Demonetize it!

News items

Three items of news follow.

Vivir Bien has been developed to map resources for solidarity economies worldwide. 'Solidarity economies' include a wide range of non-monetary and monetary non-profit activities. The site seeks to map all kinds of commons, radical and change-directed initiatives — from experimental non-monetary activities through to sharing ideas — and threats to these kinds of resources. The idea is to inform the development of links and so contribute to achieve non-capitalist modes of living and producing.

A new video advocating a world without money — in French — can be seen here.
A transcription (also in French) is available here.

Mark Boyle — author of The Moneyless Man — has just put out The Moneyless Manifesto selling in a print edition and free online. The approach taken by Mark is very much individualistic voluntary simplicity, which non-market socialists regard as a secondary — insufficient — strategy for achieving a money-free world. Non-market socialists stress collective action and change stretching deep into the productive forces and dynamics of the ways we all live, i.e. both necessary and sufficient ways to achieve sustainable and fair economies where environmental and social values are the operating principles of production and exchange in society. At the same time there is much that Boyle advocates that we agree or sympathise with. See more details about both versions of The Moneyless Manifesto here.

What we must do

For many years before we started the Life Without Money book site and this blog, we had a MoneyFreeZone site, which was taken down last month. However, 'What we must do', a short summary of ideas discussed on the MoneyFreeZone site and in our book, can be found on the Demonetize It! site here.

A German translation, by Andreas Exner, of 'What we must do', also appears on the Social Innovation Network site. The German version is 'Geldfreie Ökonomien global und lokal: Der einzige Weg zu weltweiter Nachhaltigkeit?' and can be found here.

This is a short extract from 'What we must do':

The transition to a world without money — which is only to say that the conditions are laid for humans to establish communities based on social justice and environmental sustainability — would be created by, on the one hand, diminishing production and exchange based on a monetary, capitalist rationale and, on the other hand, progressively taking over production and exchange using non-monetary compacts. Collectively, our actions would weaken a reliance on capitalist practices and strengthen networks of compacts as alternative forms of governance, production and exchange.

How to synthesise tactics within mainstream structures and strategies pursued outside them and create a bridge, a continuum, between reforms and revolution is the greatest challenge. It will only be possible by adopting a common strategy of instituting non-monetary forms of political, social and cultural relations within a vision of a money-free society to enable people to produce and exchange transparently on the basis of use-values, i.e. directly expressing principles related to social justice, and enabling the establishment of environmentally sustainable practices. Thus we must decide on compromises regarding the best possible way forward to achieve the ultimate vision as quickly and as permanently as possible. 

Another World is Possible (Possibly)

The Greens NSW GreenVoice (Autumn 2102, p. 6) broadsheet had a review of Life Without Money. We reprint 'Another World is Possible (Possibly)' with permission of the author, Hall Greenland (who retains copyright):

In 2003 the cultural critic Fredric Jameson famously observed that it was easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism. The bad news is that the first part of that observation is now even truer: the degradation of our ecosystem has accelerated in some important respects.

The better news is that the second part is no longer as true as it was. People are again imagining the end of capitalism. The book under review is part of a growing genre of post-capitalist imaginings. Clearly the recent and continuing failures of capitalism are feeding this search for alternatives. But another and more compelling reason is that people are making the link between planetary eco-disasters and consumer capitalism. All ten contributors to this remarkable book insist on the link between the current economic system — with its money, markets and insatiable growth — and the exhausting of the planet. While other books spell this out more persuasively, the purpose of this collection is to begin to tease out the possibilities of a different economy and a sustainable relationship between society and nature.

All their prescriptions emphasise more democracy, local and regional self-sufficiency, more exchanges not dependant on money, and global equality and sharing. The contributors do this from a variety of starting points. While Ariel Salleh, for instance, draws inspiration from earlier and indigenous societies, John O’Neill (Professor of Political Economy at Manchester University) takes us back to the key economic debates of a century ago when Otto Neurath argued with Friedrich Hayek about whether non-market socialism or gung-ho market capitalism offered the best road to human happiness. Over the past 30 years Hayek’s neo-liberal ideas have been given a burl with the currently observable disastrous results; now might be Neurath’s turn. Other contributors draw inspiration from the cooperative ideas of Kropotkin, the scattered remarks of Marx on the future society and experiments like Spanish anarchist collectives, Yugoslav self-management and ‘intentional’ communities.

Even when sketching out the most utopian scenarios, there is an exciting can-do optimism in Life Without Money. But it does underplay the challenges that face those of us who see the need for a great transformation if we are able to arrive at a just and sustainable world. One of these is to convince people in countries like Australia to accept a materially simpler lifestyle. If we are going to save the planet, the over-consumption of rich societies must end to allow development of poorer ones.

