equity

More on offshore banking

Amy Goodman has just interviewed James Henry, the author of the report on offshore banking that was cited in the Guardian. You can see the interview or read a transcript at here. He makes the point that when you take offshore finance into account it becomes clear that states like Nigeria are actually net creditors. These countries don’t really have a debt problem – they have a tax problem. …

The Lot of the Currency Designer

This paper was prepared by Graham Barnes for the International Social Transformation Conference in Split, Croatia, He argues that "once we realise that currency - nay, money in general - can be designed to fulfill or support specific objectives, it sets us free. Free from the constraints of the broken pseudo-science that is mainstream economics; free to recognise that not all transactions are of equal importance; and potentially free to redesign ourselves away from our existing pervasive elite monetary hegemony and reclaim the monetary commons."

The Future of Money: Review

Published by Green Books, The Future of Money by James Robertson restates much of his thinking around monetary reform and brings it bang up to date in the context of the Euro crisis. It focuses a great deal on the arguments for governments reclaiming their right to issue money from the banks, and the enormous potential benefits to society of so doing. Highly recommended.

Preface to Sharing for Survival

Brian Davey's preface to our new book Sharing for Survival: Restoring the Climate, the Commons and Society describes climate change as a 'wicked problem', with no single, clear solution. The book therefore presents a patchwork-quilt-style diversity of responses to climate mitigation. Although the authors may differ in the specifics of what they suggest, they are united by their concern for effectiveness and equity.