Emily Race-Newmark: [00:00:00] Welcome to This is How We Care, a podcast where we look at what it means to embody care, not as an individual practice, but a collective one, and to see what kind of world emerges from this place.

Thank you for being here. I am your host, Emily Race.

Today's conversation is one where we reimagine what's possible for our economy by first understanding what some of the goals and assumptions are that drive our current economic model capitalism. 

This feels like such a potent conversation because so many of the other conversations we've hosted on this platform speak to some of the challenges of our time being rooted the capitalist paradigm.

I've also directly spoken with many loved ones who have shared the ways in which this current paradigm are exhausting, challenging, and dehumanizing, and of course I've experienced this for myself. And at the same time, I know many folks, both those who we've interviewed and people in my life, who actually don't find it helpful to point blame at capitalism [00:01:00] as this enemy, instead choosing to acknowledge that no system is perfect and that we have a lot to be thankful for within this current one. 

Which honestly leaves me confused and also curious to understand more about capitalism itself and what role it may play, if any, in creating a world that's rooted in collective care.

I'll turn it over now to our guest, Della Duncan, who will help answer this question. 

Della Duncan: The classic definition of capitalism is private ownership over the means of production. That does mean that there's the separation of a very small group who really own the means of production.

And then there's a lot of people who are alienated from their labor and really sell their labor in order to be able to meet their needs, but they don't have control over what they're producing or the means of production. Now that's the classic definition, but there's many other layers to this.

So for example, how did we come [00:02:00] to a situation where there's a small group of folks that have private ownership over the means of production? 

One way that that process is described is the process of primitive accumulation, or we could say ongoing accumulation. And what that is, is that there has been many instances of land theft, colonization, genocide of indigenous peoples, and also slavery that have led to a lot of power and the ownership over the means of production, including land for a small group of people.

So part of unlearning and interrogating capitalism, is learning about its history and how we got to capitalism. 

Another element of capitalism is its goal. So its goal really is, if you look at the metrics, like what is success? What is development? What is progress in capitalism? It's seen as growth.

And it's growth of income for the individual or personal wealth. [00:03:00] It's seen as profit, the growth of profit for a business, and the growth of gross domestic product or GDP for a nation or a country. So it's the growth of those numbers. And those numbers can come at any expense, really. They can come at exploitation and harm to people on the planet.

And as long as those numbers are growing, the economy is seen as healthy or good or progressing. And so that is another facet of capitalism that's really important. And of course, then you can see why that would be detrimental to the planet—the growth addiction, and the idea that we could grow infinitely on a finite planet.

Another in capitalism is an assumption that we as humans are homo economicus—we are rational, self—interested beings. And we also think work is a [00:04:00] disutility, meaning we actually try to do as little work as possible. There's these assumptions of who we are as humans that are really helpful because economics over the years has had physics envy. It's wanted to become more and more mathematizable or quantifiable. 

Actually, when economics was originally brought into a discipline by Adam Smith, Adam Smith was a moral philosopher and economics was in the department of moral philosophy. So it was much more open to questioning and interrogation. But it over the years has become increasingly mathematizable and quantifiable and look to things like these numerics to designate metrics of success and progress.

So that's also a problem. And part of the homo economicus model of who we are as humans is helpful to that mathematization, but therefore the assumptions of, "are we really rugged, isolated individuals? Is maximizing our own self interest really what's most helpful for [00:05:00] us at this time?" that's not interrogated, challenged, or questioned.

And I'll add one more, but this idea that we as humans cannot collectively manage land or resources together; this is called the tragedy of the commons. This idea that we as humans cannot do this together, and so it's actually better for us to privatize water, healthcare, land, etc. That that is better for the management and caretaking of that place. 

Now, I have to acknowledge Elinor Ostrom, the first woman to win the Nobel Prize in Economics, and her work really breaking this myth apart and saying, "actually there's so many communities and cultures around the world now and in generations ago that have collectively managed place and resources well through commoning, and collectively managing it together," and she came up with the principles of commoning. 

So just to say that things like this, [00:06:00] assumptions and myths have really been baked into what is capitalism and really propelled it and upheld its dominance over any other alternative. 

Emily Race-Newmark: I want to just regurgitate back things I'm hearing.

One, is that it's like almost an incomplete system because it's not taking into account perhaps, the holistic needs of our people and the planet. And then I'm also hearing that these assumptions that are baked into the system themselves are worth unpacking, questioning. 

When you look at it in that way, it's almost like, "oh, okay, it's not like we're criticizing capitalism, and then it's this very black or white conversation."

I'm almost feeling that there's an opening to now start looking at, "what is it that we truly need? And what are some solutions for that?"

Is that kind of the intention the approach that you take, or how would you frame it?

Della Duncan: Absolutely. I find it really helpful when looking at alternatives to capitalism to break it down to these assumptions and elements of it. Because then in each assumption and element, we can vision alternatives. What would be more helpful? 

The one [00:07:00] part that I might phrase differently than what you said, you said kind of capitalism may be incomplete in the way that it's not including like the holistic health and wellbeing of people on the planet.

I would rephrase to, what is the goal of capitalism? The goal is growth. The goal is growth of GDP on the larger scale, growth of profit on the business scale, growth of income on the individual scale. That is actually complete for capitalism. 

What an alternative would be is, what if growth was not an end goal, but a means to an end?

What if growth served some other goal? Like human and planetary happiness or well being. That would make it more holistic. But capitalism in itself is it's doing what it's meant to be doing. 

Emily Race-Newmark: That was Della Duncan, today's guest, and it's a true honor to speak with her because of the unique perspective that she brings as a renegade economist towards understanding our current economic system, as well as the insight that she carries around possibility for other types of [00:08:00] economies through the interviews that she leads on the Upstream podcast.

