Imagining Post-Capitalism through World Building with Susanne Aichele
While in Thailand during the Funding the Commons design jam, I spoke to Susanne Aichele from Mothertree Labs. Susanne is a filmmaker, researcher, and communication practitioner focused on the intersection of ecology, community, and identity, leveraging experience with BBC, National Geographic, the UN, and WHO to create projects that foster interconnected ecologies and non-extractive practices. We spoke about Susanne's previous documentary The Ways of the DAOs (2022), how to approach narrativ...
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This is what I can imagine, with with the the big debate around, like, capitalism, post capitalism is, you know, how can you use this as a way in, but then also say, but what are we actually talking about? And maybe we can't even yet imagine what the they they feel like they're losing something. Something. And, and so this is it's interesting to witness this resistance to change, and they're kind of, you know, upset with all these, like, all the ways in which the, you know, other voices are being brought in, etcetera. So, like, okay. I've achieved something. You know, we're then going to the wider world of, like, what am I adding into the narrative? What am I adding to the world?
Hey, guys. What you're about to watch is one of the many interviews I took during my time in Thailand for Defcon twenty twenty four. I was in the country for a total of over a month and got the opportunity to meet a bunch of really cool people and interview them in person. DevCon itself was an incredible and interesting experience, and you can find my full review of it on my Patreon. So So if you like the content I've been making and would like me to continue going to these kinds of events and improving, then I hope you'll become a patron starting at just $3 per month for access to loads of bonus content and Blockchain Socialist merch at patreon.com/theblockchainsocialist. Hi, everyone. You're listening to, another interview that I'm doing in Thailand. This time, I'm in Bangkok. We are at the Funding the Commons Design Jam, and I'm here with my friend Suzanne. She is a filmmaker and many more things. You helped us, kind of lead through and help the people think through in the design jam, which is is kind of like a you can think of it as like a non technical hackathon, is kind of how I think of it. But you helped people kind of think about, how they can think about the narrative of the things that they're building. And so I thought it'd be great to talk to you about narratives broadly in crypto because you also, filmed a documentary a few years ago as well about the DAO space, and now a lot of things have changed since then or things have developed. So, yeah. I'm excited to have this conversation. Wonderful. Thanks. Yeah. But would you maybe like to give maybe you should give a much better introduction than what I gave to yourself and your work and, like, what we did in the design jam so far, and then we can jump into it. Wonderful.
Thank you. And, yeah, I'm really grateful to to have been invited by sending the comments to talk about something I'm passionate about. We, we love that. But also that I do feel is so key at, at any stage of of world building.
And, my
as a as a background. So, you mentioned I'm a filmmaker. That's that's my training. I've also worked in communication as a creative director, for, institutions like the UN, the little one, but working on the global goals and, and really, I guess, thinking through how concepts can be translated and turned into narratives, films, that are evocative for the purpose of, you know, behavior change or awareness or any way that campaigns want to, have an agenda. And it was a fantastic learning. I've worked with some wonderful people. And, I've also become increasingly aware that the, you know, a group of very smart, skilled people, I guess, working, mending and molding an agenda to then go out into the world. You know, once you go past the how much does it sell, how many clicks does it get, and all of this, and you feel like, okay. I've achieved something, You know, we're then going to the wider world of, like, what am I adding into the narrative? What am I adding to the world? And with, with some of that, I guess, especially when I worked more on the commercial side, you know, I I started having more complex relationships with, aspirational storytelling. K. And by that, I mean, you know, creating worlds that people can aspire to, which is most of like, a lot of marketing works like that. But really the real world impact of that is it's also feeding the narrative of not enoughness. Aspiration also always comes with having to get more, buy something, and also standards that we are we are, you know, inversion inadvertently selling with that, you know. And a lot of that is, the kind of, like, modernity, majority sort of cultural universality, so to speak, that, you know, many of us have grown up with and that sit much, much deeper, I think, in inside of us. So when I, left, stepped stepped away from from the, you know, marketing and and communications world for institutions, and really wanted to take a breather. What came with that also was a deeper immersion to community. So living with and also working, amongst people who are, really in a space of, thinking what's next, not just