Jan Roberts

By Jan Roberts, Founder Cultural Innovations in Action I was so excited to read Jessica Gordon Nembhard’s book: Collective Courage: A History of African American Cooperative Economic Thought and Practice. It is a pathbreaking book. It took Nembhard ten years to research and write it, because the history of cooperatives and the key role of […]

American Indian tribes are the single largest private landholders in the U.S. today.  There are over 562 federally recognized tribes in the US. In the lower 48 states, reservation lands account for over 54 million acres and there are 42 million acres of Alaska Native lands. Yet, Indigenous peoples are land rich and dirt poor.

The wealth chasm between Black and White Americans began with the unpaid labor of enslaved Blacks to grow and pick cotton making it the nation’s most valued export. However, it was the use of Black human beings as collateral for mortgages that injected the most capital into the economy. (1619 Project; New York Times, Matthew

Few of us can look out at the world and what is happening and not be disturbed, angry and scared. These horrors have shone a klieg light on the ineptness and racism of our White House leadership and the inequities and injustices that people of color have long suffered. Some of us get involved in

I have been tragically remiss in the planning for my documentary on the New Economy, which is a restructuring of our economy based on the wellbeing of people, planet and prosperity. The foundation of our current economy is the slave industry and the stealing of Native American lands.  It seems critical to me that since

You may be surprised to learn that the growing Democratic or New Economy that puts people and the planet before profit is not actually new. Its principles of a thriving local economy, economic opportunities that benefit all, and ecological sustainability can be found in the Native American worldview.  Native American history prior to colonization shows