Written by Prisca Braga | Reading Time: 6 mins
In our first post, we introduced the core compass of our organization: the New Pirate Economy, which anchors us in frameworks such as post-growth/degrowth, post-development, the pluriverse, political ecology, and socio-economic regeneration. But to understand how we actually practice these ideas, it helps to look at our own history.
For many years, our actual office and headquarters was a ship navigating the Amsterdam canals. Today, our main base is on land in Oostzaan, in a farm. While our physical setting has changed, the egalitarian, rebellious spirit of that ship is very much alive and continues to guide everything we do. Examining how we moved from the water to the soil explains how our project evolved into a place-based community dedicated to systemic change.
From Valparaíso to the Canals: Our Origins
Our organization’s history began with a literal breakdown. Years ago, Ulysses, a Dutch artist and former nomad, was traveling through South America when his motorcycle broke down in Argentina. Instead of abandoning the trip, he had the intuition to hitchhike across the border into Chile and arrived in the port city of Valparaíso.
Valparaíso is a vibrant port city with a history of self-organized community art and social resistance. Rather than a polished tourist destination, Ulysses found a community where people collaborated to breathe life into decaying urban spaces. This experience formed the foundational ethos of our movement: alternative socio-economic structures are built through localized, collective collaboration rather than top-down wealth.
Upon returning to the Netherlands, Ulysses sought to replicate this collaborative environment. He acquired a hundred-year-old barge, named her Valparaíso, and the space above the hull into a communal space that welcomed travelers and volunteers from many different countries, who contributed art, ideas, music, and stories, and together created a floating hub of changemakers in the port of Amsterdam. Operating on the water forced us to confront how resources flow, how borders are enforced, and how communities can organize outside standard commercial constraints.
Leaving the Ship, Keeping the Spirit
As our engagement with political ecology and decolonial thought deepened, our organizational model underwent a necessary pivot. We realized that passing through environments on a mobile ship limited our capacity to build long-term, structural alternatives. To move beyond superficial environmentalism, we needed to establish a committed, localized relationship with a specific piece of land.
As decolonial scholar Dr. Vanessa Machado de Oliveira points out, modern capitalist systems condition us to view land either as a passive backdrop or a resource to extract (Oliveira, 2021). Moving our headquarters ashore to Oostzaan was a deliberate step to unlearn that pattern.
In Sacred Economics, Charles Eisenstein argues that our current economic crises stem from a "Story of Separation"—the false idea that human systems can function independently of the ecosystems that support them (Eisenstein, 2011). We did not abandon the Valparaíso ship; we brought its cooperative organizational framework ashore to transition toward what Eisenstein calls "interbeing"—structuring our daily operations around explicit ecological interdependence. In doing so, we try to live as regeneratively as we can, together with our human residents, our two cats, three sheep, ten chickens, and numerous plant friends!
Bioregionalism: Becoming Inhabitants of Oostzaan
To ground this terrestrial work, we use the framework of bioregionalism, a core pillar of post-growth economics. Bioregionalism argues that human societies should organize themselves around natural geographic boundaries, like watersheds and soil types, rather than artificial political or real estate lines.
In Designing Regenerative Cultures, Dr. Daniel Christian Wahl notes that systemic transition requires us to shift from being mere "residents" who consume resources in a place to "inhabitants" who actively participate in its long-term ecological health (Wahl, 2016, p. 58).
This commitment to place-based defense aligns directly with Dr. Vandana Shiva's work. In Earth Democracy, Shiva argues that true sustainability is impossible without protecting the local commons of seed, water, and soil against corporate extractivism:
"We are all connected in the web of life, and our global crises stem from the violent assumption that humans are masters and owners of the Earth. Earth Democracy connects the freedom of all beings to defend the commons of seed, water, and land, recognizing that true wealth is life itself." (Shiva, 2015, p. 9)
In Oostzaan, practicing Earth Democracy means moving away from a model of land ownership toward a model of land stewardship. We are focused on a clear question: How do we protect local biodiversity and build a localized economy of care in this exact soil?
Praxis on the Soil: Non-Formal Education in Action
As a registered foundation (stichting), our primary tool for systemic change is non-formal education. We do not treat learning as a passive, theoretical exercise. Our land base in Oostzaan functions as our primary educational tool.
Through our projects such as international youth exchanges, practical workshops, and community gatherings, our participants test post-growth theories through collective, non-extractive labor. We organize around three tangible areas:
Ecological Stewardship: Working directly on the land to implement regenerative design principles, ensuring our presence actively restores local soil health and biodiversity.
Sufficiency and Mutual Aid: Rejecting competitive, individualistic economic habits by sharing tools, managing the site through collective agreements, and prioritizing community well-being over commercial productivity.
Pluriversal Spaces: Functioning as a practical micro-pluriverse—"a world where many worlds fit" (Escobar, 2018)—by hosting international changemakers to co-develop localized tools for social and ecological transitions.
Building the Infrastructure
Historically, 18th-century pirate crews established land-based safe havens to repair their vessels, distribute resources equitably, and support one another away from the reach of oppressive empires (Linebaugh & Rediker, 2000).
Our site in Oostzaan functions as a contemporary model for these historic safe havens. It serves as an active incubator where the abstract tenets of post-growth, decoloniality, and regenerative economics are put into practice through shared labor, community management, and cooperative educational strategies.
The dominant socio-economic system is increasingly unstable; by establishing this terrestrial base, we are actively constructing the practical infrastructure for a regenerative alternative.
If you want to move past theory and get into real practice, the crew is on the ground. Join us!
References
Eisenstein, C. (2011). Sacred economics: Money, gift, and society in the age of transition. Evolver Editions.
Escobar, A. (2018). Designs for the pluriverse: Radical interdependence, autonomy, and the making of worlds. Duke University Press.
Linebaugh, P., & Rediker, M. (2000). The many-headed hydra: Sailors, slaves, commoners, and the hidden history of the revolutionary Atlantic. Beacon Press.
Oliveira, V. M. de. (2021). Hospicing modernity: Facing humanity's wrongs and the implications for social activism. North Atlantic Books.
Shiva, V. (2015). Earth democracy: Justice, sustainability, and peace. North Atlantic Books.
Wahl, D. C. (2016). Designing regenerative cultures. Triarchy Press.
About the Author: Prisca Braga is a non-formal educator, researcher, and member of the Anchor Team at The Adventures of the Valparaíso, where she shapes the association’s educational architecture and vision. Currently pursuing a Master’s in Global Political Economy and Development at the University of Kassel, she weaves together network building, program design, and systemic transition. Guided by political ecology, degrowth, and decolonial approaches, Prisca is dedicated to building regenerative learning spaces that help communities organize and thrive beyond extractive economic models.