Meditations on the meander out of the mess of modernity
The Plan
A conscious, coherent crisis countermeasure, emerging from Collective Intelligence & the Evolutionary Impulse.
Is there a single solution to solve all of the world’s challenges, rather than a boring, bland blend of mediocre, marginal modifications? Is it possible to embrace the despair of the human condition… and then respond consciously by ‘making a proper cup of tea?’
Yes. And, it’s not the typical ‘solution’ you might think of.
In this essay, we’ll explore how simple the way forward really is (and how it’s already emerging). We’ll also explore the significant dedication required for those who take these matters seriously and are willing to commit to conscious, aligned action.
This is going to go deep, but we’ll do our best to keep it simple. Ready?
[Edit: In response to numerous requests, we’ve now included a 3-minute overview of The Plan.]
Cosmological Overview (aka Executive Summary)
- (The ‘too-long, couldn’t-read’ version)
- We (the human species) are going through what is known as a Major Evolutionary Transition (MET) during the decade of the 2020s.
- From a Great Cosmology perspective, the energy of the Cosmos is influencing and guiding individuals and the collective in ways that we have not yet fully understood. We refer to this influence as The Evolutionary Impulse.
- The Evolutionary Impulse means that our mission is less about defining scenarios on desirable futures and more about scanning for the clues the Cosmos leaves of the future as it is already unfolding. Once we find the clues, our role is to consciously align as closely as possible to this emergent future.
- A handful of imaginal humans (like imaginal cells in the caterpillar) have been given some of these clues as to how the transition will unfold. These views are necessarily piecemeal because of the complexity involved — no single human brain can (yet) hold space for the entire transition, but a collective can. To the extent to which we can collate these views, we may develop a clearer sense of how we better navigate this Major Evolutionary Transition.
- The author of this essay has been given one such clue. This particular clue is a call to transcend the expansionist monetary system that underpins capitalism as we know it. No small feat, for many complex reasons.
- The essay highlights one emergent pathway for transcending the monetary system: Combining community inclusion currencies, backed by tokenized land trusts, to incentivize and reward human creativity and the evolutionary impulse to regenerate life… along the length of river basins, so as to restore ecosystem resilience. While that’s a mouthful, this pathway has been seeded by many pioneers already.
- The essay is a form of ‘anticipatory consciousness,’ intended to offer a sense of a possible direction. It was formulated by feeling into and taking into account what is emerging from the zeitgeist. In other words, the essay is less a personal reflection and more reflecting back on what is already unfolding. Any errors in this reflection are entirely the responsibility of the author and his still-developing consciousness.
- A collection of these essays from other imaginal humans may help us collectively assemble the MET puzzle and thereby ease the transition. Early work towards building this puzzle at the very highest levels is currently underway. [In other words, please write your version of this essay, so that your clue can be considered too!]
Part I: Three Converging Evolutions
Understanding the particular clue about emerging monetary systems (or at the very least being able to sense into a way to transcend the expansionist monetary system) requires a deep understanding of three immense bodies of research:
- The evolution of consciousness;
- The evolution of monetary systems;
- The evolution of accounting.
Let’s briefly explore each of these evolutions one by one and then bring them together into a grand synthesis.
The Evolution of Consciousness
In two excellent books (Journey to Civilization, 2013 and Emerging World, 2021), Roger Briggs identifies a progression of cultural mindsets or levels of consciousness through which mankind has evolved: survival, magical, mythical, mental, material (today) and integral (if we make it). He refers to the integral as planetary consciousness.
Key takeaways from Briggs’ thinking:
- Consciousness (unique to the human species, with no agreed-upon definition) is a dynamic process that is constantly evolving.
- An embryonic leap in species-level consciousness is being enabled by emerging technologies, globalization, and the growing awareness of the interconnectedness of all life, possibly extending into the Cosmos.
- The (potential) next human operating system that is striving to emerge will be characterized by a higher level of collaboration, a greater sense of stewardship of all living systems, and a more abundant way of life.
