Creating an alternative economy and organization of production implies a transformation of the relations and ways of inter-personal functioning that have been inculcated into hierarchy culture and the capitalist system. The following analysis will give some insights into intentional ways of creating a new culture that can serve as an inspiration for the organizations that want to create an alternative to the mainstream. We can learn from these advanced forms of cooperation for other co-operative projects.

I interviewed dozens of members of two egalitarian communities (also called communes), rural Acorn community in Virginia, US (consisting of 30 adults and one child at the time of research in 2014) and suburban Kummune Niederkaufungen near to Kassel in Germany (consisting of 60 adults and 20 teens and children in 2016). Egalitarian communities constitute a more advanced version of experimenting with alternative economy than ecovillages. They share labor, land, and resources according to one’s needs and everyone contributes in a chosen way to reproductive and income-producing endeavors. They apply the principle of consensus to their decision-making.

How the communes maintain good vibes?

In both communities, there are weekly meetings to discuss and make decisions. They are also an occasion to get updates on the lives of individual members and communal affairs. In Niederkaufungen, there is a general meeting once a week and working groups that discuss specific topics meet according to their own schedules. In Acorn, another weekly meeting is scheduled to discuss a proposed topic with a moderator. This may serve as a preparation for decision-making during weekly General Assembly.

In both communes, all kinds of conflicts, all kinds, including romantic breaks-ups are seen as a communal affair. There are several people who volunteer to be mediators in such cases and help the conflicted to communicate. One of Niederkaufungen’s enterprises is a training center for non-violent communication (it is a method and theory developed by Marshall B. Rosenberg1). Therefore, the community has experienced trainers and many of the members are familiar with the method. This, however, does not mean that there are no conflicts. Some people have not talked to each other for years as a consequence of a conflict. Some resentments are held for a long time, which is often caused by not knowing and understanding the other. They may avoid the resented person and gossip. Some people feel frustrated because decisions and changes in the life of the commune take such a long time. Discussions in groups to understand different standpoints on an issue causing a conflict also may take time.

Living in a commune is not easier than in the mainstream society – it is challenging in a different way. It involves a lot of talking: in assembly, in smaller groups, informal exchanges. Gossiping is a form of dealing with frustration. Talking seems to be a crucial factor in maintaining togetherness and self-insight.

Both communities recognize that being closer and more inter-dependent than it is usually the case in the relationships outside one’s family is a challenge. The communes have developed their own ways of
maintaining community spirit and good relations among communards.

Acorn:

• regular personal updates, so called “clearness process” : “This measure consists of weekly check-ins – short sharing of how one feels during a weekly meeting, presenting one’s wellbeing and plans towards the community once a year, and obligation to talk with each community member in a one-on-one conversation at least once a year. The latter one is reported during the weekly community meeting. For example, someone shared that the obligatory conversation made her realize that she had a lot in common with someone she hardly talked to all the year.” (Gajewska 11 October 2016)
• principle of no “withholds”: “The principle of “no withholds” bases on the premise that long-term frustration may result in explosion or bad atmosphere. Members schedule an appointment to share their frustration. The addressee of this revealing is supposed to abstain from responding during certain time and integrate the feedback.” (Gajewska 11 October 2016).

Niederkaufungen:

• therapy groups: Some members choose to meet regularly in meetings, for example, men’s group, to provide each other support and more insight. There is no leader or expert. Meeting and exchanging in the group aims at therapeutic effect.
• individual therapy: Some of my interviewees participated in individual psychotherapy sessions during their stay in the community. One of them reduced working hours to allow time for processing the insights from the therapy. They considered it to be helpful to change their functioning in the group. One of my interviewees observed that thanks to individual intense therapy, which was made possible by lowering work load for this period, this person started to perceive other members differently, with less projections and blaming others.
• practicing non-violent communication: the members that I interviewed seemed to have internalized the principles of Rosenberg’s method. They process their emotions and ask what is behind a conflict. Also other members may step in to talk about a disagreement and help conflicted parties understand their needs better.
• rules regarding the use of mobile phones and similar devices: they are allowed only in private spaces and they shall not be used in the common area such as communal dining room.

Cultivating communal skills in the mainstream world

Creating an alternative reality to the one imposed by neoliberal agenda requires capacity to organize, be part of a group, commitment to collective efforts. These skills are a base for cooperative enterprises, consumer self-organizing, and other forms of collective autonomy. Many of my interviewees mentioned that work is different in their communes because they can show up the way they are. There is less pretending. I am convinced that culture can be shaped despite our conditionings. It is an interesting human adventure to look into the mystery of inter-personal relations. Many of the communards that I interviewed revealed intentional personal and group work on this very aspect. They undertook practical steps to make it work. So can we.

