In Episode 3 of the Social Permaculture Online Bootcamp, Ben Habib explores reclaiming more control over our subsistence through gift economies and the commons, as a compliment to food production. This video’s activity prompts participants to create a basic “gift circle” as an easily replicable model of community-level exchange to obtain some of the things we need, outside of money economy. The objective is not just to obtain more of what we need through networks of mutual aid, but also to lay the foundation of sharing and reciprocity needed for larger-scale alternative economic systems for the post-COVID19 recovery and post-carbon transition.
Taking it further
David Bollier. (2011). “The commons, short and sweet.”
Community Exchange Systems Australia.
Charles Eisenstein. (2011). “Sacred Economics: Money, gift and society in the age of transition.”
Terry Leahy. The gift economy: Anarchism and strategies for change.
New Economy Network Australia.
Sharable: People-powered solutions for the common good
Social Permaculture Online Bootcamp
With an emphasis on transmutation, Social Permaculture Online Bootcamp will explore issues, problems and anxieties associated with the COVID-19 crisis, and draw from insights from social permaculture and beyond to think about how we might respond.
Edge Dwellers Café 