- The stakes are high since a leap to a higher-order operating system will be a bumpy ride. If we don’t commit to the ride, extinction will be the likely outcome.
- A transcendent leap to new ways of living will be accompanied by a new origin story, which answers the fundamental questions:
- How did the Universe come to be? How did we come to be?
- Who are we? Why are we here? What is our purpose?
- Given answers to the first two questions… How should we live on this planet? What are our potentials? What are our capabilities?
- What happens after we pass on?
The Evolutionary Impulse Defined
The Evolutionary Impulse is a force that guides life on Planet Earth towards a more conscious and interconnected future. It is the energy of the Cosmos that pushes us to evolve beyond our current limitations.
The Evolutionary Impulse is characterized by a number of qualities, including:
- Collaboration: Working together towards a transcendent world. It is not about competition or domination. It is about finding common ground (our humanity; our home) and working towards a shared future vision.
- Creativity: Finding new ways to solve challenges, even if these new ways are not incentivized by the old ways of being.
- Optimism: Setting (and holding) a clear intention about the future we desire or envision, even in the face of challenges.
- Interconnectedness: The understanding that we are all part of a larger whole and that we have a responsibility to each other, to all living creatures and to the living system, which we call Planet Earth.
- Spirituality: Finding meaning and purpose in life, beyond which existing incentive systems offer us. It is about connecting with something larger than ourselves and finding our place in the universe.
The Evolution of Monetary Systems
Money is a central part of our lives, and yet an understanding of money and how it works eludes most of us. This understanding is not taught in school — at any level — even if you choose to specialize in economics.
Despite the absence of any sense of a shared understanding of money, millions of initiatives globally are attempting to address our fundamental crises of existence. When we don’t go back to first principles, it’s no wonder we’re not making meaningful progress.
In Debt: The First 5,000 Years, David Graeber (1961–2020) argued that debt is a product of specific historical and political circumstances. It’s a refreshing take on money because Graeber was an anthropologist, not an economist. Other cross-disciplinary thinkers, like Nate Hagens, have shown how these same circumstances have directly led to the polycrisis we’re all trying to address.
Key takeaways from Graeber’s thinking:
- Debt — at the scale of the international monetary system — is not a natural or inevitable part of human society. There is no similar concept in living systems. [Edit: With thanks to feedback from Will Ruddick of Grassroots Economics, there are indigenous societies where principles such as rotational mutual aid showcase elements of small-scale community debt, where commitments are made and fulfilled in a cyclical fashion. These debts facilitate the growth of trust and reciprocity, constituting the very core of mutual aid.]
- Debt has been used throughout history as a tool of political control and social hierarchy. Extreme levels of debt exist only in class-based cultures. It does not exist in values-based cultures.
- The current debt crisis is not simply a financial problem, but rather a symptom of structural, systemic social and governance issues. Unless we remove ourselves from the hamster wheel of an expansionist monetary system backed by a political system steered by private sector greed, extinction will be the likely outcome.
- Graeber’s thinking aligns with Briggs’ ideas in that a new operating system is required. This new system should be based on principles of cooperation and mutual aid, rather than on the exploitation and domination of the poor by the rich.
The Evolution of Accounting
Accounting — while a boring topic to all except accountants — has played an essential role in the evolution of humanity. Without accounting there would be no commerce, no trade. Without commerce, there would be no nation-states, no globalization, and no Internet.
There have only been three accounting breakthroughs in the entire history of human evolution. Each breakthrough presaged a massive uptick in human societal complexity and innovation.
- Single-entry accounting: The ancient civilizations of Babylonia, Egypt, and Greece used simple accounting systems to track their assets and liabilities, originally imprinted on cuneiform tablets of clay.
- Double-entry accounting: Codified in Italy in the 14th century by Luca Pacioli, every transaction now had two sides, a debit and a credit entered in the books of both the buyer and the seller. This breakthrough laid the foundations for the European Renaissance as well as globalization.
