I used to think that anybody thinking about setting up their own community currency was a bit crazy and going to get in trouble with the authorities.
To be honest, I also thought that money represented a need to get and spend whatever I had. As my interest in money and economics has grown in the last year, partly due to the downturn in Ireland in general and as this is a world wide global financial meltdown, this interest in money and local community sustainable has grown. As the economy has gotten worse, peoples faith in money and security has been knocked by the actions of, or lack of it by the Irish Government, Irish banks and their bankers, in how money is used and abused in general. This happens traditionally worldwide as well during times of financial crisis's. This was seen last with the Asian crisis in Thailand in 1998 which threatened to bring down the newly formed Asian economic union set up.
Now, that lack of faith in money, how to use it and present paths to correct growth is happening again.
So we have a once in a lifetime event to make a new direction in how we construct our path of economic growth, so can we make that transition or are we, as the founders of the state, Ireland as well as our European neighbors going to make to make that change?
There are some serious decisions to be made about Ireland's future in the E.U ahead and much depends on the Lisbon Treaty. A lot will depend on political decisions, strategic positions with an eye on future resources, and other majority factors. But lets not kid ourselves, the change is here, the people in wider government circles may try but ultimately cannot change it, as change is inevitable and the time is ripe to change our present growth patterns with GDP, export models of expansion all having to be reconsidered to align with greater levels of climate change awareness and the need for 'greener' thinking and integration.
One thing that we as local communities in Ireland, in this case, specifically Castleknock can do is start to look at developing our own currencies. The governments will try to keep the economy from certain collapse, with various PR statements, politicians will promise and economists will argue. There is no point and it is useless to stop the emergence of people and communities. The change is happening, people will embrace risk in change and bloom or people will not welcome it and not want this shift from tradition. The first path to change is at first resistance. The first to embrace it may be younger, current generation of young adults, as well as teenagers familiar with new technology to implement it and visionaries with a eye and means to make a change. When you think about it, change is not such a big deal once people are forced to make it. A recent example being the change over of the old Irish currency the 'punt' to the new monetary system the 'Euro' in 1999. At first, there was complaints and murmurs but in the end it was done and no one has looked back since.
Now, the idea of local circulations sounds a little out there, kind of revolutionary in a way that brought about civil war in past times. The reality is that people are not aware of how bad this global collapse may be. Most living people's lifetime or generation are not aware of the 'Great Depression' in late 1920s in the U.S and even then, there was no world wide recession with no debt through easy credit. The rules of the game have changed and we need to be aware of it. The various factors such as the financial collapse and advance of technology, and fundamentally, how information is governed will bring about society revolution.
Now, does the present idea of local community networks of town currencies seem so crazy given the once in a lifetime scenario that we face? We are flying without any map to direct us. There have been many examples of attempts to introduce local currencies to circulate, such as the LETS movement in the UK, and 'Lewes' pound which are still running and quite successful.
The innovative idea of currencies works because it is created by the people, for the people. People start to take pride in their own town, money and opportunities emergence for people. Locals can exchange goods for the local currency, and keep the money circulating locally, and or offer it for plain euros with store keepers if they wish to do so. The currency could be stored in a storage unit/safe locally secured as a clearing house. In addition, it may teach people to respect its use as it would initially be kept at a low circulation and not so easily available. It may instill some local civic pride. The printing of the paper for the currency would be kept low to experiment in a trail test prototype and see how popular it was.
Further, to prevent initial run out of paper supply, the actual circulation numbers would be kept secret with a law passed in government introduced to stop people selling the paper currency on eBay or incentives to allow them to spend the currency with a favorable exchange rate against the Euro. Special deals could be done with local businesses to stimulate some consumer spending and kick start the local economy again. If enough local currencies were started, the flow of money (albeit not a national credit flow) would start to move. At present, according to my own inquiry emailed to the Irish Central Bank, there is nothing stopping people starting their own currency, once it is not infringing on the Euro circulation or trade mark. So in theory it could be done.
The next consideration might be introducing a higher denomination of the local currency which in turn would mean higher security and higher cost. However, it may attract users and businesses given the loyalty factors in local communities. This may take time to get used to, but the benefits locally would taking reduced centralized risk and influential power in the Irish Central Bank, decision makers whom have often vested interests and other geopolitical considerations. This in turn may influence communities to intregrate.
