shadow networks that could provide an alternative pathway towards sustainability from the bottom-up when opportunity occurs.