This idea (known as ‘contract and converge’ and widely supported by ecologists) is a big ask and involves tackling consumerism. The buying of stuff now appears to be the way many people establish their identity and status, give meaning to their lives and express themselves. It also satisfies our addiction to novelty. The authors seem to assume that a rational realisation of ecological limits will lead people to give up incessant shopping and throw themselves into free time, cooperation, art, spirituality, family life, a sense of community and equality. That’s a huge assumption.

But if you thought that this search for a more sustaining life was something that only preoccupies Greens, Buddhists, radical Christians, anarchists and eco-socialists, you’d be wrong. The Sydney Morning Herald is now touting a ‘national wellbeing index’ to measure Australia’s progress (or lack of it). Gross Domestic Product is only one element in the index – others being equality, education, health and the state of the environment.

When a mildly liberal newspaper is looking beyond how much stuff is sold to gauge human progress, then a book like Life Without Moneymay be the canary in the mine, signalling it’s time to come up for some fresh air and new thinking.

2012 Nobel Prize for Economics

Here's a reprint of the post that Adam Buick, contributor to Life Without Money, wrote for the Socialism of Your Money Back blog (16 October 2012):

Sometimes the Nobel Prize for Economics is awarded to someone who has made a useful contribution rather than providing ideological justification for some government policy within capitalism.

For instance, in 1998 it went to Amartya Sen whose work had shown that famines are not caused by an absolute shortage of food but by a collapse in the ability of some people to buy or exchange something for food. In 2009 it went to Elinor Ostrom, whose research exposed the myth of “the tragedy of the commons” by showing that in practice where commons existed they had been managed by the community and did not break down through the self-defeating selfish behaviour of those have access to them.

This year this prize has between awarded to two people, one of whom denies that he is an economist, for the study of transactions “where price is not an issue”. Something that could be socially useful as socialism will be a society where price won’t be an issue

According today's the Times:

“Their studies helped to improve efficiency in markets where price was not an issue, matching doctors to hospitals, students to dorm rooms and organs to transplant patients.
It led ultimately to the creation of kidney exchanges, where donors could save a relative even where there was no biological match. In essence, a husband wanting to save his wife by donating a kidney but whose blood is not compatible instead donates to a stranger, whose own relative donates back to the man's wife.
Such matching arrangements are essential in most Western countries where organ-selling is illegal, and the free market cannot do the normal work of resource allocation.”

and

“Professor Shapley, who is 89, began the theoretical spade-work in the 1950s and 1960s, using game theory to analyse different matching methods. In the 1990s, Professor Roth, now 60, working independently, applied similar theories to more practical matters, helping to allocate student doctors to particular hospitals and later providing the theoretical underpinning to streamline organ donation. Professor Roth is regarded as an authority on a field known colloquially as ‘repugnance economics’ — in essence, the study of transactions where the application of the price mechanism is regarded as morally repugnant, such as the sale of body parts, sperm and eggs, prostitution and even dwarf-throwing.”

''Repugnance economics", is that the socialist answer to the "Economic Calculation Argument"?

Adam refers us to the Economist's View blog too, where Arindrajit Dube has a post, 'A Nobel for planning'?, which explores how, confusingly, 'exchange' has come to mean both market and non-market activities.

Of food, talks and forums

Lots has been happening — including our Blue Mountains region gearing up for lots of projects and energy into constructing a peak everything alternative — and I've neglected this blog for a couple of weeks so this post makes a few different points.

Firstly, have you caught up with the great article 'Treating food like stocks and shares is a recipe for disaster', on how financial sector transactions are impacting on food prices? It's by Heather Stewart and appeared in the 14 October issue of The Observer. It provides leads to other useful articles and links.

Secondly, take a look at our U-Tube video of extracts from the 30 May forum on Life Without Money in London.  Derek Wall (Green Party councillor, former Principal Speaker for the Green Party and author of Babylon and Beyond and The Rise of the Green Left) was in conversation with me and Life Without Money contributor Adam Buick (regularly published in the Socialist Standard) at Bolivar Hall, 54 Grafton Way, London. That night around 40 people participated in a stimulating discussion on why we, as a society, need to go money-free and how we might do it. We'd already posted a transcript of Adam's talk here (below).

Thirdly, each year the Postgrowth Institute leads a Free Money Day in mid-September, which seems to be more of a consciousness-raising event than anything else. This report again leads and links to further material on this year's activities.