Short description of Acorn and Niederkaufungen

Acorn community is a farm based, anarchist, secular, egalitarian community of around 32 folks, based in Mineral, Virginia. It was founded in 1993 by former members of neighboring Twin Oaks community. To make their living, they operate an heirloom and organic seed business, Southern Exposure Seed Exchange (“SESE”), which tests seeds in the local climate and provides customers with advice on growing their own plants and reproducing seeds. They work with about 60 farms that produce seed for them, which they test for good germination, weigh out, and sell or freeze for future use. The seeds are chosen according to their reproduction potential so that gardeners can reproduce seeds from the harvest instead of buying them every season. The enterprise conducts and publishes research on the varieties so that customers take less risks when planting them. Acorn is affiliated to the Federation of Egalitarian Communities, a US network of intentional communities that commit to holding in common their land, labor, resources, and income among community members.

Kommune Niederkaufungen consists of about 60 adults and 20 teenagers and children. It was founded in the late 1986, after three years of preparing and campaigning. Meanwhile other income-sharing communities have been established in the region of Kassel. They are a left wing group, with positions that range from radical and social feminist, through green/ecologist standpoints, over Marxism and communism, to syndicalist and anarchist positions. Many communards are active in political groups and campaigns in Kaufungen and Kassel. Nowadays, they are economically autonomous. Their enterprises include elderly daycare, child daycare, training in non-violent communication, a seminar center, catering and food production, carpentry. Some members are salaried outside of the commune. To become a member, one needs to give all the property and savings to the commune. However, it is possible to negotiate a sum of money in case of exit from the commune to start a new life. The commune is a member of German network Kommuja. To read more about the commune, see: https://www.kommune-niederkaufungen.de/english-informations/

Authors’s articles on both communities (you can find references included in this article)

1. Gajewska, Katarzyna (Autumn 2018): Practices and skills for self-governed communal life and work: examples of one US and one German egalitarian community. Journal of Co-operative Studies 51(2): 67-72.
2. Gajewska, Katarzyna (25 June 2018). How to Start and Maintain a Micro-Revolutionary Project. Grassroots Economic Organizing (GEO). http://geo.coop/story/how-start-and-maintain-micro-revolutionary-project
3. Gajewska, Katarzyna (2017): Kommune Niederkaufungen – jak się żyje w 60-osobowej wspólnocie. [Kommune Niederkaufungen – on living in a 60-person commune], quarterly Nowy Obywatel [New Citizen].
4. Gajewska, Katarzyna (9 October 2017): Raising children in egalitarian communities: An inspiration. Post-Growth Institute Blog http://postgrowth.org/raising-children-in-egalitarian-communities-an-inspiration/
5. Gajewska, Katarzyna (11 October 2016): Egalitarian alternative to the US mainstream: study of Acorn community in Virginia, US. PostGrowth.org http://postgrowth.org/egalitarian-alternative-acorn-community/ , first published in Bronislaw Magazine
6. Gajewska, Katarzyna (21 July 2016): An intentional egalitarian community as a small-scale implementation of Post-Capitalism. P2P Foundation Blog https://blog.p2pfoundation.net/an-intentional-egalitarian-community-as-a-small-scale-implementation-of-postcapitalist-peer-production-model-of-economy-part-i-work-as-a-spontanous-voluntary-contribution/2014/12/27
7. Gajewska, Katarzyna (10 January 2016): Case study: Creating use value while making a living in egalitarian communities. P2P Foundation Blog, http://blog.p2pfoundation.net/an-intentional-egalitarian-community-as-a-small-scale-implementation-of-postcapitalist-peer-production-model-of-economy-part-ii-creating-use-value-while-making-a-living/2016/01/10
8. Gajewska, Katarzyna (27 December 2014): An intentional egalitarian community as a small-scale implementation of postcapitalist, peer production model of economy. Part I : Work as a spontanous, voluntary contribution. P2P Foundation Blog, http://blog.p2pfoundation.net/an-intentional-egalitarian-community-as-a-small-scale-implementation-of-postcapitalist-peer-production-model-of-economy-part-i-work-as-a-spontanous-voluntary-contribution/2014/12/27
   This is a shortened and modified version of the article : Katarzyna Gajewska (Autumn 2018): Practices and skills for self-governed communal life and work: examples of one US and one German egalitarian community. Journal of Co-operative Studies 51(2): 67-72.
   This article contains excerpts of already published texts in Creative Commons and is under Creative Commons licence.

Katarzyna Gajewska, PhD, is an independent scholar, workshop leader, and transformational guide. She has published on alternative economy, universal basic income, non-digital peer production, collective autonomy, food and health. You can contact her at: k.gajewska_comm(AT)zoho.com.
List of publications here
Facebook: Katarzyna Gajewska – Independent Scholar

1 Marshall B. Rosenberg was the founder and director of educational services for The Center for Nonviolent Communication.

Header image: “The Poop Deck is a humanure toilet with two seats. The sign adjusts that way in case you want company while you do your business.” – The picture was taken in Twin Oaks egalitarian community. Picture and picture description by Raven Cotyledon from Commune Life (creative commons)

The post The Art of Maintaining “Good Vibes:” lessons on practices and skills from two egalitarian communities appeared first on P2P Foundation.

