14 January 2011
Developing the New Economy
Posted by Admin under: Creation; Economy; Evolution; Forum; History; Inspiration; Leadership; Organization; People; Permaculture; Resiliency; Sustainability .
.
In “Time for a New Theory of Money” (Yes! Magazine, Oct 28, 2010), Ellen Brown argues that “By understanding that money is simply credit, we unleash it as a powerful tool for our communities.”
Both the article and the comments it provoked, along with a series of related posts and lists of everything from new ways of measuring wealth to Common Security Clubs to Seven Ways to Transform Banking, open up a treasure trove of new ideas and experiments for building the new economy. One that looks immediately relevant is Community Banking Initiative of the New Rules Project. The very idea of the New Rules Project — “designing rules as if community matters” — is itself remarkable, and is a project of The Institute for Local Self-Reliance, which has been working on issues of scale of institutions and distributed ownership since 1974.
All of which suggests the need for a community-based version of a system that I experimented with back in the 1990s in the form of a business-to-business credit exchange, and with subsequent ideas for local currencies and community-focused investments. All of these are based on the realization that, as pointed out by Paul Grignon in his remarkable animated documentary, Money=Debt.
Another way of looking at this is that money equals commitment: it’s a promise to “pay” the recipient in the form of a legal currency that must be accepted by the sellers of goods and services, and it’s created by the promise of the recipient to repay it with interest. This means that the investment of money must generate more value that is recognized in the creation of additional cash or asset appreciation, a “profit” that is shared by the investor and the entrepreneur, and further increases the circulation of wealth.
My goal is to make this topic a focal point for the work of the Sustainable Leadership Forum over the next year. At the same time, as my wife and co-founder Victoria Zelin has pointed out, what seems to be of most interest to people are the field trips, not just meeting in a room to discuss issues. So how to illustrate the emergence of the new economy with a real-world exploration or adventure? Here are several of the ideas we’ve come up with:
- Visiting a recycling center
- Visiting local organic farms and greenhouses
- Look at water-and energy-related projects
- Visiting the Meadowlands Commissions and understanding their work in restoring ecosystems
- Looking at the work of the Passaic River Institute and Coalition
— and we welcome your suggestions.
More to come, but this is the basis for discussing our February 15 program.