COMMONING: Community Co-creation and Shared Spaces [Expanded Edition]

Nine Cases, Three Themes
Lingnan University Faculty and Students Co-author the Present, Challenges, and Possibilities of Hong Kong Commons

What are commons? This concept might seem unfamiliar, yet it has been quietly rooted in our communities in various forms, narrating profound and diverse "Hong Kong stories."

This book views commons as an ideology, a crystallization of the collaborative efforts of faculty and students from the Department of Cultural Studies at Lingnan University. Thorough and rigorous academic articles introduce the historical context of commons in Hong Kong and how it can be a method for transforming socioeconomics, culture, and sustainable living. Concise and accessible case studies document representative examples in the three categories of "cooperation," "environment," and "space," integrating the current situation and challenges of creating and implementing commons in Hong Kong.

Based on commons, we imagine shared urban spaces in a different way, observe social relationships in a different way, and explore alternative possibilities for building communities together. Commoning is not merely a concept of everyday politics—it is a socioeconomic and cultural process. This process aims to cultivate and proliferate more members of the commons, and these members will be practitioners of alternative social relationships and diversity.