- Triple-entry accounting: Introduced by Yuji Ijiri in 1986, the addition of a third momentum entry transparently tracks the flow of value through an organization, which can help to improve decision-making and reduce fraud. Triple-entry accounting is the foundation of modern cryptocurrencies and blockchain. Like the previous breakthroughs, triple-entry has presaged a massive uptick in human societal complexity and innovation. We’re only now getting to grips with the latent potential.
Part II: The Potential for a Momentous Leap
What do we do once we’ve wrapped our heads around these three immense evolutions: consciousness, money & accounting? In what ways do they converge, and how do they enable a momentous leap forward?
[This question is relevant to all aspects of society, but for the purposes of this essay, we will focus only on a momentous leap in our understanding of money as a tool for the coordination of human activities at scale.]
The convergence of a momentous leap in consciousness, monetary systems and accounting could enable the emergence of an entirely new grassroots, bioregional economic system that is grounded in cooperation, regeneration, and abundance. This system would be more equitable and more efficient than the current system, enabling the birth of a values-based society, transcending existing class-based societies, which — according to history — always collapse.
Let’s now explore how likely this outcome is.
Consciousness in the 2020s
Conscious individuals of today are like the imaginal cells that lie dormant in the skin of the caterpillar — waiting for the right time to coalesce. These imaginal humans are slowly coming together and beginning to activate. Early whispering suggestions of how to proceed are now forming into clearer notions of what comes next. The speed at which the imaginal human process is accelerating is bewildering and exciting: from a slow stirring at the beginning of the 21st Century to an unstoppable freight train by 2030.
What’s important is that these imaginal humans are designed to go through this experience, because what’s unfolding is The Evolutionary Impulse. This entire process is built into our human psyches and can be tapped into by those who have reached “the life stage of the cocoon.” This concept is explained further in Bill Plotkin’s excellent book, The Journey of Soul Initiation: A Field Guide for Visionaries, Evolutionaries, and Revolutionaries (2021).
The rest of the decade of the 2020s will be defined by more conscious coalescing of imaginal humans.
As we will see from Monetary Systems in the next section, time is of the essence. These individuals must not only envision a world that is based on cooperation, life-enhancement, and abundance; they must also design pathways of transformation. They must envision a world in which everyone has plenty of healthy food to eat, a comfortable place to live, and access to holistic education and transcendent systems of care. Not only must they envision this world, they must figure out how to get us there.
[We will cover what is emerging as a pathway of transformation in Part IV: The Plan.]
“Most of our contemporary cultures are life-destroying, which is very bizarre because all other life on the planet is not just life-sustaining, it’s life-enhancing. That’s how life evolves and diversifies and complexifies. Every species not only sustains its own life and in the life of its habitat but it it supports the further development and unfolding of life.” — Bill Plotkin, PhD, eco-depth psychologist.
Once envisioned, these imaginal humans must form prosocial, sovereign bioregional, regenerative nodes able to practically implement and quickly scale.
These regenerative nodes must form before the end of this decade.
Why?
To answer that, we need to look at what’s happening to monetary systems.
Monetary Systems in the 2020s
If you follow any independent financial commentator (one not beholden to mainstream media), you will know that the global financial system is close to breaking point.
One investigative reporter — Whitney Webb — has gone on record to say that the entire global banking system is experiencing a controlled demolition in order to introduce a global Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC), issued by the Bank for International Settlements (BIS). Already 130 countries, representing 98 per cent of global GDP, are exploring a CBDC.
Huge support for CBDCs comes from the World Economic Forum, which launched The Great Reset initiative in May 2020. The WEF have on numerous occasions publicly declared that 2030 is the date by which the Great Reset will have been accomplished.
CBDCs are driven by the WEFs Partnership Against Cybercrime (WEF-PAC). In January of 2023, at the annual Davos gathering, Jeremy Jurgens — number two at the WEF after Klaus Schwab — claimed that 93 per cent of cyber leaders and 86 per cent of business leaders believe that the current geopolitical instability makes a catastrophic cyber event inevitable before 2025. Later, during an interview, he asserted that a “catastrophic mutating event will strike the world in two years” — in other words by early 2025. We have been warned.
