Women & Money: Reinventing Our Relationship to $$$

[Nina S]

How are we thinking about money?
What innovations have occurred to you?
What new ideas are you seeing out there?

As our economic house of cards is tumbling, how are we reconfiguring our relationship to money, both women and men?

How is restoring the 'feminine' principle, across our society, effecting changes in how we relate to money?

If money is like water, value neutral, how do we shift how it's used and understood?

How can we imagine, since money often reflects our societal relationship to power, our use and flows of money changing?

[Trisha]

Hello Nina,

I am interested in this discussion. It's a conversation friends and I have been having.

Warm regards,
Trisha

[J.T. Hessert]

Water seems like a perfect metaphor for money. Both can exist in multiple forms and can act as a vehicle for ideas, can be used to cultivate growth oppurtunities and can dissolve barriers to change. I would like to spin the analogy and expand it to include education/ knowledge... which I think is the most important natural resource available right now, and can be transported via both water and money for both constructive and deconstructive purposes.

I thought Rick Reed's presentation Collaborating on a Grand Scale: Think Systematically and Act Collaboratively reflected / proved a lot of my personal thoughts with regard to wasteful competition amongst NGOs etc., inherent danger of any social venture focusing on generating income over social impact. I hope lots of people will get exposed to the success of the project he disscussed in his presentation and subsequently take a step back and honestly re-evaluate the direction of their organizations initiatives with relation to other individuals / organizations working on similar ventures and view their geographical sister/ neighbor organizations as potential collaborators toward the desired aim of social impact rather than competitors in an effort to seek funds to enable the intent of social impact that we all should ideally share.

At this present moment I think everyones focus needs to be on innovative social impact.

( To reiterate: Rick's presentation proved on one level that it is important not to get distracted by the need to generate funds so as to enable the desired social impact; the focus must be on social impact first, generating funds to enable social impact second. )

Limited research re a specific geographic area in the U.S. supports the idea that their are actually a tremendous amount of financial resources that are annually allocated with social-change as the intent: grants, prizes, fellowships, donors, aid programs.

The obstacle seems to be conventional thinking. Conventional thinking #1 dictates that money is a critical ingrediant to achieve social impact/ social change. So the next question from the conventional thinking perspective is: securing the resources necessary to create desired impact must be a product of either A) some incoming generating venture or B) donations from funders.

As mentioned by Ms. Cousteau water can exist in multiple states: cloud vapor, snowflakes, unstable icefalls, glaciers, smooth skating ponds. And like money, water can interact with the environment in both a deconstructive and constructive way. Either way; it is a tool for creation.

Personally starting out on a recent project my challenge to myself -I work day jobs- has been to shift my focus from obtaining x amount of financial resources to fund project x... to focusing on the desired social impact outcome exclusively. And to try to create personal relationships with individuals, communities and organizations that will build their ability to use each other as tools/ resources to address root causes to social/ environmental problems that we face collectively, with the core focus being to create a system where the maximum amount of minds possible are inspired / motivated to contribute innovatively to the problem solving process.

With that said... I understand that income generation is a key element to sustainable design of any kind of social-change initiative; so am accepting donations (smile). And more seriously... I will admit to being skeptical of Rick Reed's projects sustainability with regard to remaining immune to corruption/ favor granting etc. amongst those who become entrenched in positions of power.

Maybe he can chime in here and defend the project?

There is a lot of information/ knowledge / educational material on the internet that is very much available to anyone who has time/ focus: I think one of the most worthy goals of any organization is to inspire people to become involved in self-motivated learning with the end intent

[J.T. Hessert]

continued from above:

learning with the end intent....

being to empower and educate others so that they too can become part of the problem-solving process.

There really is no ceiling on what a person can learn if they are motivated and have access to the internet. I think providing people with the inspiration to become motivated is a very worthwhile goal, and something that the Bioneers conferences succeed at, and something I hope my project will succeed at.

Ideas -- like money and water -- can exist in multiple forms, and can be used for both constructive and deconstructive purposes.

Interesting topic, would be interested to hear from others.

[Nina S]

Hi, JT...
re: Rick Reed's project, ReAmp, I don't think anything's immune to corruptability, but do believe that building systemic collaborations is vitally impt, and requires far more focus on
process along the way, than most projects allow time for.