This is the third part of a series that presents egalitarian communities, mainly Acorn community in Virginia, to shed some light on the way that the postcapitalist mode of production in the physical world could work. It should be noted that the opinions presented here are not necessarily those of the founders or members of the community where I have done research. I interpret my findings with regard to their significance for this economic change and their reflection on the postcapitalist mode of production. Acorn community does not define itself as a peer production project so the following analysis is not an evaluation of the implementation of peer production theory into practice. It is instead an extrapolation from their practice to how peer production organizations in the physical world could operate in the current system and in the future.

The term peer production refers to various ways of organizing production that are distinct from the state and market logics. The main characteristics of this form of production are: 1) Self-selected spontaneous contribution of participants in the production process;{1} 2) creation of use value rather than exchange or market value, which results in free access to public goods; {2} 3) non-delegation and distributed coordination, in contrast to hierarchical state and market providers. The first article of this three-part series focused on the consequences of self-selected spontaneous contribution as a model of organizing work and the second one presented a model of producing the use value despite the necessity to survive in the capitalist system. In this article, I will examine how the principles of non-delegation and distributed coordination can be translated in the reality of the physical world. Clearly, there are some elements of Acorn’s governance that resemble this model.

Non-delegation and distributed coordination

Peer production organizations operate beyond the principle of delegation, which contrasts with hierarchical state and market providers. Peer production can create nonrepresentational democratic structures. The way the governance is organized in p2p projects has been studied, mainly based on the examples of online peer production and hacker spaces. The question of authority and the mechanisms of control and influence has been in the center of scholarly attention{3}.

Acorn community is an example of a peer production model where the majority of the decisions and execution of the decisions is based on non-delegation and decentralized coordination. In contrast to other examples of peer production, the decisions and the way of functioning of the community affects the lives of the members. In other cases of peer production, volunteering constitutes a small part of volunteers’ lives and does not affect their life conditions. Therefore, studying this example may help to imagine a system where peer production is the dominant mode of production.

During the weekly meetings, community inhabitants propose changes to the life and organization of the community. Issues that affect diverse aspects of community life are discussed. Every member must agree to a proposal for it to be passed, or a compromise must be made that everyone is comfortable with. Full members may block proposals.

Non-delegation implies that there is a small number of fixed rules. The decision making and rules are conversation-based and changeable. One of the rules is the 42-hour weekly labor quota (I wrote about it more in the first post). There are some rules for the counting of one’s working hours (although the accounting is almost purely for personal use as no one requests the report). The community has defined such activities as going to a doctor and exercising for up to two hours per week as labor-creditable. However, some of my interviewees considered the labor quota to be simply a measure to avoid exhaustion. One of the interviewees said that probably a case of physical violence would lead to expulsion but even this is not certain. It would be dealt with during a meeting.

Because of the non-delegation principle, it is impossible to use authority in order to enforce someone’s work contribution and choices. Therefore, members sometimes utilize other means of influence, such as indirect pressure or strike. If certain work is needed for which a specific person has skills, such as reparation of a device, they may feel pressure to do it without being ordered to do it explicitly. Being asked to step in is often enough of a motivation to pursue a task even if it would not be this person’s first choice. Another way of enforcing work contribution is giving up a task with which one feels overwhelmed and wait until other people find it necessary to step in. Or not.

Abundance and redistribution as governance model

David de Ugarte outlines in a post on June 8, 2015, a vision for a community where abundance solves the problems related to decision making on redistribution. By avoiding the conflicts over the use of resources, the need for collective decision making is reduced.
“That is, where one person’s decision does not drastically reduce others’ possible choices, the sphere of the decision should be personal, not collective. Collective choices, democratic methods and voting are ways of managing situations where, more or less explicitly, there is a conflict in the use of resources. They are a “last resort” imposed by scarcity. The point is to avoid, as much as possible, the homogenization that they involve.”

Indeed, collective decision making may consume a lot of time and life energy. One interviewee mentioned that someone’s membership had probably been refused because this person’s personality would imply spending a lot of time on decision-making and discussions. It is not clear whether this was the only reason to exclude this person but mentioning this example shows that members are wary of spending too much time on decision making.

The question about how resources are redistributed in the communities popped up quite frequently when I presented the experience to people curious about the community. For instance, someone asked what if someone eats a lot. Remembering how much food was composted during my stay at the Acorn, I could not imagine that this could be an issue. However, there are latent conflicts over food in the community. Some people are vegetarian or vegan, so they need an accommodation in their menu. There is a consensus that every day a vegan option should be prepared by the cook. For example, the community buys or produces animal products and buys beans to accommodate vegetarians. Some, however, would like the community to be completely self-sufficient and use home-grown animal products rather than buy vegan meat replacements.

The community has not yet arrived at a stage where money is not an issue. There is still a perception that some spending is made at the expense of other possible spending. The way money is spent is a source of discontent for many members that I interviewed. Some wished that certain investments in infrastructure and production tools had not been undertaken. One of the members said that this type of “collective” decision may cause temporary disengagement and frustration but in such moments, he considers what he has: he does not want to have an apartment and a job, so putting up with some decisions is a fair trade off for this comfort.

