The Alternative

Radio - In Development for BBC World Service
3 part 47” documentary series

Presenter/Writer - Nick Romeo
Producer - Ashley Pollak

From wealth inequality to climate change, the problems of our late-stage capitalist economic system can seem daunting and unsolvable. Yet innovative ways to build a more humane economy are not just possible, they’re already here.

In this series we will immerse the audience in three extraordinary living experiments - working alternatives to the capitalist system that are already thriving around the world. What if an entire economy was cooperatively organised? What if cities were designed to fight climate change?  And what would the true cost be of the products we buy? 

Journalist, critic, and essayist, Nick Romeo (author ‘The Alternative: How to Build a Just Economy) takes us on a whistlestop tour of the world’s most inspiring new model societies, living, working and socialising as a local in each location.

We’ll learn about the one-eyed priest who helped start a co-operative experiment in an impoverished Spanish town in the 1950s. Now the Mondragon co-ops employ 80,000 people in everything from manufacturing to grocery stores. We’ll meet locals as they work and play, exploring how their collective spirit shapes the culture of the region, one of the least unequal in Europe.

We’ll see how the city of Oslo is reimagining everything from graveyards to construction sites in their journey towards a low-emission future. With one of the world’s most audacious carbon reduction goals, with fewer cars, more wild animals, and cleaner air.

And in the Dutch town of Groningen, he’ll discover the ‘True Pricing’ being pioneered by local retailers, including the Albert Heijn supermarket group. The evolving experiment reflects the true cost of cheap goods on humans and the natural world in the purchase price with the goal of of-setting these impacts.