Citizens

Zusatztext

Citizens is a bold, uplifting wake¿up call for anyone who feels that democracy, community, and everyday life have been reduced to clicking, buying, complaining ¿ and waiting for "them" to fix it. If you're tired of politics-as-performance, brands-as-saviours, and institutions that treat people like customers or problems to manage, this book hands you a different lens: the Citizen inside every one of us. Jon Alexander's core idea is brilliantly simple and deeply practical: to change the future, we must change the story. He reveals the hidden narratives shaping modern society ¿ and why so many well¿meaning reforms fail because they keep the same assumptions in place. The three stories: ¿ The Consumer Story: we're users, consumers, taxpayers, and voters-as-buyers. We demand, choose, and rate while organisations compete to "serve" us. ¿ The Subject Story: in fear and uncertainty, we trade agency for protection ¿ hierarchy, obedience, surveillance, and strongman certainty. ¿ The Citizen Story: we are interdependent, creative, empathic people who can participate, collaborate, and co¿create solutions. Citizenship becomes a verb: engagement, responsibility, belonging, contribution. With a foreword by Brian Eno and praise from leading voices in democracy, business, and social change, Citizens makes a persuasive case that the Citizen Story is already rising ¿ often beneath the media radar. From citizens self¿organising in crisis to neighbourhood renewal, Alexander shows how citizen power and collective intelligence can outperform "top¿down" command or "market fixes" when challenges are complex: climate change, inequality, polarisation, loneliness, and loss of trust. What you'll get from this book: ¿ A fresh, memorable framework for democratic renewal, civic participation, and citizen-led change (ideal for readers of politics, social science, and systems thinking) ¿ A clear diagnosis of why consumerism can't solve the problems it created ¿ and why "change without consequences" is a dangerous fantasy ¿ Realworld stories of ordinary people doing extraordinary work ¿f rom Birmingham and Berlin to Kibera, London, and Grimsby¿proving that citizenship is not rare; it's human ¿ Practical pathways to participatory democracy: citizens' assemblies, deliberative democracy, participatory budgeting, community organising, volunteering, crowdfunding, civic tech, and open innovation ¿ A sectorbysector roadmap for transforming the institutions that shape our lives: Citizen NGOs, Citizen Business, and Citizen Government ¿ "Social acupuncture" tools for leaders, organisers, and teams: find the leverage points where energy for a new way is ready to flow, then unlock it Citizens is designed to be used, not just admired. It's equally valuable for public servants, educators, nonprofit leaders, business leaders, community organisers, activists, and social entrepreneurs. It also includes questions for discussion and reflection ¿ ideal for book clubs, classrooms, leadership teams, and civic groups. If you want hope without hand¿waving ¿ and a practical, inspiring guide to participation, collaboration, and rebuilding democracy from the ground up ¿ Citizens will change how you see people, power, and possibility. It's a manifesto for democratic innovation and civic imagination: moving from passive consumption to active citizenship, from endless outrage to shared responsibility, and from isolated individuals to resilient communities. Step out of the Consumer mindset. Claim your role as a Citizen.

Autorenportrait

JON ALEXANDER began his career with success in advertising, winning the prestigious Big Creative Idea of the Year before making a dramatic change. Driven by a deep need to understand the impact on society of 3,000 commercial messages a day, he gathered three Masters degrees, exploring consumerism and its alternatives from every angle. In 2014, he co-founded the New Citizenship Project to bring the resulting ideas into contact with reality. In Citizens, he is ready to share them with the world. ARIANE CONRAD has built a career turning big ideas into books that change the world. Known as the Book Doula, she has co-written several New York Times bestsellers. BRIAN ENO is an artist, philosopher and Citizen who has played a critical part in British culture since the early 1970s. He is a deep believer in the power of ideas and the possibility of a better world, beliefs which manifest both in his audio and visual art, and in his deep engagement with social, political and environmental issues. This is how Britain Eno starts his foreword: Is there any way out of the mess we're in? You certainly wouldn't think so from reading the papers. The richest people in the world are already scrambling onto the lifeboats, be they called New Zealand or SpaceX. And the poorest are dying in increasing numbers as they flee their war-torn, climate-ravaged countries. Meanwhile official politics seems either impotent or positively malign, a well-oiled machine infallibly finding the worst and pushing them to the top of the heap. Most of the graphs seem to be pointing in the wrong directions: going up when they should be going down, or plummeting when they should be rising. Yet there is hope. Because something is happening. There is a coalescence. A different story is rising and ripening. It is a story of who we are as humans, what we are capable of, and how we might work together to reimagine and rebuild our world. This story doesn't show up on the media radar because that radar is resolutely pointed in the wrong direction. It's expecting the future to be produced by governments and billionaires and celebrities, so its gaze is riveted on them. But behind their backs, the new story is coming together. It is slower, more diffuse, and more chaotic, because it is a story of widely distributed power, not of traditional power centres. As Jon Alexander and Ariane Conrad name it in this vitally important book, this story is the Citizen Story. When you see the world through the lens of this story, you see that there is a revolution in progress. The people are organising, not only in grassroots movements but also, crucially, inside the very institutions and organisations that are currently failing us. The people are starting to feel their power, and they're making for the engine rooms.

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