Utopie Magazin

UTOPIE. magazin fuer sinn & verstand is a printed magazine with a first edition of 1000 copies at 80 pages per issue. The magazine will be published quarterly in German and will cost around 7 euros. Upon the success of our crowdfunding campaign, the first edition will be published this fall.

Besides a main topic per issue you'll find a recurring variety of sections all around the central questions on the subject.
All articles will be published in their original language together with other contributions on the magazine’s five-language website: www.utopie-magazin.org.

Alignment of the magazine

Isn´t the loss of Utopia the real crisis in current societies?

Where and how do people manage to develop and launch alternatives to the systemic structural setting of the modern world? Is this even possible or are contemporary utopian ideas too small to be effective or even noticed? What would a bigger movement look like? And who can be part of it? Is imagination the key? Or rather, the intellect? Does cultural tradition help? Does the possibility of Utopia depend on history? Does conversion begin in the mind or does it require technological achievements? What could catalyze the change? Contradictions? Awareness? Is understanding without an existential threat possible? And where is the exit? The outside?

UTOPIE magazine promotes projects, ideas and theories that pursue a system-critical, sustainable and social, as well as subversive claim. The magazine is a supra-regional and international place of discussion, bringing together alternatives and encouraging the will to configure the world and society.

UTOPIE is a bridge between intellectual cognition, radical imaginary, scientific approaches and everyday knowledge. UTOPIE is not the organ of any specific parent discourse. It is a melting pot for perspectives which need new definitions and meanings, as well as some self-irony or even humor.

Utopie represents a non-place, something outside the known and the norm. UTOPIE is convinced that living as we used to is no longer possible. UTOPIE is journey and search.

Our wish is to place utopian thinking on the agenda of the day. UTOPIE aims to overcome the lack of utopia in society as a source to feed other collective imaginations. The project brings together authors and collectives from different countries and continents familiar with free culture and the creative commons. Our will to create a Babel of voices is already itself a utopia. UTOPIE is a journey towards opening a conversation beyond the usual ideological, cultural and national boundaries.
The readers of UTOPIE deal reflectively with their immediate society and social emancipation beyond national borders and backdrops. They are curious about alternatives to the world that surrounds them. They have an affinity for art, culture and scientific topics as well as the humanities. UTOPIE answers the need for inspiration, with the search for positive and undiscovered perspectives of our immediate social environment and the grievances in the world.

We hope the magazine will radiate hypotheses that cause disquietude, commotion, action and creativity. The ideal (utopian) goal is the creation of a sense of community, which looks for new paths and new interpersonal relationships within the process and while the journey continues.

What is about to emerge here is an independent magazine, which to a large extent is founded on an impossibility. For lovers of dialectics: it could not be done if it was possible. Making it come true is just a way of showing that we have not lost the ability to implode in reality. Our assumption is that supporting UTOPIE is an inherent way of valuing the energy of those who don't resign themselves to the difficulties of the times and a way to encourage the birth of new paths to understanding “the other” and to transform “our” reality.

UTOPIE is a non-profit project which from the outset is free from the rules of the market and aims to implement collaborative forms of distribution in order to avoid conventional sales channels and to independently develop beyond advertising and market influences. To make this come true, UTOPIE needs supporters, contributors and volunteers.

If we reach our target of €5,000, the first print, with an edition of 1000 copies, will be realized. The content of the first edition, with a focus on Movement & the Myth of Technology, is ready and waiting. In reaching €10,000 we will have guaranteed the second edition which will appear around three months after the first. The focus of the second edition is Community & the Myth of Liberty. Authors, artists and translators have already been confirmed for the second edition.
If our goal of € 10,000 were to be significantly exceeded, the project would able to guarantee a third edition.

The total money collected is to be completely invested in printing and distribution.

The success of this campaign will have an important significance for the future of the project and, we also believe, for the future of a necessary debate. If we were to reach our highest goal we would be able to buttress the foundations of the project, ensuring not only the initial startup but also its continuity. With two to three print editions guaranteed, the magazine would have time to create its own alternative distribution network, essential for self-sustainability. Launched by this campaign, we believe UTOPIE can sustain itself in the future on the support of the utopian readers we seek.