ABSTRACT
This chapter in the Routledge Handbook of Degrowth (2025) discusses and summarises, from a degrowth perspective, the current discursive lineage and usage of the closely intertwined concepts ‘conviviality’ and ‘commoning’. Conviviality and commoning are central concepts for a good life for all. Whereas conviviality designates a certain quality within the relationships between humans and non-humans alike, commoning is about organising these relationships. In recent degrowth discourses, conviviality has been mostly used with reference to ‘convivial technologies’, as a set of criteria on the assessment of technologies. Commons can be best understood through patterns of commoning, which are distilled from practical examples from around the world and offer concrete advice on how to design and govern a given commons. Drawing from art, social sciences, political theory, design, biology and speculative fiction, the authors explain with examples – such as composting toilets, community-supported agriculture, housing projects, intentional communities, permaculture and open-source hardware – the potential of both conviviality and commoning to inspire, inform and foster prefigurative politics and direct action.