Voting with hands and feet

Operating with minimum delegation or non-delegation implies that governance is produced in either daily actions or big ruptures. I call it a system of voting with hands or feet.

Voting with hands: Acorn’s members have contrasting views on the extent to which the community should participate in the money economy. While there is a consensus that the community needs to run the enterprise, there is a difference of opinion whether their subsistence should be financed by money or whether the community should engage in self-sufficiency. The members that prefer to limit dependence on money can decide to work less for the enterprise and more for achieving autonomy. For instance, one of the members who deals a lot with food defines the creation of food autonomy for the community as one of the main objectives of his work. Since there are enough volunteers who want to care for animals, the community can produce their own animal food. In this way, people can vote by their choice of activities on where the community is going.

Voting with hands has an impact on the way the community operates, so it can be considered as a decentralized decision making system. A story of a “policeman on strike” can illustrate this point. The community used to have a system of controlling expenses. Someone was “appointed” for the position of an accountant to check the expenses. This person did not enjoy the role of “policeman” and gave up this task. Since no one took over the position, in the end, the expenses are noted by everyone using the community’s money and are accessible for review. A system of transparent decentralized control has emerged. However, voting with hands can cause some animosities, which the example of one member changing the website without anyone else’s permission illustrates.

Voting with feet: Long term frustration may evolve into bringing a new community into being. For instance, some members of Twin Oaks community did not like the structured labor system in there, so they started Acorn to accommodate their more anarchist leanings. Living Energy Farm, a radically environmental community that is being created in the vicinity of these two communities is a response to frustrations about the use of resources in these communities. Voting with feet looks easy on paper but it may be preceded by longish frustration for both those leaving and the ones who stay in a community. Some Acorners told me about a group of members that used to live in the community and then left. They were close together and made well-elaborated proposals that were probably discussed among them. The rest had an impression of being dominated.

The inner transformation for a non-delegation democracy

One of my interviewees described what the governance and work organization implies for the members in emotional and psychological terms. Sometimes it may feel lonely to be the only person caring about certain work domain or project that he committed to. Since there is no way of forcing people to be more interested, he needs to make efforts to promote what he cares about. It takes systematic work and engagement to build up a reputation that gives one more influence and support for one’s project. The non-hierarchical relations imply a lot of self-responsibility but also a feeling of empowerment. There is always a recourse and possibility to intervene. Dealing with difficulties requires more dialogue – more taking into consideration the other side. Non-hierarchy stimulates personal development.

Endnotes

{1} Don Tapscott and Anthony D. Williams, Wikinomics: How Mass Collaboration Changes Everything, Expanded Edition (London: Athlantic Books, 2008), 36. Pekka Himanen, The Hacker Ethic and the Spirit of the Information Age (Random House, 2002).
{2} Michel Bauwens and Sussan Rémi, Le peer to peer : nouvelle formation sociale, nouveau modèle civilisationnel, Revue du MAUSS, 2005/2 no 26, p. 193-210.
{3} Mathieu O’Neil, Cyberchiefs: Autonomy and Authority in Online Tribes ( London: Pluto Press, 2009); Mathieu O’Neil,, ‘Hacking Weber: legitimacy, critique, and trust in peer production’, Information, Communication and Society, 2014, vol. 17, no. 7, pp. 872-888; Kostakis, V., Niaros, V. & Giotitsas, C., Production and governance in hackerspaces: A manifestation of Commons-based peer production in the physical realm?, International Journal of Cultural Studies, February 2014, vol. 13, pp. 1-19.

What is Acorn community?

Acorn community is a farm based, egalitarian, income-sharing, secular, anarchist, feminist, consensus-based intentional community of around 32 folks, based in Mineral, Virginia. It was founded in 1993 by former members of neighboring Twin Oaks community. To make their living, they operate an heirloom and organic seed business, Southern Exposure Seed Exchange (“SESE”), which tests seeds in the local climate and provides customers with advice on growing their own plants and reproducing seeds. Acorn is affiliated to the Federation of Egalitarian Communities, a US network of intentional communities that commit to holding in common their land, labor, resources, and income among community members.

Information on sources

I spent three weeks in August 2014 at Acorn community in Virginia where I conducted interviews with 15 inhabitants of this community (accounting for about half of the membership). The interviews will be used in my book analyzing a scenario of a postcapitalist mode of production from a personal perspective. It will be published in Creative Commons license. My research trip has been co-financed by a Goteo crowdfunding campaign. Some inspiration comes from four public meetings with a member of East Wind community, which I organized in October 2014, in Strasbourg, France. In total, 47 people participated in these events.

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank my interviewees, Couchsurfing hosts, and Acorn community for their hospitality and their time. The following people have contributed to the Goteo crowdfunding campaign: pixocode, Daycoin Project, Olivier, Paul Wuersig, María, Julian Canaves. I would like to express my gratitude to these and eight other co-financers. I would like to thank for the editing and suggestions from GPaul Blundell, communard of Acorn, instigating organizer of Point A DC.