While CBDCs are relatively innocuous — when viewed through the lens of late-stage civilizational collapse — CBDCs become a dangerous form of the elite class attempting to control the masses.
In short, CBDCs — as they are currently described — are life-destroying. In other words, they are at odds with The Evolutionary Impulse, which is “not just life-sustaining, it’s life-enhancing.” While I have no evidence to refer to, I’m relatively confident that those pushing for life-destroying systems will eventually lose out to The Evolutionary Impulse. Their story will become less relevant and — if push comes to shove — the masses who have a preference for life-enhancing systems will rise up and overthrow the ruling elite. History is replete with prior examples where this uprising has occurred.
- The French Revolution (1789–1799)
- The Haitian Revolution (1791–1804)
- The Russian Revolution (1917)
- The Chinese Revolution (1949), and many more.
What happens when the ruling class starts losing relevance? They (attempt to) increase the levels of control they have over their citizenry.
According to the 7 Phases of Globalization, we entered Phase 6: Totalitarianism & Decay in 2009. From the study of collapsology, it is fairly safe to predict that increasing control will be the hallmark of the 2020s… at least until those who hunger for life-enhancing systems rise up.
There are two key takeaways from this section on Monetary Systems:
- The planet is currently in a race between systems that are life-destroying and systems that are life-enhancing. Sadly the former systems are backed by teams that are more coordinated than teams representing the latter, so this development of CBDCs needs to be taken seriously. The good news is that life-enhancing systems are evolutionarily coherent. The concept of evolutionary coherence is important because it helps us align our social systems according to how the natural world works. It also helps us to distinguish between systems that are life-enhancing and those which are life-destroying.
- Not every caterpillar successfully makes the transformation into a butterfly. In other words, The Evolutionary Impulse does not guarantee any kind of momentous leap. In some cases, imaginal cells do not come together quickly enough before the “nutrient soup” within the chrysalis runs out. The Evolutionary Impulse for imaginal humans is to literally view this as a race for the survival of the human species. And it is incumbent on the rest of us to support them wherever and however we can.
Let’s now explore how the evolution of accounting can support life-enhancing systems.
Accounting in the 2020s
The cryptocurrency and blockchain industry — based on the principles of Triple Entry Accounting — has matured significantly since Bitcoin launched in 2009, a mere 14 years ago. There are now thousands of different cryptocurrencies and blockchain projects, and the market capitalization of the entire space is over $2 trillion.
However, the cryptocurrency space has also been marked by spectacular failures and scams. The Mt. Gox exchange was hacked in 2014, and over $450 million worth of Bitcoin was stolen. TheDAO project was hacked in 2016, and over $50 million worth of Ether was stolen. There are numerous examples of smaller hacks as well as thousands of examples of outright scams. Bitcoin itself repeats many of the design flaws of existing fiat-based monetary systems. But the Wild West of the early days is slowly making way for more mature systems to emerge, developed from a more evolved planetary consciousness.
With early lessons now learned, the transparency introduced by Triple Entry Accounting has the potential to be a force for good in the world. Double-Entry accounting shenanigans like Enron, WorldCom, Tyco International, Bernie Madoff, Theranos, and Samuel Bankman-Fried are more challenging to pull off when Triple-Entry accounts are kept.
But there is an even more important reason the evolution of accounting is evolutionarily coherent, particularly when considered in relation to the convergence of our three evolutions.
Triple Entry Accounting allows imaginal humans to create entirely new monetary and governance systems that are life-enhancing, rather than life-destroying.
Just think about that for a moment. It’s profound.
Imaginal humans can create ethical monetary systems that don’t have the growth imperative that comes with an expansionist monetary system. We can create governance systems that are just and inclusive of the downtrodden. We can lift people into abundance. Not only can we do this, when we observe the clues that the Cosmos has left for us, an ethical monetary system is part and parcel of The Evolutionary Impulse.
