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SFI's Cities, Scaling, and Sustainability research effort is creating an interdisciplinary approach and quantitative synthesis of organizational and dynamical aspects of human social organizations, with an emphasis on cities. Different disciplinary perspectives are being integrated in terms of the search for similar dependences of urban indicators on population size - scaling analysis - and other variables that characterize the system as a whole. A particularly important focus of this research area is to develop theoretical insights about cities that can inform quantitative analyses of their long-term sustainability in terms of the interplay between innovation, resource appropriation, and consumption and the make up of their social and economic activity. This focus area brings together urban planners, economists, sociologists, social psychologists, anthropologists, and complex system theorists with the aim of generating an integrated and quantitative understanding of cities. Outstanding areas of research include the identification of general scaling patterns in urban infrastructure and dynamics around the world, the quantification of resource distribution networks in cities and their interplay with the city's socioeconomic fabric, issues of temporal acceleration and spatial density, and the long-term dynamics of urban systems.

The rise of the state is a key marker in the evolution of human society. States typically emerged when one chiefdom (amid a competing set of chiefdoms) achieved a greater and more effective level of organization.
Despite the presence of similar conditions, some states rose and flourished while some advanced chiefdoms never passed the threshold into statehood. Why states emerged in some places and not others, why they arose independently in six places around the world starting about 5,000 years ago, and why their rise was usually associated with the growth of cities, are fascinating questions for anthropologists. Answers to these questions could offer insights into today's urban systems.

Facebook page - Anyone can join the Participedia community and help crowdsource, catalogue and compare participatory political processes around the world. All content on Participedia is collaboratively produced and open-source under a Creative Commons License. Explore: Search, read, download and gain insight from our database of cases, methods, and organizations. Create: Help improve the quality of this knowledge resource by editing existing content or publishing your own. Teach: Use Participedia in the classroom as a tool to engage students and showcase their research.

Participedia's searchable database of democratic innovations is made up of three distinct content types including Cases, Methods and Organizations. Bolstering this knowledge base are added resources, including surveys, teaching tools and external data sets. The initial vision for Participedia was developed by Archon Fung (Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University) and Mark E. Warren (Department of Political Science, University of British Columbia), and is guided by a set of standing committees.

Participedia harnesses the power of collaboration to respond to a recent global phenomenon: the rapid development of experiments in new forms of participatory politics and governance around the world. We live in a world in which citizens of most countries are asking for greater involvement in collective decisions. Many governments, non-governmental organizations, and even some corporations are responding by experimenting with ways to increase public participation. Hundreds of thousands of participatory processes occur each year in almost every country in the world. They are adressing a wide variety of political and policy problems. And they often supplement and sometimes compete with more traditional forms of politics, such as representative democracy. Participedia responds to these developments by providing a low-cost, easy way for hundreds of researchers and practitioners from across the globe to catalogue and compare the performance of participatory political processes.

Collaboration is appealing in concept but challenging in practice. While extensive resources-including ones from the Community Tool Box, The Intersector Project, and NewNetworkLeader.org-exist online to support collaborative efforts, the fact remains that we human beings are simply not very good at making "we" work. And yet, most changemakers today acknowledge that to address the complex social and environmental challenges we face we must learn how to collaborate-across organizations, sectors, networks, and differences. Effective collaboration must become a reality, not just an aspiration.

This site, CCL Community, is an intranet for volunteers/members of Citizens' Climate Lobby. The purpose of which is to: Deliver content that's relevant to each user. Be a communication tool. Enable and foster chapter and regional collaboration. Help chapter/group leaders and volunteers become more effective organizers. If you are not a member yet, please join Citizens' Climate Lobby.

Climate Interactive is a not-for-profit organization based in Washington DC. Our team helps people see what works to address climate change and related issues like energy, health, food security, and disaster risk reduction. Our easy-to-use, tangible, scientifically-grounded tools as well as our programs for engagement help people see for themselves what options exist today to shape the future they want to see.

Citizens' Climate Lobby is a non-profit, nonpartisan, grassroots advocacy organization focused on national policies to address climate change.

For over 200 years we have been helping people and organizations develop the skills and knowledge they need to succeed. We develop digital education, learning, assessment, and certification solutions to help universities, businesses, and individuals move between education and employment and achieve their ambitions. By partnering with learned societies, we support researchers to communicate discoveries that make a difference. Our online scientific, technical, medical, and scholarly journals, books, and other digital content build on a 200-year heritage of quality publishing.

Strategic Doing has developed over more than two decades of work with people trying to strengthen their organizations, communities and regions. Here's Ed Morrison, the developer of Strategic Doing, reflecting on its origins:

The Open Government Partnership is a multilateral initiative that aims to secure concrete commitments from governments to promote transparency, empower citizens, fight corruption, and harness new technologies to strengthen governance. In the spirit of multi-stakeholder collaboration, OGP is overseen by a Steering Committee including representatives of governments and civil society organizations.

MapLight is a nonpartisan research organization that reveals money's influence on politics. We research and compile data about the sources of campaign contributions in U.S. presidential, congressional, state, and local ballot and candidate elections. We provide journalists and citizens with transparency tools that connect data on campaign contributions, politicians, legislative votes, industries, companies, and more to show patterns of influence never before possible to see. These tools allow users to gain unique insights into how campaign contributions affect policy so they can draw their own conclusions about how money influences our political system. MapLight was founded in 2005 by Thomas Layton, Jaleh Bisharat, and Daniel G. Newman. Daniel, MapLight's President, was recognized as one of Fast Company's 100 Most Creative People in Business in 2010 for his work at MapLight.

Once you have understood the approach and strategies of the Complex paradigm, think of where you can start making changes in your organization or business model. Where do you use the Linear paradigm, and are those actually linear systems?  Some companies like to plan how their users should interact with their products, and typically don't allow them to configure their own solutions. What if you started preparing rather than planning?

We empower shapers to build platforms and organizations that mobilize ecosystems for the age of complexity, chaos and interdependence.

Our Videos and Webinars are a mix between conversations with #PDToolkit adopters, open AMAs with the connected community and featured talks with special guests. They cover all about platforms and ecosystems and how the strategy of the connected organization needs to change in the XXIst century.

Future Now pushes progress toward America's Goals, with a report card on each state and innovative cost-effective strategies to impact legislators, the media, partner organizations and the public.

The Network Weaver Consultants Network is a loosely affiliated group of consultants who provide a wide range of network services for organizations, networks and communities. Some of the consultants have taken a 5-month intensive practicum on network consulting led by June Holley and Kristin Johnstad. However, there is no vetting process for this page: anyone who has experience can put their name on this site. Make sure you contact the consultants directly to access more detail about their experience, interests and availability. The map below shows the Network Weaver Consultants and Services. Click and hold on a consultant's node to focus on who they're affiliated with and what service they provide, click and hold on a service node to focus on which of the consultants provides that service. Keep scrolling past the map for the consultants' bios.

"A land trust is a nonprofit organization that, as all or part of its mission, actively works to conserve land by undertaking or assisting in land or conservation easement acquisition, or by its stewardship of such land or easements.  Typically, land trusts have or have access to expertise in land acquisition, real estate law, and land management.  This blend of expertise allows the land trust to assist the land owner, municipality, agency, or whoever, in identifying the most suitable mechanism for protection."

There is an emerging knowledge movement that is slowly building all over the world, though it often goes unnoticed by the media and most formal education systems. A part of this movement can be described as a network of 'eco-versities'-people, organizations and communities who are reclaiming knowledge systems and a cultural imaginary to restore and re-envision learning processes that are meaningful and relevant to the challenges of our times.