About the Author

Katarzyna Gajewska is an independent writer interested in wellbeing, alternative economy, food politics, and other issues. She focuses on personal and daily life in order to stimulate collective imagination and democratic debate.

For updates on my publications, you can check my Facebook page or send me an e-mail to the address to get updates by e-mail: k.gajewska_comm AT zoho.com

The post An intentional egalitarian community as a small-scale implementation of Post-Capitalism appeared first on P2P Foundation.

“If one wanted to crush and destroy a man entirely, to mete out to him the most terrible punishment … all one would have to do would be to make him do work that was completely and utterly devoid of usefulness and meaning.” Fyodor Dostoyevsky in The House of the Dead

I observe a lot of suffering related to senseless work. David Graeber describes the entire system of “bullshit” jobs that causes emotional suffering. The quest for sense and usefulness has attracted many to peer production projects and to intentional communities. It is one of the elements of the postcapitalist mode of production to enable people to contribute in a meaningful way, to produce use value.

In this article, I will present egalitarian communities, mainly Acorn community in Virginia to examine whether the postcapitalist mode of production in the physical world can be introduced by establishing intentional communities. It should be noted that the opinions presented here are not necessary those of the founders or members of the community where I have done research. I interpret my findings with regard to their significance for imagining the postcapitalist mode of production. Acorn community does not define itself as a peer production project so the following analysis is not an evaluation of the implementation of peer production theory into practice. It is instead an extrapolation from the practice to how peer production organizations in the physical world could operate in the current system and in the future. The main characteristics of this form of production are: 1) Self-selected spontaneous contribution of participants in the production process;{1} 2) creation of use value rather than exchange or market value, which results in free access to public goods; {2} 3) non-delegation and distributed coordination, in contrast to hierarchical state and market providers. The first article of this four-part series focused on the consequences of self-selected spontaneous contribution as a model of organizing production.

In this article, I will examine how producing use value can be translated into production in the physical world in the context of the constraints imposed by the capitalist system. I will describe how structuring production via intentional communities can generate use value at different scales: for members, for the communities movement, and for society at large. I also explore how the production of use value can be accomodated within the necessity to make a living in the present system and what role communities can play in the transition towards a system where work/working produces use value rather than exchange value? How to navigate the pressure to make a living? – this is the dilemma of many in the peer-to-peer movement. Some have already contributed to this subject: Las Indias in their blog post on the fear of selling out or Lars Zimmermann in his post on Sensorica. I hope that the examples described below will widen the range of possibilities that can be imagined.

The main tenet of the peer production model is that one’s self-selected contribution is motivated by the opportunity to pursue public interest. There is no expectation of reciprocity (access is not dependent on involvement in the production process) and the results are distributed for free. {3} According to Benkler and Nissenbaum, peer production is based on and will inculcate a new set of virtues such as self-selection and volunteerism, gift culture, and the will to contribute to a broader community. {4} Currently, most of the peer production projects in which use value is created in the form of open source and open access products results from the involvement of peers who have other sources of income than their involvement in peer production. However, the motivation behind the contribution to open source projects may be also influenced by the fact that many peers can expect a postponed monetary reward because their participation in digital peer production builds their reputation in the domain of software development. Skills development can be another reward. As long as remunerated work is necessary to sustain public benefit work, it will be difficult to see a pure example of peer production in which peers are solely motivated by the production of use value. Ignoring the material bases of survival for the contributors in a peer production project may have dangerous consequences for the entire project because it may induce motivations to overtake the project by its most active contributors. Therefore, organization models that make the for benefit contribution sustainable and meet the logic of survival are interesting to explore.

Acorn Community sustains its roughly 30 members through operating an heirloom and organic seed distribution business, Southern Exposure Seed Exchange (“SESE”), and through subsistence agriculture. The enterprise is an interesting example that integrates profit making into the production of use value.

As I mentioned in the previous post, the contribution to production is not entirely spontaneous because the members are obliged to meet 42-hour labor quota and because some members may resent people that do not contribute and consequently make it difficult for a free-rider to feel socially integrated. Therefore, the work in the community, especially within the labor quota, is motivated by self-interest, although less strictly than in the classical employment system. My interviewees mentioned that escaping the stress and anxieties of having a job in the capitalist system and sufferings related to having a boss and pursuing senseless activities were one of their main motivations for joining the community. Other individual motivations were to be able to live a healthier life and be part of a community. Many interviewees mentioned that their involvement is part of their pursuit of the struggle against capitalism. As one of them, a former environmental political campaigner, put it, he decided to shift from oppositional to propositional action. Many members see their lifestyle as an experiment that may inspire society to change. One needs to take a selection bias into account, though. The 15 individuals that I have interviewed may have agreed to be interviewed because they consider participating in the community a way of inciting a broader change. Therefore my project of spreading information and further analysis may correspond to their vision and motivation to participate in the community.

