Ted Howard, Co-Founder and President of the Democracy Collaborative in the USA and described as ‘one of 25 visionaries changing your world’ gave a talk to 160 people at a Bath Co-operative Alliance public meeting on Community Wealth Building. This is a powerful tool for more inclusive and democratic local economies which is being implemented in places as diverse as the US city of Cleveland, Barcelona, Bologna and Preston (named as the UKs most rapidly improving urban area in 2018).

The introduction was given by Jules Peck, Bath based Democracy Collaborative Fellow, who discussed community wealth building in the context of regional mutual banking.

The event took place on Friday 5th July 2019 at Widcombe Social Club in Bath.

Ted Howard has been at the forefront of developments around community wealth building. His new book The Making of a Democratic Economy, written with Marjorie Kelly, shows that there is a new economy emerging focused on helping everyone thrive while respecting planetary boundaries. Ted will explore with us ideas that we could put into practice to make our local economy better able to generate wealth, keep it local and more fairly share it out to create good jobs, better communities and more sustainable environmental practices.

Jules Peck has a thirty year career working on sustainable development within and at the interfaces of the worlds of business, government and civil society. Jules is the Founding Director of Avon Mutual, a Community Bank for the west of England, and a Fellow of the Democracy Collaborative, of NEF and of the RSA.