Impact assessment method: sustainability with existing frameworks and integral approach

September 11, 2019 IJCCR

Christophe Place

Haute École de Gestion de Genève – Geneva – Switzerland, Email : christophe.place@gmail.com

Implementation of monetary innovation for social innovation network development may be appropriate as a reliable exchange and an incentive system for community value co-creation between stakeholders and sustainable regional development. Nevertheless, some questions remain: (1) What context and objective favour the implementation of monetary innovation? (2) How to enhance and evaluate the impacts of such innovations? To contribute to these research questions, a synthesis of 4 reference currency evaluation studies and 3 assessment frameworks standards, such as Sustainable Development Goals, Impact Reporting and Investment Standards and Global Reporting Initiative, will allow us to not only improve a previous impact assessment method of 71 indicators, by integrating an integral approach categorization, but also to qualitatively assess a recently launched currency, the Léman case study, as a first impetus with 34 indicators. Beyond policy intervention, networks of individuals and organisations may integrate an impact assessment method with an integral approach and continuous improvement process, to reach economic, social, environmental, governance and cultural impacts to evaluate the interest of supporting such initiatives. Further research is needed to develop this impact assessment framework, especially a bottom-up methodology.

Article C. Place

To cite this article: Christophe Place (2018) ‘Impact assessment of monetary innovation: sustainability with existing frameworks and integral approach’ International Journal of Community Currency Research 2018 Volume 22 (Winter) 74-88 <www.ijccr.net. ISSN 1325-9547. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.15133/j.ijccr.2018.007

Forms of money power and measure of economic value. The alternative currencies coping with care of commons

September 11, 2019 IJCCR

Maurizio Ruzzene

Associazione Decrescita; RetiCS (www.retics.org); Email: ruzzene@gmail.com

ABSTRACT

Among the main causes of the current crisis, there is certainly a lack of adequate criteria to measure economic value, and this is linked to the way official currency value is designed, imbued with intrinsic and anonymous economic value. Official currencies perform their function of economic accounting only because they offer a general equivalent of all value (Marx), i.e. because they have an abstract and internal value, but this prevents them from being effective instruments of economic measure, making them unstable and relatively inexpressive of any concrete value.

Despite its importance in the current systemic crisis, the lack of instruments for measuring economic value has not warranted special attention in prevailing alternative currency schemes. This is partly related to a prevalence of approaches that limit attention to the social integration functions of alternative currencies and/or the exchange functions for reviving economic growth and full employment of resources. However, in order to restore the wider emancipative potential of alternative currencies and better address the current systemic crisis, we have to reconsider the economic measure problems mainly from the viewpoint of the links between human activities and the common conditions of existence, or life contexts, in which the flow of time has a fundamental influence.

Article Ruzzene

To cite this article: Ruzzene, M. (2018) ‘Forms of money power and measure of economic value. Time based credit for care and commons economies’ International Journal of Community Currency Research 2018 Volume 22 (Summer) 39-55 <www.ijccr.net> ISSN 1325-9547. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.15133/j.ijccr.2018.015

Classifying non-bank currency systems using web data

September 11, 2019 IJCCR

This paper develops a new classification of non-bank currency systems based on a lexical analysis from French-language web data in order to derive an endogenous typology of monetary projects, based on how these currencies are depicted on the internet. The advantage of this method is that it by-passes problematic issues currently found in the literature to uncover a clear classification of non-bank currency systems from exogenous elements. Our textual corpus consists of 320 web pages, corresponding to 1,210 text pages. We first apply a downward hierarchical clustering method to our data, which enables us to endogenously derive five different classes and make distinctions among non-bank currency system and between these and the standard monetary system. Next, we perform a similarity analysis. Our results show that all non-bank currency systems define themselves in relation to the standard monetary system, with the exception of Local Exchange Trading Systems.

Ariane Tichit*, Clément Mathonnat*, Diego Landivar**

* Clermont University, Auvergne University, CNRS, UMR 6587, CERDI, F-63009 Clermont Fd. Email: ariane.tichit@udamail.f; Clement.MATHONNAT@udamail.fr; ** ESC Clermont, 63000 Clermont-Fd. Email: diego.landivar@france-bs.com.