Acorn’s members do not receive a salary but rather are granted unconditional access to all the resources and services produced by the members and made available according to their needs (except for tobacco and alcohol). This is supplemented by a small monthly stipend that can cover needs that are not met by the community. All members have the same position in the community. This is one of the reasons why the community calls itself egalitarian. The enterprise produces use value by redistributing its income to all members of the community, even those who do not play a major role in the success of the business in a monetary sense, as is the case in the capitalist mode of production. Although I have not interviewed anyone who does not work for the business at all, in theory it is possible to do only domestic jobs, grow food for the community, and engage in other subsistence-related activities to fulfill one’s labor quota. Since there is no special reward for individual effort or skills, one can define their work as being closer to work for benefit rather than for profit. The system resembles what one could imagine as an advanced form of an unconditional basic income at a group scale with two modifications:

1) Access is conditional on overall conformity with the labor quota (some proponents of an unconditional basic income also are in favor of a social contribution quota).
2) In contrast to a monetary transfer, the same for everyone, almost all goods and services are freely available to all members. Actual consumption varies widely between individuals. The model looks similar to free public services. {5}

This model can be an inspiration in the discussion and imagining of how the production of use value could be imagined at a broader national scale.

Acorn business model: integrating exchange and use value

Southern Exposure Seed Exchange, the enterprise run by Acorn community, is an example of how a profit making enterprise can produce a use value. The enterprise sells heirloom seeds and provides services helping gardeners grow and preserve them for the next season. They work with about 60 farms that produce seed for them, which they test for good germination, weigh out, and sell or freezefor future use. The seeds are chosen according to their reproduction potential, by which we mean that gardeners can reproduce seeds from the harvest instead of buying them every season. The enterprise conducts and publishes research on the varieties so that customers take less risks when planting them. The orientation on reproducibility of seeds and increasing food autonomy is certainly an alternative to the major seed distributors who have an interest in generating dependency on their seeds. Instead of creating dependency on their seeds, the enterprise focuses on widening their selection, currently having about 700 varieties in stock. As a result, its promotional activities increase the biodiversity in the region.
One can compare the business model to an open hardware initiative. Expertise and a product that can be reproduced are provided to the customers. However, the customer needs to pay for the material part of the product. This model, being very locally oriented, could be implemented by other enterprises. The promotion of heirloom seeds that is a part of the enterprise’s activity can have broader impact on the environment in the local area.

Benevolent investment: earn money to change the world

The profits from the business are invested in projects that have broader social change as an objective. The material and human resources of this thriving enterprise are invested in the replication of the model in different settings. It distinguishes them from charity funding, which often is oriented on short-term goals instead of sustainable structures that would improve quality of life. Examples of investments include expanding the infrastructure of the community and helping other communities expand creating a complementary network of egalitarian communities which have developed an internal system of labour exchange. One current initiative, PointA, which wants to bring the community-organization to urban areas and benefit from urban-rural exchanges illustrates how the community’s resources can serve to increase autonomy from market forces through sharing and exchanging.

Producing exchange value and participating in the market system may actually contribute to the sustainability of the communities, making more use value production possible. A member of East Wind community in Missouri, which runs an enterprise producing peanut butter, observed that the authorities probably do not bother the community because the enterprise is one of the major taxpayers in the locality.
One of my interviewees thinks that a complete withdrawal from the money system would be the ideal final stage in the intentional community movement because as long as the community takes part in money exchanges this sustains the system. Instead, by operating on “zero dollars” and by setting an example, undermining “faith in money” would contribute to its end. Certainly, this long term vision can be achieved by creating prefigurative practices of postcapitalist modes of production. Participation in them, despite being sometimes motivated by the advantages to one’s quality of life and not necessarily the pursuit of a social change, may be an opportunity to inculcate non-hierarchical organizationalstyles and develop skills needed to live outside of the employment system.

Communities may use their resources to have an impact on society outside their network. For example, Acorn has been involved in a lawsuit against Monsanto. The Midden, an urban egalitarian community in Columbus, Ohio, enables its members’ political involvement by sharing their resources and decreasing their costs of living. A member of East Wind community (another egalitarian community located in Missouri) would like to help the local town next to his community become a place where food is grown in public spaces and accessible to all. For this purpose, the community can donate seeds and help in setting up the initiative.

The same person wanted to become a biologist before joining East Wind community but he dropped out of his studies. Now he works on experiments with aquaponics and growing trees. It is a way of continuing his passion outside of the rigidities of science funding and the limitations imposed on researchers in academia (check, for example, the writings by David Graeber). Since the labour quota in this community is 35 hours a week and includes varied activities, some time and energy may still be left for pursuing passions and creating a use value.
Securing basic needs and freeing time for useful activities by organizing into intentional communities may be a response to the dilemma that the p2p movement is facing. When the contribution is directly linked to profit, this may influence the motivation and produce other disadvantages to the final product (see Zimmermann’s post). However, the movement needs to address the subsistence problem if it wants to thrive. So by rearranging the mode of production, the communities may be places for producing knowledge and science to develop more autonomy. That may be their transitional role.

