Free, Equal and Mutual

Free, Equal and Mutual: Rebalancing Society for the Common Good

Rudolf Steiner—prompted by a compelling need to create conditions for lasting peace—campaigned for a threefold society in war-torn Germany from 1917 to 1919. He recognized that the dynamics of politics, the economy, and culture were very different, calling for clear boundaries and partnership. Running a business as one would a government department or school is a recipe for failure. He saw self-determination for individual people as healthy but, prophetically, viewed “national self-determination” under the conditions set out by the Treaty of Versailles as a recipe for toxic nationalism and future war.

With today’s resurgent nationalism, global warming, rising inequality, and blowback from continuous war around the world, our market-dominated society is in meltdown. However Rudolf Steiner’s free, equal, and mutual vision offers a timely alternative for rebalancing society. This pushes back “the market” from politics and culture. How? Healthy boundaries are reasserted among the sectors of private business, the public state, and the pluralistic culture. This shapes a dynamic threefold society based on mutuality, equality, and freedom—for people and planet.

CONTENTS:

• Christopher Schaefer: “Dancing with the American Shadow”
• Christopher Schaefer: “Toxic Excess: 9 Propositions in Search of the Threefold Social Order”
• Gerard Haefner: “Great Again”
• Edward Udell: “Rudolf Steiner and Social Threefolding During and After World War I”
• Christoph Strawe: “Interview”
• John Bloom: “Red, Blue and the Lost Primary”
• Richard House: “Academisation of Britain’s Schools: Progressive or Reactionary?”
• Steve Briault: “Rudolf Steiner’s Threefold Image of a Healthy Society”
• Steve Briault: “Threefold Development at Work”
• Steve Briault: “Three Conversations: Land for People, Farms and Homes, Rebalancing Society”
• Martin Large: “Telling Free, Equal, Mutual and Earthcaring Stories”
• Robert Karp: “A New American Revolution: Associative Economics and the Future of the Food Movement”
• Christine Arlt: “Sekem, A Model for Holistic Sustainable Development in Egypt”
• Glen Saunders: “Money and Ethical Banking”

“Today’s advanced economies have reached a critical turning point. Free, Equal, and Mutual shows a way ahead for rebalancing society through a cooperative commonwealth economy based on ‘voluntary socialism’, with a rights-based state and a flourishing civil society—all working for the common good.” —David Drew, PhD, MP, Shadow Minister for Rural Affairs, UK

About the Author

Martin Largeis a facilitator, lecturer, activist and social business enabler, chairing the Community Land Trust National Demonstration Project , 2005-9 and Stroud Common Wealth. Author of Social Ecology (1981) and Common Wealth (2010).

Steve Briaultis Director of Development at Emerson College, Sussex, and an international consultant in organization and community development.  Author of The Mystery of Meeting – Relationships as a Path of Discovery, and Liquidity – Flowing Forms in Water and Money.