Hi! I wanted to write about my experience of being a student in the first set of courses for ZSchool, which have just finished. ZSchool had 14 online courses, which ran for 2 months for April and May. It has now joined with other partner organisations to become the World Institute for Social Change (WISC), so far consisting of Bogazici Performance Arts and Publishing (BGST) – Turkey, Centre For Civil Society – South Africa, Center for Anthropology and Social Change (CASC) – U.S., Chicago Veterans for Peace – U.S., New Politics – U.S., PM Press – U.S., Rabble – Canada, Real Media (RM) – UK, Real News Network (RNN) – U.S., ROAR Magazine – Holland, Sto Kokkino : The Radio that Listens – Greece along with Z Communications (ZCom) – U.S.
I took 2 courses in April – Anarchy now and then, with Andrej Grubačić, and Finance Capital in the 21st Century with Jack Rasmus. Andrej and Jack were both excellent, and I loved the topics they directed our focus to, the content they gave for us students to look at, and the knowledge they shared. For both of these courses the format was students were offered interesting pieces to read each week (and videos shared for the anarchy course). Andrej and Jack suggested areas and questions to think about concerning the content given. From here, students were invited to discuss the topics raised with other students, and also ask questions / share comments with the faculty. It’s a privilege to be able to ask questions to people with a wealth of experience and understanding in their subjects (both are also widely respected authors), and get thorough and helpful answers, information and ideas. I also appreciated chatting online with other students, from many countries around the world, to get different perspectives.
In the Anarchy now and then course we looked at what is Anarchism? (different interpretations from the early period of anarchism), anarchism in the colonial and postcolonial period, anarchism in Italy, Spain and Russia, anarchism and education, anarchism between 1968 and 1989, and read from Andrej’s book with Staunton Lynd (Wobblies and Zapatistas), discussing the relationships between marxism and anarchism, concepts such as guerilla history, amongst many other items. That’s a lot of anarchism! There’s a good mix of history, influences, practices, networks and practical and philosphical considerations. Andrej also included links about current info, such as what is happening in Rojava, where political events are taking place now which contain elements of anarchism.
For Finance Capital in the 21st century we looked at the views of Marx, Keynes, Fisher, Minsky on finance capital along with Jack Rasmus’s own views, shadow banking and the new financial capital elites, and recent financial events and crises in Asia, Europe and America. Two key questions were: How has finance capital and the new finance capital elite changed in the 21st century? What is the growing impact of financial instability on the global economy today?
These are my simplistic overviews – you’ll be able to find out more on the course website
https://znetwork.org/zschool/moodle/
The anarchy course was excellent. It made me find out more about anarchism – something I’d been wanting to do for years, and even though I had quite a few good books on it already, I’d never stuck with. It encouraged me to keep on reading and learn more about important people, history and ideas involved with anarchy. Andrej knows his stuff inside and out, and we explored examples and occasions of anarchism in practice (worldwide), something I’m not used to hearing about. To be able to discuss views and share opinions with other students was useful, and rewarding.
Jack’s course was an insight into a world that I was interested in, but knew very little about, finance capital. I learned so much through this course – about economics, markets, banking systems, assets and shares, and a whole lot more! This might not sound interesting to some people, but I found it literally jaw-dropping. Many of the things that go on around us, by people and organisations with a lot of money and influence, that affect our lives and the lives of the vast majority of people in our countries and countries all around the world are, in effect, omitted from the mainstream media. I found it especially interesting to learn about the causes that lead to countries taking up austerity measures, what that actually means, who it affects, who benefits from it. It’s amazing stuff. There are still things that I don’t fully understand, as economics can be confusing, but I know a shedload more than I did before. Jack is great at explaining the concepts and systems involved, and cleared up a lot of the confusion. More than before I feel it’s really important to know about the forces that govern the world around us, which most of us are probably quite unaware of.
As you can probably tell, I’m a big fan of ZSchool, now the World Institute of Social Change. I’ve got a lot from both courses and totally recommend them to anyone who wants to know more about these subjects. I would add that having done both courses, I’d probably recommend doing one at a time. The two courses required a fair amount of reading (all excellent with relevant content), and I feel that if I focused on one at a time I would have been able to get involved with the discussions earlier, and contribute more, and these are some of the major benefits of these courses. Having said this I’m not the fastest reader! I think some of the other courses could be done combined, depending on how much time people have and how much involvement students are invited to engage in, as some faculty do mention this in their course info.
This is my experience from the first set of courses, and I hope it helps shed some light on what WISC (formerly ZSchool) offers. The courses are reasonably priced, especially considering the amount of knowledge that is imparted, the information that is shared and the platforms provided to discuss and learn with other students from all over the world. I’ll take another course when the school starts again in July, probably one looking at participatory economics or vision, as I’m interested in thinking about future possibilities for society, and what is do-able. In all honesty I’m tempted by all of the courses – to learn more about rights, the environment, organising, the effects of war, what’s happening in Greece, online anonymity, investigative journalism, feminism, international migration and more – they all seem significant at this moment in time, and empowering. I found the courses helped me to understand the world we live in a bit more. They’ve also given me some ideas on what I can do to be a part of the change that I want to see in the world (to borrow a phrase from Mr Gandhi).
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