in technology wise, but system system wise. You know? What are the next world? And although, you know, the, making the, the film around, like, the the journey of the DAO was, for me, also a way to to understand. Like, the interviews I made really were a way for me to learn and to to dig a little bit into the care and the human aspect of all these people I'm meeting, and really going to, like, why do you care? What's the longer term vision, and how do humans and nonhumans play into this? So often for me, filmmaking is a is a is a sense making process. Mhmm. And at the same time, I also, felt that there was an an ask to not to not maybe go ahead and and narrate the next story, but actually to also introvert and say, right, what like, from which place do I come telling these stories as well? You know, once we are, once we're at sort of at a place where there's so many exciting things happening and you know that there is gonna be interest Like, that you know that, you know, more and more now the the, I guess, main mainstream, news outlets and media want to know what it is so they can get it and grasp it and etcetera. And through a a more, like, I guess, personal journey of really, looking beyond existing narratives. So something I mentioned is the hero story. I don't know how familiar you new listeners would be. It's a, you know, it's a sort of concept that's used being being used within writing, filmmaking. Like, it's being taught in in Hollywood very much. Your script has to sort of comply to these. So look it up. I won't be able to to do it justice. But to realize that not only it's a sort of framework to work towards, which can be helpful, but it's also a monomyth. And the bigger impact of this monomyth is that, you know, it serves, as the world building tool has served for a long time as a world building tool, or justification for a lot of the, leanings towards individualism, towards, you know, the kind of leadership where people hope to be saved, you know. And and it does I guess maybe I could speak to what it tends to not do, which is, you know, multiple voices, complexity, because there's always, like, the kind of solution. And, and also for, you know, for, for failure. Right. I mean, so basically, I'm I'm now already going into, like, the things that I feel like I would want to dig out a little bit more. Mhmm. Once we recover or compost this monomyth, which, is is another, increasingly important aspect that I realized is, I was like, what's the next story? What is this better story? And so part of this more these last years of researching and introspection has been, actually, this again is a tendency of what's the next thing, the hero story tendency. And I really feel there needs to be some sort of composting, of where we are with all the ugly bits and all the bits because it is you know, the stories that we narrate also narrate us, and the way they come to us is from multiple multiple so there's a unfurling as a we like to call it, there's an unfurling to be done before I feel we actually know what is narrating us, you know. Donna Haraway has this incredible quote Nice. In part of her book. You know, it's important which stories tell stories, and the worlds that build the worlds. And so that's really the inquiry I'm coming with, and there are some senses of what what might be kind of the next steps into it, but, there's definitely no solutions. I think it's more of an attitude towards, you know, integrating complexity whilst obviously also knowing that there are limitations in communication, you know, that there are to understand an audience, can, unfortunately, at at at a big scale, not mean that you know every individual person. You can talk to them. So there will be simplification. But at the moment, we communicate and think about our design to to really, I don't know, have it as opposed to, like, this these these statistics are not actual humans, you know. And we and so I speak about, how we can think of, rather than two two dimensional people as four dimensional people, which means not only are they complex now, but they also live through time, and we all, you know, whether we've experienced loss or wherever we are in our in our journey, to remind ourselves that worlds if we wanted to really do it justice and really be authentic and allow authenticity, and everyone to bring all of it to it, whether that's in your, you know, in your organization or whether that is the the users that we think of, then having some sort of level of of of awareness of, of the of the complexity of that is feels really important to me. Mhmm. Yeah. I'd love to say that. I think