Endnotes
{1} Don Tapscott and Anthony D. Williams, Wikinomics: How Mass Collaboration Changes Everything, Expanded Edition (London: Athlantic Books, 2008), 36. Pekka Himanen, The Hacker Ethic and the Spirit of the Information Age (Random House, 2002).
{2} Michel Bauwens and Sussan Rémi, Le peer to peer : nouvelle formation sociale, nouveau modèle civilisationnel, Revue du MAUSS, 2005/2 no 26, p. 193-210.
{3} Lakhani, Karim R.; Robert G. Wolf (2005): Why Hackers Do What They Do. In: Joseph Feller, Brian Fitzgerald, Scott A. Hissam, Karim R. Lakhani (eds.), Perspectives on Free and Open Source Software. MIT Press, Cambridge, MA. Michel Bauwens and Sussan Rémi, Le peer to peer : nouvelle formation sociale, nouveau modèle civilisationnel, Revue du MAUSS, 2005/2 no 26, p. 193-210.
{4} Yochai Benkler and Helen Nissenbaum, “Commons-based Peer Production and Virtue,” The Journal of Political Philosophy 14 (December 2006): 394-419.
{5} I appreciate the comment of GPaul Blundell that helped me see the distinctions more clearly. The definition of public services in the model of unconditional basic income is one of the problems to be solved by the movement.

What is Acorn community?

Acorn community is a farm based, egalitarian, income-sharing, secular, anarchist, feminist, consensus-based intentional community of around 32 folks, based in Mineral, Virginia. It was founded in 1993 by former members of neighboring Twin Oaks community. To make their living, they operate an heirloom and organic seed business, Southern Exposure Seed Exchange (“SESE”), which tests seeds in the local climate and provides customers with advice on growing their own plants and reproducing seeds. Acorn is affiliated to the Federation of Egalitarian Communities, a US network of intentional communities that commit to holding in common their land, labor, resources, and income among community members.

Information on sources

I spent three weeks in August 2014 at Acorn community in Virginia where I conducted interviews with 15 inhabitants of this community (accounting for about half of the membership). The interviews will be used in my book analyzing a scenario of a postcapitalist mode of production from a personal perspective. It will be published in Creative Commons license. My research trip has been co-financed by a Goteo crowdfunding campaign. Some inspiration comes from four public meetings with a member of East Wind community, which I organized in October 2014, in Strasbourg, France. In total, 47 people participated in these events.

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank my interviewees, Couchsurfing hosts, and Acorn community for their hospitality and their time. The following people have contributed to the Goteo crowdfunding campaign: pixocode, Daycoin Project, Olivier, Paul Wuersig, María, Julian Canaves. I would like to express my gratitude to these and eight other co-financers. I would like to thank for the editing and suggestions from GPaul Blundell, communard of Acorn, instigating organizer of Point A DC.

Further publications

Another article on a Montreal-based enterprise where I conducted interviews for the book in progress can be found here: “There is such a thing as a free lunch: Montreal students commoning and peering food services.”A longer article on the same enterprise is published by a closed-access academic journal. Gajewska, Katarzyna (2014): Peer Production and Prosumerism as a Model for the Future Organization of General Interest Services Provision in Developed Countries Examples of Food Services Collectives. World Future Review 6(1): 29-39.

Please, do not hesitate to ask me for an electronic version at the address: k.gajewska_comm AT zoho.com

I have also published other articles related to peer production and unconditional basic income:

Gajewska, Katarzyna, “Technological Unemployment but Still a Lot of Work: Towards Prosumerist Services of General Interest,” Journal of Evolution and Technology.

Gajewska, Katarzyna, “How Basic Income Will Transform Active Citizenship? A Scenario of Political Participation beyond Delegation,” Paper for 15th International Congress of the Basic Income Earth Network, June 27th to 29th, 2014, Montreal, Québec.

About the Author

Katarzyna Gajewska is an independent (unpaid) writer and social activist. In her book in progress, she explores potential psychological consequences of transformation towards a postcapitalist mode of production in the physical world. Formerly an academic (precarious) researcher, she builds upon her scientific background in industrial relations and political science and incorporates other lenses in the analysis of a scenario of a potential future. She focuses on personal and daily life in order to stimulate collective imagination and democratic debate.

For updates on my publications, you can check my Facebook page or send me an e-mail to the address to get updates by e-mail: k.gajewska_comm AT zoho.com

The post Case study: Creating use value while making a living in egalitarian communities appeared first on P2P Foundation.

“My research project is an exploration of an alternative way of organizing the production, outside of the capitalist logic based on the obligation to work, separation between producers and consumers, and the orientation on profit and not the benefit.”

Please support this very important campaign from P2P Foundation-associated researcher Katarzyna Gajewska. You can find the crowdfunding campaing page here. It also happens to be hosted in Goteo.org,  a truly P2P-Commons oriented crowdfunding platform.

