Transitioning from Extractive Capital Models to Generative Capital Models

“We believe that a new economy cannot be built in vacuum. We see this as a process of metamorphosis. The ethical and aware classical players will join first to transfer their classical store value and production assets into new assets. This is in essence a transfer of resources from the old economy into the new. As the new (generative) economy builds momentum and critical mass the other more pragmatic players will join. SENSORICA and Enspiral are well-positioned to to this, because we are using tools to gather data about economic activity and because we are transparent. Without metrics and evaluation systems it is a hard sell. All players in the generative economy need to realize this, and start practising “open book accounting” or “value accounting” a la OVN, or something similar.” – Tiberius Brastaviceanu

1. Michel Bauwens:

We have today the emergence of ‘ethical’ entrepreneurial coalitions around Commons-Based Peer Production, like Sensorica and Enspiral, but obviously these emerging and nice projects are embedded in a dominant system which has another logic, so the questions emerges, how does the new ethical economy deal with mainstream forces, especially in the context of needing capital for development.

Two obvious choices are:

1) full separatism , i.e. some parts of the solidarity economy refuse any dealings with the for-profit world

2) cooptation, in which the generative ethical players start behaving extractively, echocing the old logic

The middle way is therefore to consider a set of transitional strategies which regulate the cooperation between the old exctractive economy and the new generative economy, but on the terms of the generative players !!!

But how do we get there ?

Here’s how the co-founder of Sensorica sees it:

2. Tiberius Brastaviceanu of Sensorica: on Transferring Assets to the Ethical Economy:

“If the proposition to investors is to pump $ into projects and get more $ in return, we are just feeding the beast. Instead, the proposition should be transfer of assets.

This is how it goes. When you have a major economic transition what was used to store value in the old system might not work in the new system. Smart people move their assets in order to keep their wealth. For example, selling land and buying equity in new means of production (factories) during the transition from feudalism to capitalism.

So we need to tell investors that I3C helps them to transfer their assets to the new economy, using $ to buy equity into new means of production, divesting from old business models into new business models. They give us $, to organizations like SENSORICA, and others, who function based on new relations of production, we use it during the transition to buy equipment, tools, food, pay rent, invest in infrastructure, for as long as these things are purchased in $, we scale, but we are ready to switch to other reward mechanisms, redistribution schemes and currencies. These investors gain equity in these new ventures, so they are able to maintain their wealth. But, the difference is that their role in this new economy will not be the same. They will not own p2p means of production. It’s like loosing old social status, titles and benefits during the industrial revolution, when new social classes were formed.

Essentially the message is: keep your old assets and your wealth will melt down progressively. Transfer your assets and you’ll maintain (some of) your wealth. We show you how.”

3. Joshua Vial and the people of Enspiral have their own proposal for Capped Returns on Investments:

The idea of capped returns, proposed and discussed by Joshua Vial the Enspiral Foundation and community, is to accept private investments but to cap their possible returns, after which the funded resource is ceremoniously donated to the commons, with attribution to the investor(s).

See this talk by Joshua Vial!

Of course, our own proposal for commons-based reciprocity licensing, i.e. adopting the CopyFair principles, goes in the same direction.

2 Comments Transitioning from Extractive Capital Models to Generative Capital Models

  1. AvatarJessie Henshaw

    Another approach is simply to do “inclusive accounting”, to internalize all the measurable externalities for economic accounting. Present GDP accounting doesn’t count any of them. If inclusive accounting were used at least the economy could be guided by truthful estimates of profit and loss for the economy as a whole. The current catastrophe could then be seen as produced by the opposite, “exclusive accounting” that was the fist application of computer models to business decision making, defining “the bottom line” exclusively in terms of maximizing current account profits, and so removing the consideration of any associated distributed costs to society of supporting such businesses.

    One “inclusive accounting” model is the “World SDG” for maximizing the lasting profitability of the system as a whole. It mainly offers a way to honestly and accurately attribute responsibility for the future costs of accumulating “externalities”. Then self-interest legislation could support wise investor choices and rule out unwise ones for the common interest, such as by giving capital gains tax preference to investments in truly sustainable economic infrastructures, and prohibiting the reinvestment of gains from clearly unsustainable business practices. Like Christmas toys, of course, “some assembly may be required”. Still, it’s a rather practical approach that could at least quickly expose the true scale of long term societal liabilities for current investments for short term profits, which could then be reported with with normal annual business reports so everyone sees the true whole impact of those operations.
    http://synapse9.com/signals/2014/02/03/a-world-sdg/

  2. Avatarjulian

    Is it possible to speak to someone about this? We are looking to raise a small amount of money and are interested in the new emerging models.
    Julian Noel

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