Keywords

non-bank money, text mining, web data, downward hierarchical clustering, similarity analysis

Article Tichit pdf

To cite this article: Tichit, A., Mathonnat, C., and Landivar, D. (2016) ‘Classifying non-bank currency systems using web data’ International Journal of Community Currency Research 20 (Summer) 24-40 <www.ijccr.net> ISSN 1325-9547. http://dx.doi.org/10.15133/j.ijccr.2016.002

The “commodity – money – commodity” Mutual Credit Complementary Currency System. Marxian money to promote community trade and market economy

September 11, 2019 IJCCR

Samo Kavčič

Šercerjeva ul.26, 4240 Radovljica, Slovenia. E-mail: kavcic917@gmail.com

Abstract

The Mutual Credit Currency System, this most radical form of endogenous money, was evaluated and compared with Marx’s Commodity-Money-Commodity requirement. A simple simulation of a small community closed loop economy was used to illustrate the functioning of two types of mutual credit currency systems. The first, dubbed MCSG, behaved according to the specifications and recommendations of the mutual credit currency system’s founding fathers, Riegel and Greco. The second, dubbed the Komoko Monetary System, or abbreviated to KMS, was a sub-type of the mutual credit currency system with some additional restrictions and one additional liberty. The main restriction introduced in the KMS was that it almost exclusively supported the exchange of only newly produced goods and services. The liberty introduced is forecast-based credit allocation. It was shown that the MCSG has an inconsistency that could potentially lead to instability. The restrictions applied within the KMS can provide a remedy for this potential flaw, while at the same time rendering the KMS compliant with Marx’s requirement. The monetary control measures applicable in KMS were discussed, which guarantee robustness and stability and make KMS a true complement to the official fractional reserve banking.

Keywords

Mutual credit system , Commodity – money – commodity, Cash flow forecast, Currency circuit, Monetary control, Endogenous money

Article kavcic pdf

To cite this article: International Journal of Community Currency Research 20 (Summer) 41-53. <www.ijccr.net> ISSN 1325-9547. http://dx.doi.org/10.15133/j.ijccr.2016.003

Vol 20 (Summer) pp. 2-23

July 28, 2016August 12, 2016 IJCCR

Psychological factors influencing the use and development of Complementary Currencies

Carmen Smith, Alan Lewis

University of Bath, Claverton Down, Bath, BA27AY, United Kingdom, Email: C.J.Smith@bath.ac.uk; A.Lewis@bath.ac.uk

Abstract

This paper presents a novel socio-psychological analysis of the motivations and experiences of mutual credit members in the United Kingdom and in the United States. Primary data comprised of interviews and participant observation, supplemented with secondary data analysis of organisation documents, and a review of the literature in psychology, sociology and economics. Group members were motivated to secure personal resilience against hardship, and the personal agency that results from this, along with the experiences of community and cultural identity positioning, motivates engagement. Consequently these groups are defined as cultural communities offering personal resilience to members through informal reciprocity. This approach, which prioritises the social aspects of exchange, has implications for the design of complementary currencies, particularly mutual credit initiatives, and demonstrates the value of engaging with the fields of psychology and sociology in developing interdisciplinary understandings of alternative economic practice.

Keywords

Complementary currency, mutual credit, sustainability, reciprocity, resilience, community

Article Smith pdf

To cite this article: Smith, C; Lewis, A. (2016) ‘Psychological factors influencing the use and development of Complementary Currencies’ International Journal of Community Currency Research 20 (Summer) 2-23 <www.ijccr.net> ISSN 1325-9547 http://dx.doi.org/10.15133/j.ijccr.2016.001

Emerging trend of complementary currencies systems as policy instruments for environmental purposes: changes ahead?

July 8, 2012August 12, 2016 IJCCR

Using complementary currencies systems as policy instruments for environmental purposes is a trend that seems to be progressively emerging in Europe. The Belgian Science Policy INESPO Project, which provides the framework for the research presented in this paper, is building on this emerging trend. The aim of the INESPO project is indeed to build new instruments for energy saving policies in the household sector based on the innovative coupling of Complementary Currencies (CC) and Smart Meters (SM). According to the rationale of the project, the new CC-SM instruments should promote behavioural changes in everyday life as well as encourage households to invest in energy efficiency. The idea behind the project is not to miss the opportunity of including an incentive scheme for behavioural change should a significant SM roll-out take place.

In order to gain insights for the design of the CC part of the instrument, a first step was to turn to projects that had in the past already used CC as policy instrument for behavioural change towards sustainability. To this purpose, projects which have pioneered this path in Europe were analysed. However, although this emerging trend for CC systems had not been left unnoticed by academics (see, for instance Seyfang, 2006 for an insightful discussion on the contribution of NU-Spaarpas to sustainable consumption, or Blanc 2010 and Blanc and Fare, 2010 for a system typology), it appeared that, to the best of our knowledge, no taxonomy of their constitutive parameters had been developed yet.

In this paper, we would like to contribute to the research on CC as policy instruments for environmental sustainability by presenting a selection of such CC systems and by proposing a taxonomy of their constitutive parameters. The resulting hierarchical classification of parameters is also intended to serve as a building tool for designing similar CC systems. However, in our view, “going down the bones” of CC systems, as it is done with the taxonomy, is not enough to make such CC systems thrive. Indeed, beyond the systematic list of parameters that will define the global architecture of the system, attention should also be given to “flesh” (e.g. expectations from stakeholders and carriers of the system) and “soul” (e.g. the conceptual framework used to build the system).