I mean, definitely if you look at, in particular, the crypto space, like, there's definitely a lot of, the hero myth, like, it I mean, I think it's, like, pretty That is a, like, narrative, archetype that is often used in stories around tech and kind of, like Yeah. I think it's formed the ideology, and I think I mean, you probably have a lot of thoughts on this too, but, like, the the movement of, like, film generally into, like, this kind of archetype or, like, way of telling stories through the lens of, like, a particular person who saves the world in some way. Definitely a lot to say about that. Ideologically, rise of neoliberalism, I think, go hand in hand a bit. But, yeah. Yeah. And then also we see the opposite with, like, I don't know, FTX, the fall of FTX and and just the crazy story of Sam Bankman Fried, who was the hero and is now the villain or whatever else. But it's always, like, focused on this, like, this one guy did this crazy thing, you know, rather than looking at, or or it's more it's more seldom that you that you can, like, look at the the more systemic issues that led to, like, why did this one crazy guy be able to, like, do these crazy things whenever, like, shouldn't there have like, we don't live in isolation with one another. Like, other people saw what he was doing. You know, like, someone must have known. Those stories are often kind of, like, it complicates the story too much. I almost feel like we've come to a point where, a lot of film or the way that news are the news is, like, shared with people is very, like, it's dumbed down for you as if you can't take the complexity as well. So, yeah, so I guess what is how how how do you try to well, what I noticed in the in the in the DAO video, in the documentary was that you largely let the people speak for themselves and not really place any kind of, like, it's really exciting what they're doing or, like, they're so naive, you know, like, there wasn't either of those things that I saw. So, like, how do you because I imagine not telling the hero story is maybe sometimes actually more complex. It is. It's it's it's difficult, and I think this is where,
you know, the the familiarity with drama in a certain way that, you know, that culture and and we ourselves, like, narrate the, you know, the failure, the the the achievement, seeing seeing ourselves also on a timeline of, like, you know, achieving. We're so there's such a familiarity with it that I do feel that the training towards seeing and and portraying complexity that, it will take time and it will probably feel unfamiliar and hence maybe a little bit alienating. But thank you for picking up on that because I do, I think my tendency now is to to let people speak and to to intentionally allow different opinions to coexist. I actually feel that that, our capacity, and I say us and the audience capacity for for complexity is is incredibly, astute and and and big. And, you know, we did this poetry exercise yesterday and and it involved to be like someone writes a line and the next person picks it up. And whilst there's a little bit of an influence between the lines, when you read the poem, in theory you'd be like, okay, it'll be a mess. And it's like it's it's just like it's a it's a kind of nice creative task. But but actually why one of the reasons I love it is when it is read back, you it shows how much your mind is able and willing to to to bridge, you know. And that can obviously also be done in simplifying things. But I do I I feel that, you know, there are traditions that are still very active that have a very complex, narrative tradition. And, so we don't have to start from scratch either. But something so something I'm questioning now is, yes, what is is there will there be a reduced role of top down narration, you know? I love I will forever forever loves films and and cinema, but I do think it has its limitations. And so, what I'm, so Tony Tony Lai and I, sort of collaborate under this umbrella Mother Tree Labs and, you know, the bringing, we say, law and law together. And and this is a bit of a side step, but I think it'll come in handy to to really see how it might, work into the space. So, law as a code of social, you know, social cohesion and and also understanding each other, to the awareness that you can change the law, and we see that a lot, but it's not gonna be adapted. People don't see themselves belonging to this or Yeah. That it's it's alienating. And, and so if we are going to change, you know, different types of coding or governance, then what are the the narrations that come that come with it? And again, you can do you can release a a video that encourages people and convinces them why it's better to work collaboratively. But really and most of my research is done, like, kind of here. You know, like, really the the conviction for me comes, like, I know how I've changed whenever I've changed my behavior or mind or changed my mind. And it has been usually experiential. It has been through my peers or, like, people close to me, or people I, you know, trust. So so increasingly, experimenting with and and encouraging, in person storytelling. There's a set of cards that, that we're gonna, bring out this year, and it's, prompts, 77 prompts. And that's really a gift back to the community. But these are questions that I've been collecting over the last three years, that questions that brought out stories without being, how shall I say, without making you feel like you have to have the wittiest or the right answer or something. Right. Right. And what I love about them is that that they tend to bring out answers. Within the answers, there is a sort of witnessing each other's depth and amount of stories that we have. I'll give you an example. What is your relationship to your mother's maiden name? Right? Yeah. Which, you know, I'm I'm, I'd love to hear as well. But but, that's an example of a question because I've sat in a room with 10 people and if again, and there's there should never be a sort of expectation that people answer because there's level of vulnerability that in in in answering this. But the you suddenly