Never before have we had the tools available to navigate the next evolutionary leap forward. Up until the 2020s, we haven’t had the maturity to handle the responsibility of building our own life-enhancing systems. What an incredible time for imaginal humans to be alive!
Conclusion
The Evolutionary Impulse and the three forms of evolution we have explored can help to create a life-enhancing world. We cannot expect life-destroying systems to make life any better, no matter how much we try. We must reimagine how we live on this planet and with each other, and we must do so with urgency. These tools can help to promote ‘right livelihood’ without the prerequisite of economic growth. We can construct transcendent governance and incentive systems that protect the environment, build stronger communities and address every Ecological, Social and Governance challenge we’re grappling with.
Here are specific examples of how the convergence of these three trends could lead to a momentous leap forward for humanity:
- More equitable distribution of resources: The current monetary system is based on debt and speculation, which leads to a concentration of wealth in the hands of a few. A new monetary system could be based on cooperation and sharing, which would lead to a more equitable distribution of resources.
- A more regenerative economy: The current economic system is based on the extraction of finite resources and the production of waste. A new economic system could be based on the principles of thrivability, which would help to restore the environment and ensure that future generations have access to the resources they need.
- A more just and peaceful world: The current economic system is often seen as a source of conflict and inequality. A new economic system could be based on cooperation and mutual understanding, which would help to create a more just and peaceful world.
As you can tell, I am optimistic about the future, when — and only when — we consider the three evolutions together. Otherwise, the future looks bleak indeed. I believe that our evolved consciousness, combined with evolved monetary systems and underscored by evolved accounting and governance have the potential to be a force for good in the world, and I am excited to see how we can shape what we have during the remainder of this decade.
But we mustn’t merely muse about these possible futures. We must actively bring them forward from the future. To help understand how this might work, we need to understand how various asset classes have incentivized human coordination throughout the 19th and 20th Centuries.
Part III: Emerging Asset Classes
With the thrill of these converging trends supporting us, let us return to the provocative question with which we opened this essay:
Is there a single solution to solve all of the world’s challenges, rather than a boring, bland blend of mediocre, marginal modifications? Is it possible to embrace the despair of the human condition and then to respond consciously by ‘making a proper cup of tea?’
Over the past few months, small groups of us have been exploring what tools and thinking are emerging that assist in creating ethical, healthy value flows out of life-destroying systems into systems that are life-enhancing.
Our exploration is guided by the following observation:
“There are no solutions; there is only the ongoing practice of being open and alive to each meeting, each intra-action, so that we might use our ability to respond, our responsibility, to help awaken, to breathe life into ever new possibilities for living justly.” Karen Barad, author of Meeting the Universe Halfway: Quantum Physics and the Entanglement of Matter and Meaning (2007)
With the scene thus set, let’s dive into what we’ve discovered (so far).
Today’s Asset Classes
Exter’s Pyramid is an economic model that visualizes the organization of asset classes in terms of risk and size. The original version was developed by American economist John Exter in 1963.
Exter’s original upside-down pyramid was divided into four levels of asset classes, with the following explanations:
- Level 1 - Natural Resources: Land, and the resources we extract from it, is the foundation of the pyramid. It is the most basic asset class and is essential for all economic activity.
- Level 2 - Labor: Labor is the human energy that is used to produce goods and services. It is the second most important asset class and is essential for economic growth.
- Level 3 - Capital: Capital is the financial resources that are used to invest in land and labor. It is the third most important asset class and is essential for economic development.
- Level 4 - Entrepreneurship: The ability to identify and exploit new opportunities based on the previous three levels is determined to be the most important asset class and is essential for economic innovation.
The asset classes in Exter’s Pyramid played an important role in the Industrial Revolution. Resources were essential for the development of new factories and mines. Labor was needed to operate these new facilities. Capital was used to finance the development of new technologies. And entrepreneurship was the driving force behind the innovation that made the Industrial Revolution possible.