Fourthly, just to report that at least 20 people turned out to chat about themes in Life Without Money on Thursday 11 October at 6.30 pm when Anitra talked with Clair Woods to over 20 people at one of the In Conversations series held regularly at Travellers Bookstore in Collingwood, Victoria, Australia. The main focus was experiences of daily life in two remarkable North American intentional communities, Twin Oaks (Virginia) and Ganas (NYC), and in Spain exploring squats (such as Can Masdeu, Barcelona) and a 'post-industrial village', Ca La Fou. The event was For more details email Claire Woods at shop@travellersbookstore.com.au or phone (03) 9417 4179.

Kirk Huffman’s take on Vanuatu

Veteran ABC (Australian Broadcasting Commission) journalist Sean Dorney recently interviewed Kirk Huffman on his 'Making land work' article in Explore magazine — Radio Australia, 28 September, here. Some excerpts follow.

DORNEY: Kirk Huffman argues that the drive to try to make land in Melanesia economically productive under the "Making Land Work" policy is misguided — that it will simply lead to land alienation, ongoing disputation and probably poverty.

HUFFMAN: ... land has been working for Melanesians, and working well for Melanesians for thousands of years. It's just that, I guess, any sort of project that economists, development economists are involved in — because they only think about money — they think that land is not working for someone unless it's making money. That's a bit ridiculous in Melanesia where you've got the world's highest percentage of people who are still basically self sufficient and still living on their own traditional land. The land is actually the biggest employer in the whole of Melanesia! It doesn't just sort of hand out shillings at the end of every week like in the White Man's World. In the White Man's World money has become the God. Everything is focused around this thing called money. If you look at money, modern money, from a Melanesian point of view the closest comparison you can make is that it's rather like an addictive drug. It's useful and beneficial in small quantities but if you over-do it it can become addictive and very socially divisive. And you get what we call in Vanuatu: 'Sick belong money!' Money sickness.

... It does seem to me a little bit strange that something that is promoted as development is something that essentially means that traditional land custodians essentially lose control over their land. There must be a better way around all this. There must be a better way around all this. OK, if you want development — right, one needs this, one needs that — we all know that. But let's have the kind of development that is relevant for us. You know, we don't need outdated and faulty economic theory forced onto, essentially, almost self-sufficient island nations and cultures. Because if you pull them into, fully into the modern, highly unstable financial situation a little glitch or a hiccup or a collapse on the far side, the isolated side of the world like, for example, the United States or wherever, you could actually affect people in Melanesia. And it's not fair! You'd think economists would actually learn something. It needs economists to respect the fact that there may be parts of the world that their type of economic theory does not fit. It's actually a clash of cultures between a Western, money obsessed, capitalistic, individualistic system against Melanesian systems which are actually much, much older, a lot more sophisticated, a lot more communally-orientated, a lot more geared to self-sufficiency and profound thinking about ways of looking at the environment where you're actually part of the land. The land is actually part of you ...

Gifting economies and climate change timeline

Arena, an Australian magazine of left political, social and cultural commentary has just published a great review article of Life Without Money: 'Gifting economies: Modelling alternative economies at the grass roots'.

Patrick Jones, who has practiced self-sufficiency and collective sufficiency for a long time in Central Victoria, has written a cogent article ranging over recent international literature and developments to contextualise our collection. He explains how at one time he would have considered life without money as 'a flaky ideal' and 'utopian wishfulness' but now, having lived a simple lifestyle and striving to achieve sustainable practices, he regards the scenario as:

manageable, achievable and critically necessary in preparing for the unavoidable and ensuing crises: economic contraction, climate change, energy descent, greater social division and aggregating ecological 'overshoot' and estrangement: in short, the results of hypertechnocivility, or progress-capitalism, peaking.

In this vein, I suggest following — and contributing to — the World Resources Institute's timeline of 'natural' disasters, i.e. extreme weather and climate events, for 2012.

Natural capital

There are few phrases that trigger more irritation in me than 'natural capital'. From a Marxist point of view, 'social capital' is simply absurd; all capital is materially made from social work (work for money) and nature. On the one hand, we are part of nature, so you might reduce all capital to nature. On the other hand, capital is wholly social so we get back to relationships, meaning and power.

The point is 'natural capital' is shorthand for a strategy of capitalisation of more and more of our planet. The most disappointing aspect of the rise of the natural capital concept is that many environmentalists have supported its growth, say, in the form of carbon trading and carbon credits. The Corner House, however, is one the research centres that continues to reveal the dangers of this trend — well worth a browse and read.

The Corner House crew also provide useful analyses of the global financial crisis, its 'management' and consequences. And in the Power Point, 'What news on the Rialto with notes', Nicholas Hildyard shows the fallacy of treating the difficulties in the financial sphere as simply technical in the all-too-common 'finance-as-car-' perspective.