Hélène Joachain and Frédéric Klopfert

To cite this article: Joachain, H. and Klopfert, F. (2012) ‘Emerging trend of complementary currencies systems as policy instruments for environmental purposes: changes ahead?’ International Journal of Community Currency Research 16 (D) 156-168 <www.ijccr.net> ISSN 1325-9547 http://dx.doi.org/10.15133/j.ijccr.2012.022

IJCCR 2012 Joachain Klopfert

The SOL: A Complementary Currency for the Social Economy and Sustainable Development

May 29, 2012August 12, 2016 IJCCR

This paper reviews experience with The SOL, a very innovative and interesting complementary currency scheme which has been tested in France since 2007. It aims to contribute to the development of the social and solidarity economy, and contribute towards sustainable development. The SOL is the result of an informal working group who in 1998 examined the different models of existing complementary currencies schemes in the world. It aims to both introduce a new concept of wealth not exclusively based on money and to foster the social economy or third sector. Three different types of SOL are described: Co-operation SOL, Commitment SOL, and Dedicated SOL, and the paper reflects on the currency’s strengths and weaknesses, and developmental issues for the future.

Marie Fare Volume 15(2011) Special Issue D57-60

IJCCR 2011 Special Issue 11 Fare

To cite this article: Fare, M. (2011) ‘The SOL: A Complementary Currency for the Social Economy and Sustainable Development’ International Journal of Community Currency Research 15 (D) 57-60 <www.ijccr.net> ISSN 1325-9547 http://dx.doi.org/10.15133/j.ijccr.2011.022

HOUR Town – Paul Glover and the Genesis and Evolution of Ithaca HOURS

May 23, 2012August 14, 2016 IJCCR

Ithaca HOURS are, arguably, the most successful of the local currency experiments of the last two decades. At the height of their popularity in the mid-1990s, perhaps as many as 2,000 of Ithaca and region’s 100,000 residents were buying and selling with HOURS. The high profile of HOURS in the Ithaca community has prompted a series of articles, television news segments and documentaries, primarily for the popular media. Though constituting valuable documentation of an intrinsically interesting phenomenon, these reports has tended to be fragmentary and ahistorical, thus lacking in context in terms of the longitudinal evolution of the Ithaca region’s political economy. The present study attempts to remedy these lacunae in our understanding of the genesis and evolution of Ithaca HOURS by presenting a systematic account of Ithaca’s experiment with local currencies over the past decade and a half through the person of Paul Glover, the individual most closely associated with the founding and developing of HOURS. The article follows the activist career of Glover through the end of 2003, thus placing HOURS in the context of Ithaca’s activist community’s efforts to push the local polity and economy in the direction of ecological sustainability.

Jeffrey Jacob, Merlin Brinkerhoff, Emily Jovic and Gerald Wheatley Volume 8(2004) 3

IJCCR vol 8 (2004) 3 Jacob et al

To cite this article: Jacob, J.; Brinkerhoff, M.; Jovic, E.; Wheatley, G. (2004) ‘HOUR Town – Paul Glover and the Genesis and Evolution of Ithaca HOURS’ International Journal of Community Currency Research 8 <www.ijccr.net> ISSN 1325-9547 http://dx.doi.org/10.15133/j.ijccr.2004.003

Development at the Conjuncture of Feminism and Associationalism

May 23, 2012August 14, 2016 IJCCR

This article looks at whether or not Community Currency Systems form part of an alternative development agenda when analyzed through the lenses of feminism and associationalism. It begins by differentiating Alternative Development, as a static concept, from alternative development which is only comprehensible in its current context and form. The latter, according to the author, must involve a process of self-empowerment, a deepening of democracy and embody strong sustainability. A case study is provided of Thailand’s first CCS, Bia Kud Chum, and its encounter with state authorities. Using this example, it is shown that CCS and feminism share a recognition of the shortcomings of economic dualism and the desire to re-structure market values. Risks from this vantage point include the creation of new gender-biased institutions and an increase in women’s double burden. The associationalist analysis of CCS highlights the system’s capacity to serve as a vehicle for decentralization and potential in building networks central to economic success. However CCS proponents must be wary of co-optation into a programme which threatens the redistributive role of the state in the South. In the conclusion, it is argued that the Bia Kud Chum system was able to initiate a process of self-empowerment and encourage a deepening of democracy, and should, therefore, be considered part of an alternative development agenda.

Jeff Powell Volume 6(2002) 1

IJCCR Vol 6 (2002) 1 Powell

To cite this article: Powell, J. (2002) ‘Development at the Conjuncture of Feminism and Associationalism’ International Journal of Community Currency Research 6 <www.ijccr.net> ISSN 1325-9547 http://dx.doi.org/10.15133/j.ijccr.2002.004