Past-Future Commons - Brodie Weir

Past-Future Commons - Brodie Weir

The publication is a tool to understand the legal history of the commons and land ownership in Britain, looking at how the history of resistance and alternative relations to land, and environmental resources can be re-assessed, used, and learnt from to help guide us in a future of environmental uncertainty. It is a project of Futuring, a pragmatic analysis and exploration of what we can do and how it has been done before. It is an action of intellectual positivity.

Weir explores the English revolution and the legacy of early radical political dissenters ‘The Diggers’ all the way through to contemporary struggles and resistances across the world. It rethinks the nature of nation state borders and the potential for a post human, legal personhood; distributed to rivers, beavers and ecosystems. It attempts to understand and learn from others in a radical solidarity; offering viewpoints, methods and techniques of enacting and dealing with change in our unstable world, working towards a co-operative future.

Intricately designed and beautifully printed, the publication envelops writing, diagrams and archival material to create both a proposal and an artefact of practical and transformative change.

Past-Future Commons is a publication written by Brodie Weir as an outcome of his research fellowship with Future Days festival 2025, in Lisbon.

Three-colour risograph.
A4.
30 Pages, including a fold out diagram.
Printed in the UK by Pagemasters.
2025.