The Industrial Revolution was a time of great progress for humanity. And the asset classes in Exter’s Pyramid played an important role in making this progress possible.
When we fast-forward to today, we can see that Forms of Capital have quickly surpassed the availability of Natural Resources and Forms of Labor. Entrepreneurship has been surpassed by Oligarchy. This is problematic. Each of these asset classes are under threat from a number of challenges.
- Natural Resources: As the voracious human appetite — combined with an expansionist monetary system — devours more and more natural capital, we are slowly realizing that it will become more difficult to sustain traditional forms of economic activity.
- Labor: Automation, globalization, ageing populations and the combination of Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence are all converging to make creative human endeavor less valuable than it has been in the past. Labor, until very recently, has been used to produce goods and services. We are slowly realizing that the vast pool of creative human endeavor will require a more purposeful outlet.
- Capital: The concentration of wealth in the hands of a few wealthy individuals and institutions is the predictable outcome of late-stage class-based civilizations. The field of collapsology has conclusively shown these patterns repeating over more than 5,000 years of human history. We are slowly realizing that the gigantic pools of debt we’ve created serve the smallest percentage of humans, as the entire monetary system teeters closer and closer toward collapse.
- Entrepreneurship: As innovation limited to the pursuit of purely economic growth reaches its limits, we are slowly shifting our creative minds towards addressing issues of planetary concern. The amount of innovation already available is staggering, but there is no asset class to serve this explosion of human creativity.
An entirely new asset class is essential for human progress in the remainder of the 21st century. A new asset class can help us to address the challenges facing the traditional asset classes, and it can also help us to drive innovation, create new opportunities and solve global challenges.
In short, a life-enhancing monetary system must address which asset class will underpin the emergent system.
The answer is Land Trusts, a key component of the future as it is emerging.
Part IV: The Emerging Plan
Combining Community Inclusion Currencies, backed by Tokenized Land Trusts, to incentivize and reward Human Creativity and the Evolutionary Impulse for Regeneration within River Basin Resilience Strategies.
Land Trusts
A land trust is a Public Benefit Organization that stewards (not owns) land for the benefit of the community and the regeneration of the planet. Land trusts can be used to nurture imaginal humans and those who they inspire.
Land trusts can be a valuable tool for promoting community development and stimulating the emergence of new forms of human ingenuity, focussed on the restoration of planetary health. Land trusts are the new asset class designed to help stabilize human settlements and to provide a foundation for life-enhancing governance and incentive systems to emerge.
One of the early pioneers of legally-recognized land trusts for regenerative purposes is Cormac Cullinan, a South African Environmental Attorney and author of Wild Law: A Manifesto for Earth Justice.
Tokenizing Land Trusts
Tokenization is the process of converting an asset into a digital token that can be traded on a blockchain. This process can be used to tokenize land trusts, thereby creating a digital representation of the land trust’s potential in the restoration of human and planetary thriving.
It is also possible to consider Stewardship Tokens (which shift the focus away from ownership and towards stewardship, which is the role of taking care of something).
Consider a 100-ha piece of land valued at $1m. The entire land is converted into 100 tokens, each representing 1ha and sold separately to 100 buyers for $10k each. Each token represents a stake in 1ha of the land, but this time not from an ownership perspective. Instead, it’s a stake in the importance of responsible land management and the ecosystem services provided by the land.
Tokenizing land stewardship allows for the recognition and trading of the environmental and social benefits generated by regenerative land practices conducted on the land. These activities could include carbon sequestration, biodiversity conservation, water resource management, reforestation, and a host of related activities. More importantly, the land itself represents the chrysalis in which imaginal humans are nurtured as they develop new forms of stewardship activities. The tokens represent participation in these stewardship activities, providing a means for individuals or organizations to contribute to and benefit from the positive impact on the environment and society.
This form of stewardship tokenization enables income-generating potential from Payment for Ecosystem Services or PES.