There are always those who may not agree with a systemic focus, but many, over time, are won over - at least that's what I understand has been the case with Rick's project.

I'm attaching a project description here, for those who may be interested.
Nina

[Nina S]

Hi, Trisha,

What's most interesting to you about it? There are so many facets, I look forward to hearing/reading...

Thanks for writing!
Nina

[Calliope Inguz]

My favorite way of thinking about money is with Hazel Henderson's "Economy Cake" illustration, aka "Total Productive System of an Industrialized Society."

Link to it here: http://hazelhenderson.com/totalProductiveSystemIndustrialSociety.html

The base of the cake is Mother Nature. Next layer, resting on this, is the Love Economy - that is everything that happens as a result of social cooperation. Both of these are of course non-monetized.

Next layer is the Underground Economy - those things that have become monetized but still are below the radar.

Finally, you get the GNP Public Sector, resting on all that has come before. And finally, finally, you get the GNP Private Sector - basically the icing on the cake. And of course speculation is the froth on the icing.

And of course those bottom, non-monetized layers of the true economy are exactly the ones relegated to the "feminine" realm. To me, the first step is realizing that those underlying value flows, especially the ones in the Love Economy, are the real "water". And what you said in your Sunday remarks about nurturing relationships is exactly to the point.

[J.T. Hessert]

Thanks for that sketch Calliope. I regret the tone of my earlier post and would like to revise it: I think the RE-AMP (http://www.reamp.org/aboutreamp) project is impressive and a very exciting model to learn about. My skepticism evolves from: theoretically if you remove the figurative lubricant of funding stream sourced from the Garfield Foundation (who deserve a thank you) will the project sustain itself: and furthermore... could it be proved that all the NGO's / foundations within the network of member organizations would willingly align themselves for a similar project independent of the funding stream...

Basically: could Rick Reed take the model established @ RE-AMP in the midwest - hand in hand with his professional expertise and credibility etc. - to another geographical area in the United States... recruit willing participation of all regional NGO's etc., assess their collective funding and help them develop strategic collective goals via the creation of a steering committee, and develop (just like RE-AMP) working groups which enable all participating organizations to capitilize on teamwork; "networking, direct support, coordinated tactics, and group- fundraising. By working together, we all work smarter and faster."

So my question is: is the injection of money into the system the key -- or does the RE-AMP model really revise the system itself? Or are both are at work? Can it be proved that money is value neutral?

I hope this doesn't hijack the original disscussion or come across as rude; it just seemed like that particular presentation was very interesting and raised a lot of questions which tie into the metaphor of money / water, their changing values with our changing times.

When I mentioned ideas being used constructively vs. deconstructively... I was thinking of how Naomi Klein and other speakers reframed the economic troubles as an oppurtunity to push for support for a clean energy economy. peace

[J.T. Hessert]

Is the 'social cooperation' - to borrow language from Calliope's diagram - that is developed amongst midwest NGO's and foundations within the REAMP project network a result of the funding stream from the Garfield Foundation? Now that the model has been established and successful in the midwest: could it be replicated in a different geographic region by using the premise that co-operative relationships between regional NGO's etc. are of greater value than funding. Will the directors etc. of the NGO's come forward and confirm this? It seems like it would be a real challenge to replicate it without the funding stream. Any thoughts? Anyone involved in the project with feedback?

[J.T. Hessert]

To summarize: my impression is that RE-AMP uses funds to create government over regional non profits for the purpose of impacting established government / policy. To me the use of funds to facilitate the development of this government-like organizational structure over the regional NGOs etc. with the intent to influence the real world government system lends itself to eventual corruption; consistent to that which exists in our current government. Eventually the organizational structure REAMP created will behave like the ineffective government it is working to influence. I think its a short term solution that does not address the real problem.

[Nina S]

I've emailed Rick and his colleague, Jennie, and asked them to log on, when they can, as I'd welcome their input to this.

Re: other financial system structures, I've been exploring The Gift Economy, which has modeled various barter structures, and also Bernard Leitaer's notion of yin and yang economies.