The analysis ends like this: 

I like to contrast the 'finance-as-car' approach to that of the hero of Richmal Compton’s Just William tales. For those who do not know the books, William is a 1930s school boy growing up in a suburban English village. His sole object in life is to enjoy as much time with his gang as possible, without the interference of grown ups.

William is daily preoccupied with resisting his parent’s well meaning, but deeply intrusive, plans for him. He does not organise his resistance around tactics but around strategic goals.

He knows what he wants. And he does not compromise his overarching aim to achieve short term gains. His actions always serve his longer-term strategy. If he plucks low hanging fruit, it is from the right tree.

He knows adults have different and conflicting interest to his. They are there to be circumvented. He never confuses sympathy from adults for his cause with a convergence of goals.

He knows that simply confronting adults is always likely to end in defeat. So he organises to undermine their power, to erode and discredit it. And then to act.

William knows his own powers and their limitations. And he acts to expand those powers by looking for small openings, which he can exploit to his own ends. He is forever on the lookout for the vulnerabilities of the adult world.

Were William to be confronted by the new Rialto that is financialised capitalism, I suspect his first instincts would be to seek allies that shared the same political outlook and analysis, not just discontented fellow travellers; to probe for vulnerabilities; and to search out sites of resistance where campaigns can best be used to promote longer term strategic ends rather than achieve short term but easily reversed gains.

Go William!

BTW, 'Richmal Compton' was a woman ...

Alternative Indicators for Well-being for Melanesia: Vanuatu pilot study

Alternative Indicators for Well-being for Melanesia: A Vanuatu Pilot Study has revealed that: 79 per cent of Vanuatu citizens (ni-Vanuatu), including 92 per cent for rural dwellers, can access their customary lands; 90 per cent of ni-Vanuatu have knowledge of the boundaries of their customary land; 88 per cent believe that this land is sufficient to meet their needs; 95 per cent of those with access grow their own food to eat and build their own homes.

How many of us in the rest of the world can point to the sources of our livelihood with such a direct and profound sense of right and responsibility?

Vanuatu still has a vibrant traditional economy that has served it well for thousands of years. It has supported a population several times larger than the present one with enough healthy organic food for all men, women, and children, and continues to do so for most ni-Vanuatu today. It supported living conditions for extended family units — with housing, cooking and sanitation facilities — supported community organizations by providing places for congregation and interaction, and continues to do so for most ni-Vanuatu today. The traditional economy is culture. It is how society organizes itself to provide for the livelihoods of its members.

Perhaps the most intriguing finding from this study on ni-Vanuatu well-being is that of TORBA Province, the northern most province in the country with the lowest GDP per capita and least access to markets ... in effect the most 'economically handicapped' and, coincidentally, the Province with the highest subjective well-being (or, happiness) of any other province by a significant amount. It is also the province with the highest perceived equality, highest levels of trust in neighbors, most positive assessment of traditional leaders, highest rates of community interaction, and the list goes on.

Neo-environmentalism, money and growth

Last month there was a great article by Paul Kingsnorth in The Guardian: 'The New environmentalism'. Here are some extracts to encourage you to read the whole piece (it's not long):

Neo-environmentalism is a progressive, business-friendly, postmodern take on the environmental dilemma. It dismisses traditional green thinking, with its emphasis on limits and transforming societal values, as naive. New technologies, global capitalism and western-style development are not the problem but the solution...

According to the neogreens, growth has no limits ... Wilderness does not exist, "nature" is a human construct, and everything that matters can be measured by science and priced by markets. Only "romantics" think otherwise.

... The neo-environmentalists are growing in numbers at present not because their ideas are new, but because they offer a business-friendly worldview which, unlike the tiresome old green message, is designed to make people feel comfortable ... Optimism is permitted again. Indeed, it is almost mandatory.

But maybe the green movement was asking for it. For some time, mainstream environmentalism has demonstrated a single-minded obsession with climate change and technological solutions to it, to the exclusion of other concerns. Its language and its focus have grown increasingly technocratic and scientistic...

Global campaigning for an abstract "environment" does not appear to work. What does work is engaging with nature on a human scale. Perhaps the best rejoinder to those who believe the world is a giant spreadsheet is an engagement with its messy, everyday complexity. A kind of vernacular environmentalism; an engagement not with "the environment", but with environments as we experience them in lived reality. Perhaps it's time to go back to basics.

So we might learn what grows wild in our local area and whether we can eat it. We might build up a bank of practical skills, from horticulture to land management. We might go out at night and plant seeds in vacant flowerbeds near where we live. We might work on small-scale engineering projects, from water purification technologies to micro-solar panels. We might work to save bees or butterflies or water meadows or woodlands or playing fields that we know and have a relationship with. We might walk in the hills, or on the canal bank, or in the local waste ground; get to know our place and how it works...