There are a number of benefits to tokenizing land trusts.
First, it can help to shift capital from harmful practices towards regeneration practices. When land trusts are tokenized, the tokens can be sold to impact investors, who will then benefit from the stewardship activities conducted on the land trust. This can provide the land trust with the capital it needs to carry out land regeneration projects.
Even better, the land trust can sell Stewardship Tokens to imaginal humans who are keen to leave a legacy associated with systems that are life-enhancing, rather than a traditional fiat-based legacy, which would be associated with life-destroying systems.
Second, tokenization can help to increase transparency and accountability in land trusts. When land trusts are tokenized, their assets are recorded on a blockchain, which is a public ledger. The token can be linked to Bioregional Progress Indicators, which are a range of indicators relating to the health of the ecosystem. This means that anyone can immediately see how the land trust is being stewarded.
Third, tokenization can help to create a more liquid market for land trusts. When land trusts are tokenized, their tokens can be traded on a blockchain marketplace or exchange. This means that investors can buy and sell land trust tokens at any time. This can help to make land trusts more accessible to investors and can help to increase the liquidity of the land trust market, particularly in the Global South.
Overall, tokenization can be a valuable tool for land trusts. It can help to raise capital for land regeneration projects, increase transparency and accountability, and create a more liquid market for land trusts.
Tokenizing land trusts is in its early development. Some of the pioneers include Joe Brewer, Alex Corren, Jeff Emmett, Sev Nightingale, and Aletta Venter. Will Ruddick pioneered a real-world application of tokens with his Community Asset Vouchers (CAVs).
One of the safest and most legally-binding asset tokenization platforms has been created through a partnership with Swarm and Mattereum, thanks to the efforts of Vinay Gupta.
Community Inclusion Currencies
Community Inclusion Currencies (CICs) are a type of complementary currency that is designed to support local businesses and communities. CICs are not legal tender, but they can be used to purchase goods and services from local businesses.
CICs can be a valuable tool for smaller communities to stimulate healthy value flows, without relying on interest-bearing debt. When people use CICs to purchase goods and services, they are essentially circulating money within the local economy. This helps to keep prices down and to promote inclusive development. CICs were pioneered by Will Ruddick in Kenya.
The Future of Community-Issued Currencies Backed by Land Trusts
Our exploration has led us to believe that Community Inclusion Currencies backed by Land Trusts are the most effective vehicle for creating healthy value flows out of life-destroying systems into life-enhancing systems. Land trusts provide a stable foundation for these currencies, and they can help to promote regenerative development, community cohesion and social justice.
The Fractal Nature of Land Trusts + CICs
Imagine, just for a moment, nodes of land trusts along a river basin. All of these nodes are actively regenerating their land and improving the quality of the water in the river. They communicate and trade with each other up and down the river, using their Community Inclusion Currencies. They cooperate with each other to improve their Bioregional Progress Indicators. Increased collaboration brings more value through external investment into the entire river basin. All land trusts are actively practising slow water, which improves the resiliency of the entire basin to floods and fires. Food sovereignty is assured because all communities are producing their own food.
Over time, a thriving local economy and healthy ecology is established in the river basin. Other river basins start taking note by replicating their efforts. In time, all river basins in a country operate on similar principles. Other countries start taking note, especially where rivers cross national borders. Very soon, the entire continent is covered with thriving river basins.
And that is how we fractally scale from small rural communities to the entire planet.
This entire concept is known as the River Basin Resilience Strategy (RBR) and was originally seeded by Joe Brewer through his work in Colombia, South America. It is the essence of The Plan, and part of the prototype we are building in the Valley of Grace in South Africa.
What’s Required?
We believe there are a number of important elements required if we are to make this healthy value flow a reality:
- A Land Trust Working Group. This group will formalize the new asset class of Land Trusts and make it appealing to institutional investors like insurance and pension funds. Interested? See this Concept Note.