Extracted from the Campaign Site:

Basic income and organizing our lives through peer production: future scenario focusing on psychological impact

Imagine to limit the pressure to work to the minimum! Peer production combined with an unconditional basic income offers such a possibility. I will explore a scenario of reorganizing production of services and goods related to subsistence. The scenario will inform the debates on a universal basic income. Scenarios taking into account the personal perspective can help to decolonize the public discourse by freeing citizen’s imagination.

Besides, I will participate in BIEN conference in June and present my paper: “How Basic Income Will Transform Active Citizenship? A Scenario of Political Participation beyond Delegation.”

Main features

Peer production organization has mainly developed in digital content production such as Wikipedia and in the development of software products. It is debated whether this type of production organization can spread to other areas than e-governance, journalism, gaming, Internet and digital production.

Since these forms of organizing production outside of the digital world are very rare and the empirical studies on the work within peer production in physical world are very limited, one needs to develop an inductive study.

The main aim of the project is to develop a grounded theory on the operating and the consequences of peer production in physical world by applying inductive logic of inquiry and open-ended interviews. The literature on peer production and on organizations having similar principles in place can help formulating first hypotheses for empirical examination.

Why this is important

This will help to anticipate the results of developing this logic in producing services and assess whether an alternative way of organizing subsistence services can meet the structural challenges of our times. These challenges include the outflow of production from developed countries and increased productivity causing underemployment and the precarious employment, the growing proportion of population which is not able to work in full time hierarchic employment system due to aging or other limitations, and the democratic deficit inherent in the current forms of organizing services provision.

I believe that we need to create alternative scenarios to the capitalist hegemony and its “relentless campaign against the human imagination” (Graeber 2013). We know and we feel what does not work within the current capitalist system. But what a different system would look like in its very practical and daily dimension. It is difficult to think outside the box if you are emotionally bound to the current system through the employment norm and the fear. I will try.

Goals of the crowdfunding campaign

The research stay and conference in Montreal are part of my broader project. I hope to write a book but even if I don’t manage to complete a book I will publish the completed parts as articles on other sites or on a blog anyway.

In this part of the project, I will examine peer production of food services. Three peer food services collectives (People’s Potato at the Concordia University, Midnight Kitchen at the McGill University, and Ras-le-Bol at the UQAM) are present in Montréal. The biggest one is People’s Potato. These organizations meet the criteria of peer production in physical world:

1) Self-selected spontaneous contribution of participants: The volunteers can join collectives spontaneously and are assigned a task. For instance, during my explorative study in March 2013, I came to help at the People’s Potato without registering before.

2) Creation of use value rather than exchange or market value: Using services is not conditioned by the involvement as a volunteer. The production is financed by fee levies but the meals are distributed for free and broadly accessible (the largest collective produces 400 meals a weekday). One does not have to be a member of a respective university to receive a meal. This feature makes the cases interesting as they do not contain the clear group boundaries to determine who uses a resource or service, which is contrary to the factors facilitating the emergence of self-organizing.

3) Non-delegation and distributed coordination: The collectives are workers’ cooperatives with no hierarchy. The Annual General Meetings are accessible to the stakeholders and the public. The work of volunteers is coordinated by the employees of the collectives.

4) Production of material services and quality requirements: The collectives produce cooked meals (university food services). Hygiene and safety are inspected by public authorities. Further information on these organizations can be found in my World Future Review article. In the study of food services collectives, my units of analysis are the collectives as organizations and the individuals involved in these initiatives in different ways. I will gather data through interviews and observation.

Time plan:

1) BIEN conference participation and paper presentation in June

2) July and August: research on peer production, the plan is still not precise. I will apply to Acorn community in Virginia for a three-week stay. it depends whether they will accept me and whether I will be able to cross the Canadian-US border. If I stay in Montreal, I can conduct research on urban agriculture (there are some projects following peer production logic) and the restaurant Robin du Bois. The latter one operates mainly with the help of volunteers in its tasks and sharing profits with social projects.

3) During September and the first half of October: I will conduct research on university food collectives described above.

Team and experience

I am an experienced researcher and I have already started doing research on this topic.

I have published the following articles within this research agenda:

1. Gajewska, Katarzyna (2014): Peer Production and Prosumerism as a Model for the Future Organization of General Interest Services Provision in Developed Countries Examples of Food Services Collectives. World Future Review 6(1): 29-39. wfr.sagepub.com/content/6/1/29.abstract , Send me a message if you would like to receive a pdf!

2. Gajewska, Katarzyna (2014): Technological Unemployment but Still a Lot of Work: Towards Prosumerist Services of General Interest, Journal of Evolution and Technology 24(1): 104-112.

3. Gajewska, Kasia (25 July 2013): Direct Democracy in Montréal: What Can We Learn From the Maple Spring. Occupy.com: www.occupy.com/article/direct-democracy-montr%C3%A9al-what-we-can-learn-maple-spring

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