Some podcast hosts, staff and board members got together last month to discuss how we can create hopeful media. Here are some of the notes from our meeting that we will use to guide our production in the future.

At Democracy at Work, we’ve been having some meetings about what kind of shows, books and podcasts we want to make, and one thing we’ve agreed on is to try to share solutions.

We want to send a message that helps people feel hopeful because they know the truth: capitalism is just one way of organizing our world, and we can do so much better. 

This is the season of giving, and we believe our work gives people hope. But we also rely on contributions from you, our audience, to keep producing this kind of solutions-oriented media. 

If you donate to Democracy at Work this holiday season, your support will go a long way in helping us share positive visions for society after capitalism. 

Continue reading notes from our meeting on instilling hope in our media below. 

Some podcast hosts, staff and board members got together last month to discuss how we can create hopeful media. Here are some of the notes from our meeting that we will use to guide our production in the future:

• Being hopeful doesn’t mean things aren’t difficult. We never want to lose track of the injustice of capitalism. Offering a solution to an issue doesn’t mean things are fixed. We will stay committed to critiquing capitalism as a systemic problem, while offering an alternative path forward.
  
  
• Remind our audience that it’s been done before. There are plenty of examples from history and the present day of organizing the economy in a cooperative way. If we can remember that it’s been done before, then we will know it is absolutely possible to do it again.
  
  
• We will recognize the benefits and negatives of any solutions we offer. Solutions like worker cooperatives may be better than capitalist businesses, but that doesn’t mean they’re perfect. We should normalize talking about all aspects of solutions, like co-ops. After all, socialism is not heaven. We will still have problems in our alternative system; let’s just try to get better problems than the ones we have now.
  
  
• We can recognize that sometimes alternatives fail- just like the status quo. The truth is, alternatives fail all the time. Sometimes co-ops go out of business or unions can’t win a campaign. But that doesn’t mean these ideas are not viable. Capitalist businesses are constantly failing and going bankrupt- yet people keep creating that same model. This is the truth about alternatives, and it’s what we need to share with our audience if we want to take these ideas seriously and gain people’s trust.

Workers need to believe that a radically different future is possible. If people are to fight for a better world, then we need to help people believe that it can be done. And we can say as a team, that we wholeheartedly believe we can do better than capitalism.

If you agree with this message, please consider financially contributing to Democracy at Work, where we are dedicated to creating media that is hopeful, serious and engaging. 


Season’s greetings, 

Democracy at Work