- On-the-Ground Practitioners. This global network of imaginal humans will be hard at work on regenerative projects conducted on Land Trusts secured by imaginal humans while being richly rewarded through Community Inclusion Currencies and a Conservation Basic Income. Interested? See this Concept Note.
- A Practitioner Holarchy. An organization structure that functions within embedded or nested degrees of increasing complexity. Each whole becomes part of a greater, more complex whole. For example, each Land Trust has its own structures of how they organise themselves, but they collaborate within a river basin. The river basin reports back to even larger bodies (say watersheds or bioregions), which all connect to a national body, a continental body and then a global body. Interested? See this TEDx talk.
- A Global Strategic Stewardship Council. This body will define overall (but not local) governance structures, establish credibility, ensure accountability and transparency, set Bioregional Progress Indicators and more, while allowing maximum flexibility at the local level. Interested? Early work is currently underway — watch this space.
- A Global Education Campaign. This ethical campaign will establish the credibility of Land Trust Tokens and create demand for this entirely new asset class, developed from the bottom up. The new asset class stimulates healthy value flows out of life-destroying systems into life-enhancing systems. Interested? This will be one of the outputs from the Stewardship Council. In the interim, here is an extensive (and growing) Resource Database.
- Finally, evolutionary coherence will need to be maintained through an Ecosystem for Regenerative Funding. This ecosystem will need to consist of:
- Consciously aligned imaginal humans all providing different forms of capital, including Natural Capital, Human Capital, Social Capital, Manufactured Capital, Financial Capital, Incentive Capital, et al.
- Education and communication platforms, to keep the ecosystem updated on the latest developments.
- Measurement, Reporting and Verification (MRV) processes to maintain evolutionary coherence.
- Interested? Join the Ecosystem for Regenerative Funding.
Let’s get to work!
Feedback
We’d love to hear what you think! This is a work in progress and we need as many hands on deck as possible.
The easiest way to provide feedback is to comment directly below. If you know of imaginal humans, ask them to come and add their thoughts and/or write their own essays on the piece they have been given.
Finally, we already have a small but growing group actively working on what you’ve just read. If it resonates and you’d like to get involved, come and check out the program. Cohort 2 gathers from August 31st, and we’d love to have you come play with us!
About the Author
Michael Haupt is a South African applied philosopher who has lived in 16 cities on 6 continents. He spent the first 25 years of his working life in a corporate career, implementing high-end info-tech systems for household-name telecoms and financial operators around the world.
After a life-changing event in 2004, he spent 15 years in the systemic change space: consulting with think tanks and research organizations interested in changing the system responsible for the polycrisis. He walked away from the space in 2020 when he realized how few of the well-intentioned initiatives recognized — and were able to embrace — the imperative to transcend rather than transform the life-destroying system our global civilization is built on.
He is now committed to bringing to life a living laboratory and prototype of a life-enhancing system for a community of 20,000 people in a stunning valley in Western Cape, South Africa. As a solo dad to a daughter who will turn 21 in 2035, the best 21st birthday gift he can think of is a thriving model society — for her and for her children and future generations.
Michael is a polydidact with no formal education. Polydidact is a portmanteau of these two words:
- Polymath: a person who has a wide range of knowledge across a number of different fields. The term comes from the Greek words “poly,” meaning “many,” and “mathēs,” meaning “to learn.” Most polymaths share certain qualities, such as:
- A broad and deep curiosity about the world;
- A strong ability to learn new things;
- The ability to see connections between different fields of knowledge;
- The ability to apply their knowledge to solve problems in new and innovative ways.
2. Autodidact: a person who has learned a subject without the benefit of a teacher or formal education; a self-taught person. The word comes from the Greek words “auto,” meaning “self,” and “didaktos,” meaning “taught.” Autodidacts are known for their ability to:
- Learn at their own pace and in their own way;
- Be free of limitations imposed by the curriculum of traditional schools;
- Explore their interests in depth and develop their own unique skills and knowledge, applicable to current circumstances.