get, with a simple answer question like this, you know, relationship to, you know, like how feminist your mom was, like how, like, cultural nuances, etcetera. So, so that's an example of storytelling that is maybe we can call it distributed storytelling, you know? And that's not fast, and that's not like, you know, maybe, it it'll it will happen slow at the speed of at the speed of, you know, connection and, however long the evenings. But, so that is to say, I think the models of of storytelling are, like, maybe have to expand and be different. And I'm, you know, and I would love to definitely be more, hearing in what people are thinking in terms of, like I say marketing, there's more. Right? But, like, the storytelling when it comes to, funding and getting people engaged and and stakeholders and and and people using it, because I would love to bring my my expertise into it. But, yeah, I'm currently, like, really looking at, what is the yeah, how do we compost the hero? I three three of my three of my sort of key, or should I say, like, testing testing people are my, my stepfathers. And, they, you know, they, for me, represent like, they're quite different, but they're all in some way, you know, people who've grown up in, in a world where their story was the majority story, like, they were so used to and and because that is shifting now, I can really see, the in different ways how they they've become really uncomfortable with that. And if they've almost, you know, they they feel like they're losing something. Something. And, and so this is it's interesting to witness this resistance to change, and they're kind of, you know, upset with all these, like, all the ways in which the, you know, other voices are being brought in, etcetera. So, and I wanna give a little bit of empathy for that because, again, if we wanna take people with us, then, yeah, I guess we wanna make a decision also if we wanna, cut and burn and and run or whether really, the composting part, is how that's done. And I really don't think that there's gonna be a one off campaign to do that. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know if it's gonna take a long time
to get rid rid of all that kind of ideological baggage and I think, yes. I mean, I I I put some of these things on the table because they're kind of, like, I think some of the narrative playing around I mean, you know, three of these are coming from Gitcoin, which does a lot of work, Kevin, Milwaukee on trying to make new narratives in the crypto space. You know, this is my book, and then these are, like, you know, two oversized postcards that I accidentally printed. Perfect for the camera. But easier to see for the camera.
I imagine a post card sized Yeah. Post card sized post.
On imagining, a post capitalist world, that we're going to be sharing with during all these conferences. But, yeah. So I think my my feeling after hearing you say this is that if we can destroy or compost, sorry, the the hero's journey or hero's narrative in the crypto space, which is, like, a very individualistic libertarian kind of, like, space where I mean, there's a lot of emphasis on, like, the individual accumulating capital, however, in which way they can. If they accumulate a lot of capital, then they're like, wow, that guy's a genius or whatever. If we can kind of, like, try to seed these new, worlds to build or these new narratives and, like, make them something that people want to take part in Mhmm. I feel like is maybe a step in the right direction. So, like, yeah. So I'm I'm curious. We can have use the last few minutes maybe to I I'm curious to hear your feedback and thoughts on, the postcard idea Mhmm. That we had. This is from our, our developer sorry, designer, Ruben. And I remember we were, like, thinking about we were for even, an event back when we went to Berlin, you know, we were just like, what do we put on this postcard? Just like, what do we get? And he wrote this down and I was like, oh, this is great. This is this is I didn't know what it was but it was just like I imagine a post capitalist world with you and I think it's in part what I liked about it in, like, using this project as a vehicle for trying to, seed a different framework for how to look at not just technology, but, like, the socioeconomics in which it is embedded in is to, like, make an invite. Yes. I say, I imagine a post capitalist world with you. So, I mean, I'm we're explicitly saying, like, world building in a way, but also we are making it collective. We're saying we're not saying, like, we are going to do this or you have the power to, like, spend your money or whatever, which is often the way that advertising is framed. It's like, we want to do it with you. Come with us. Yeah. Which, I don't know. That was, like
