Collage featuring hands presenting alternative energy, public housing, child care and other public commons imagery

Taking Back the Public Commons

Reporting, analysis, and ideas from the movements pushing to spend public money on public goods and services.

This is the first series of new solutions journalism published by YES! since the publication joined Truthout’s Center for Grassroots Journalism. Many thanks to the donors who helped enable this renewal of YES!

If you would like to help us continue to publish new solutions journalism, please donate here.

The Trump administration and its allies in state and local governments are working to defund everything from health care to education to climate justice initiatives. Fortunately, people around the country are pushing back, defending not only our existing public services, but expanding the horizons of possibility.

In Taking Back the Public Commons, YES! Media and Truthout shine a light on the innovative organizing to win control over public funding and defend public goods. We document efforts — from the federal level right down to the neighborhood — to shift power away from the ultra-wealthy and corporations and toward the rest of us to decide how the government operates and how public dollars are allocated. And we share bold ideas from organizers trying to ensure that all of our needs are met. In this authoritarian moment, we’re spotlighting the people transforming their communities with the goal of helping everyone lead a full and healthy life.