He suggests (Belgian economist who designed the Euro) that a yin economy is like what occurs in Bali, where everyone contributes to the care and upkeep of their temples, and it serves to help knit the local community together. His article called Beyond Greed and Scarcity is a good place to begin. The yang economy, he proposes, using currency, should be primarily used to facilitate trade with travelers from other regions. His analysis is that our western culture has only the yang currency, and hence a deficit in systems to knit local communities together.

Things like Ithaca Hours provide a structure for people to trade what they have and need, which seems a strong and viable model. I've heard tell that in Japan, many thousands are using a similar system to trade for care, shopping and errands to care for each others' elderly relatives. Given the looming reality of increasing eldercare we face, that's an exciting prospect to me to imagine someone replicating here.

Lots of food for thought, eh?

[J.T. Hessert]

Thanks for those links, in particular the Leitaer article and the REAMP_Article_Oct_05.pdf. I was regretting that I did not have a pen / paper during his presentation, that description / series of graphs is great I look forward to looking thru it more.

I am still very skeptical and agree it would be great if Rick or Jennie could answer some questions or even do an interview with some bioneers staff.

Systems Thinking applied to grant making seems to me to be a description of developing a privately funded government that behaves like an unelected rich oligarchy and controls A) regional perhaps even national philanthropic funds B) (more significantly) clean energy economy development.

Look at the changes that have occured in the world over the last few hundred years since the Revolutionary war when the U.S. was founded. I think at best it is a 50 year solution. A solution that is very necessary; but that doesn't address how money and power are tied to each other etc., the need to create more of a egalitarian national/ global community. If he could do it without the funds and be equally effective I would be impressed.

I am learning re how grants/ non-profits operate so my opinion might not offer much value to those who have been working within that system.

But my impression is that the funds are the key.

[Jennie Curtis]

RE-AMP is actually not systems thinking applied to grant making, rather it is systems thining applied to the energy system in the Midwest to understand (as a group of interested and connected stakeholders) what needs to shift to effect change? The takeaway for NGO's is better program designs, the take away for foundations is coordinated grant making (which I admit is not common practice). RE-AMP has created a learning network (note it is not an organization in itself) whereby NGOs and foundations sit at the table together. We are finding that it levels the playing field and we are acting more like partners, rather than the foundation oligarchy that dictates the rules and asset allocations unchecked.

J.T.'s comment that "funds are key" is a notion we work hard to dispell - nonetheless these are old entrenched ways to operate and indeed I imagine that perceived access to resources may be what motivates some NGOs to participate. What they learn after "joining the network" is that there is much, much more value added to their work by being involved in RE-AMP. Truth be told, there aren't enough dollars to go around. We all operate in the world of limited resources. Hopefully, the RE-AMP model is showing that deeply coordinated action uses limited resources better. Foundations need to be partners with our advocate colleagues, not dictators of the purse.

I should add, per another comment by J.T., that there is much more funding to organizations, both members and non-members of the RE-AMP communtiy, that is not reflected in (or reported to) our community. There are no rules per say, that a donor or a NGO has to report their funding streams. It is totally voluntary to report that information. The idea is that our community benefits by sharing the information so that all understand who is working on what, what's working, what's not... Transparency is better for the whole.

RE-AMP is about 4 years old - by now it can and would exist without the Garfield Foundation. We are no longer the sole funders of the convening, network services or grants. Garfield's test along the way has been to understand that, and see benchmarks demonstrating, that the community "owns" RE-AMP and that it isn't just a contruct of one foundation which had an interesting idea.

I don't meant to imply that there aren't challenges. Of course there are. Perhaps Garfield Foundation in particular is a bit idealistic about what can be achieved by operating this way, and indeed we are still offering leadership. I also admit that foundations are not used to sharing power and some are not sure how to react to this proposition. In terms of the impact in the philanthropic sector, we are still trying to figure out how to share our experience effectively so that other can learn, and perhaps adopt.

I have been asked (in fact at Bioneers) what foundations fund RE-AMP-like processes. Sadly, I do not have a good answer. I do believe that many, many funders value, and pay for, collaborative processes. But I don't know of any which consider it a particular niche. For Garfield, we are still so fully invested in RE-AMP that we have no bandwith or dollars to move to other issue areas at this time. But we are thinking seriously how to have the discussion within the philanthropic community about it.

I hope I don't detract from your conversation, but I at least wanted to offer a few thoughts to clarify.

Wishing all well, Jennie