I'm excited about that, but I'm curious as a Yeah. I'm sure. I'm sure. I'm sure. I'm aware of how many minutes do I have left? I'm not wrong here. No. I, I, Tony brought the sticker yesterday and I was like, ah, yeah. This is because the you're absolutely right. You just picked up on something I was gonna say which is, like, we imagine something with you. Like, you can imagine that a brand that wants to sound really personable, would do that and already, like, my my kind of flag goes up, would go up with that. Whereas Mhmm. This is a person, I, whoever is, like, putting this invitation out there. And so I I really love I mean, invitations to co create are absolutely the portal into belonging into this other world, because you you you, design yourself. You're you're creating it together. So, beautiful sensing into that. There's a person I really have started to cherish when it comes to words, and and this is, so Bayo Akomolafe, is, someone who writes, incredibly well about, I guess, what how we want to an invitation to move beyond the logics that we have grown up with. And so, you know, I'm sure you have so many conversations around post capitalism capitalism, like, who it pops up. And I think provocations are absolutely needed. And and I I would kind of, like, borrow his sensibility and please read him because he he's so good with words, so I can't do it justice. But, sometimes the, sometimes we have to also imagine how we can step beyond an existing logic because when, you know, the anti this tends to enforce this. You know? So so, and this is what I can imagine, with with the the big debate around, like, capitalism, post capitalism is, you know, how can you use this as a way in, but then also say, but what are we actually talking about? And maybe we can't even yet imagine what the imagine, like, the you know, because because in discourse, often it's been like, here's this, and then there's this post this, and then there's this post this. And, how we're trying to say it. And it's almost like, this is not about word word policing. It is about, like, and, and actually, what do you what what do you personally mean by that? You know? And then I think this is where storytelling like, words can invite storytelling so that so that we are not coming in assuming that we know what we're talking about. Right. Right.
Yeah. Yeah. Even though I do have a lot of thoughts about it. Oh. But, yeah, I think it's, yeah. I mean, it was interesting because it's like, it is it is still even though, like, it's it's collective but also personal because it's, like, it's from me to you. Mhmm. So I feel like it's a starting point still of maybe meeting where people are at who may be still in the, like, stuck in this framework of individualism to where they can then make an invite. So, like, kind of the joke that I'm trying to, like, do with this as well is, like, you know, write a letter to your post capitalist lover and I love that. Give it to them and then, like, you know, imagine with them. And it's big enough to write letters. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly.
This is that is wonderful. Something that, we we started doing in a, Tony and I, host a, a gathering, called EcoWeaving. Mhmm. And so this is the regenerative, Web three, ever growing beautiful, network. And and, one of the, you know, invitations there was to to write a letter to an ancestor, on a page of, wildflower seed paper of the region, very important. And then, and and in this letter really, and this might be someone that you haven't met before, but maybe the ancestor that you think of when you think about system change or, like, someone that you can imagine has also been going through big shifts in their life. And write sort of connect to this previous generation and then plant it and see something else grow and see maybe how, you know, things are not just linear, but connect to a sense of, circularity. And I also feel part of storytelling is gonna be a lot of ritual inventing because, you know, copy pasting other cultural rituals, I think taking invitations and inspiration from it, but I really feel that one of our creative tasks is gonna be like sense making and ritual making, for the more abstract aspects of our life. And, anyway, this came up when you'd said let I I love that. I'm totally cheering you on. This is great. Nice. Thank you.
Well, yeah, I think we're about at twenty minutes. So I wanna thank you so much for, yeah, for coming on. And if you wanna share with anyone, like, where your work is or if you wanna share any websites you wanna check out or social media or whatever whatever you prefer.
But, yeah. So mother tree labs, as one word, .com is, Tony Lai and my, sort of, research, I guess, soil. And, and we see it as a, you know, it it is our work, but because of the kind of growing mycelial community, it's really we see it as a community of practices. And for us, learning out loud, being you know, having a very, I guess, relational approach to, where people's heads are at, where projects are at, and how we can connect them and that's ever changing. Right? So, and then and then and then continuing this thinking and conversation around, like, how stories, exist. You know, the, so in, Aotearoa New Zealand, we've had some beautiful examples and experiences of how like, the traditional Maori, narrative and relationality to to nature, mother earth, like their, you you know, their their their ancestors and and, the personhood of of, nature, you know, how that's kind of being brought up after being suppressed for for, obviously, an extended period of time. And once they're also, digesting the the pain of that and the trauma of that, there's just such an incredible, yeah, there's so many examples in the world where on a small scale or even, like, nationwide scale, this is being, done and emerging. And so constantly learning and sharing whatever we can, in forms that make sense for, different localities. Nice. Yeah. Thank you. Thanks so much.