News from the ECG Delegates Assembly 2023

The Delegates Assembly (DA) is the movement’s biggest gathering. Once a year delegates from more than 170 local chapters across 35 countries are invited to vote on key questions of our globally growing organization, sharing ideas and new tools or simply network with likeminded people from around the world in a three-day online event. This year’s DA took place from Jun 29 until July 1, with highly valuable information and content.

Christian Felber opened the keynote with a strong message: “Our movement is needed more than ever. And it is getting more and more into shape. We are largely an organization of volunteers – which is one of our biggest strengths –and at the same time we are becoming a more and more professionalized international NGO with international impact.”

In his presentation, Felber strongly emphasized the urgency of global non-governmental organizations that aim to protect the wellbeing of the Earth. Three analytical models dominate the public discourse, clearly indicating the urgency of action:  the planetary boundaries, the global overshoot day and the ecological footprint. The founder of the ECG called on the members to link the idea of the ECG to those models but was concerned that the scientific community currently focuses too much on the analysis and too little on alternative models and concrete practices such as:

  1. The Common Good Product (citizens’ involvement)
  2. The Common Good Balance Sheet (linking micro and macro levels in the economy via global CRS reporting standards)
  3. The idea of individual but limited ecological consumption budget

In the second part of his keynote speech Christian pointed to a huge threat for democracies: the increasing polarization of society, which he defines as “the reduction of a public debate to two poles making all shades of nuance in between invisible”. As an example, he gave the classic economical stereotype of “it is either capitalism or socialism”. Felber concluded his presentation with a hope-giving message: “The ECG offers an attractive, moderate model in between. If we open up this spectrum and make the alternatives visible – and even voteable – then we are actively depolarizing the public discourse. The argument for the idea of the Common Good is becoming stronger and stronger”.

In the second keynote of the opening day, Luciana Cornaglia, member of the ECG management board, presented some thrilling insights on the driving factors of the ECG in Latin America. While in Europe, the Common Good Balance is the number one tool to spread the idea of the ECG, in Latin America it is rather the idea of the Common Product that is resonating most strongly. One of the reasons being that the traditional societal models of the more than 800 native and traditional peoples living in the region very much align with the model of the Economy for the Common Good. Such as respect, balance and harmony with nature. Luciana stated we should use the opportunity to learn from the wisdom of the indigenous people and take from each culture what is best for the future economy. The exercise of the Latin American group in developing a Common Good Product also underlined that all over the world individual prototypes of the CGP need to be developed. There is not one universal CGP.

Bridget Knapper, member of the management board, presented a tool to help the movement develop, align and execute a coherent and goal-oriented strategy: the visualisation of the strategy using a “Theory of change”. The digital tool is based on the strategic goals that were created and prioritized by the movement at the DA 2019, resulting in the five top goals of the ECG, guiding e.g. our policy making and funding. The “Theory of change” is a useful visualization of our strategy aiming at giving members the opportunity to identify where and how the work they do in local chapters and hubs contributes to the different goals of our organization. The tool will be widely introduced to the organization. All chapters, hubs and members are kindly invited to use and contribute to it.

Other topics over the three days were: Fundraising, Matrix 5.1, 6.0 and CSRD, Common Good Product and Common Good Index, Improving customer experience with the Common Good Balance Sheet, Balance Sheet for municipalities, EU data ecosystem, Ecological human rights/internal process ECG and ECG label and rebranding.

Sad to have missed all this? Become a member today and find recordings of most presentations in our open Wiki. Summed up, the 2023 Delegates Assembly was yet another strong expression of the productive energy of our movement and the proof that interacting with each other with tolerance and mutual respect for diversity is indeed possible.The event concluded with the idea of making the main focus of these days an international exchange for the whole movement in 2024 in order to establish it even more as the most important international gathering of the Economy for the Common Good.