We originally recorded this conversation together in October of 2023. 

I'll now turn it over to Della to introduce herself and share some of the insights and learnings she has with us today.

Della Duncan: My mythopoetic identity right now is that of a renegade economist, and the plants that are blooming or flourishing in my Right Livelihood garden right now are that of hosting the Upstream podcast about alternative economics, serving as a Right Livelihood coach, a post-capitalist business consultant working with Fritjof Capra on uplifting systems thinking, founding the California Doughnut Economics Coalition, writing a book, caring for my mother, and facilitating and teaching in various other ways. 

Emily Race-Newmark: I'm dying to know your definition for renegade economist. It's tantalizing, like, "ooh, what is that?"

It sounds like it's needed, but tell us what it means. [00:09:00] 

Della Duncan: Yeah, the title I actually first heard from Kate Raworth, author of Doughnut Economics. She was described that is because she's really shaking up economics, and I really loved that she was called a renegade economist. And so part of it was an aspiration to be in community with folks like her. 

Essentially, to be a renegade economist to me is, there's so much about the assumptions underlying mainstream economic thinking and the way that our mainstream economic system functions that is causing suffering for humans and the planet and ecosystems.

And so to be a renegade economist is to question and challenge and interrogate mainstream economic thinking, and to uplift and to share alternatives—alternative paradigms, worldviews, values, ways of thinking, theories, stories, practices—that would actually support human and planetary flourishing and thriving instead of [00:10:00] suffering.

Emily Race-Newmark: Because you're such a wealth of knowledge and you spend so much time in this arena, I would love to look at what are some of these alternative economic models that you have seen out there? 

You mentioned California Doughnut Economics Coalition, so tell us about the work that's happening there and doughnut economics as a model. 

Della Duncan: One of the main influences for me in this realm has been Donella Meadows and her essay, Leverage Points: Places to intervene in a System.

And she ranks in this essay, acupuncture points for systems change—in order of effectiveness. 

And the top three are: changing the goal of the system; changing the paradigms of the system; and then the final, the highest, is transcending paradigms—which means holding paradigms lightly and being able to have beginner's mind or just shift between them to not get like proselytizing or dogmatic or to think there is one truth with a capital T.

So I just offer that because these alternatives are all in that realm up there. 

So changing the goal of the system, [00:11:00] this is where doughnut economics comes in. There's many communities and peoples all over the world who are thinking, "hey, the GDP metric of success for an economy, and capitalism particularly, is not helpful. It's not holistic," as you said, "it's not really measuring what's really important to us."

And we are attentive to what we measure. We are attentive to what we measure. So what could be an alternative? So people are saying, "okay, well, what if the goal was not growth or the rise of gross domestic product, but what if it was something else like happiness or wellbeing?"

In Bhutan, we have gross national happiness. Which is looking at a holistic sense of happiness is the goal of the economy instead of gross domestic product. We have the economy for the common good movement out of Austria. We have the Buen Vivir movement out of Latin and South America. We have the Wales the well being of future generations.

So we have these all over the world. And then one of [00:12:00] them that has really caught on is called Doughnut Economics. This comes from Kate Raworth, the person who brought renegade economist to my understanding.

If you imagine a doughnut in your mind, you have the center hole of the doughnut, which is meeting human needs. So imagine wherever you are, how are the needs being met in your community? How many people have access to safe, clean drinking water; to adequate education; to health care; to political voice; et cetera—your housing needs met, et cetera.

You could sketch, how are people doing where you are living, in that realm. If they're under, then they're not reaching the full doughnut hole. If they're meeting the doughnut hole, then it's called the social foundation. 

The outer part of the doughnut is what is the planetary boundaries.

And these are measured from Rockstrom and the Stockholm Resilience Center. But these are basically our planet's tipping points. So our planet can [00:13:00] sustain some shifts in things like ozone layer depletion, biodiversity loss, carbon emissions, etc. But certain tipping points really mess up our whole planetary system and can tip our planet into alternate states.

 The goal of the doughnut is to get us within the actual doughnut part, imagine some sprinkles there, where we're meeting human needs, but we're staying within the needs of the planet. The goal of the doughnut is, "let's change the goal of economies to not being growth of GDP, but be let's meet the needs of people while staying within consideration of the needs of our ecosystems or the planet."

That's the alternative goal there. 

And so the California Doughnut Economics Coalition, Which I co founded with a few other folks here, and we've just transitioned to a non profit, we are trying to do a doughnut portrait or a selfie, as they're called, for California. So we're trying to say, "how is California doing in terms of meeting human needs and [00:14:00] staying within the needs of our ecosystem?"

And then, how do we transform the goal of the California economy instead of growth, to be how do we get ourselves within the doughnut? Which Kate calls, "the safe and just space for humanity." 

Emily Race-Newmark: It's so interesting that this is one model that's gaining a lot of traction, so I'm curious why that might be? What's your guess?

Della Duncan: Kate says that we think in images and visuals, and a lot of people when you say, "okay, what do you think of when I say economics, like macroeconomics or econ 101," a lot of people think of a supply and demand curve.

So her offering of the doughnut is a visual representation. There's something about it being like a visual form that is really helpful for our remembering of it that's useful. 

The second thing though, is that in the center of the doughnut on the planetary scale, she's drawing from the Sustainable Development Goals from the United Nations.

And then on the outer ring of the planetary boundary, she's drawing from the Stockholm Resilience [00:15:00] Center. So drawing from places that are already doing large data collection and analysis and using them, I think brings some validity.

The other reason though is some of these other examples that I gave are very cultually specific, for example, gross national happiness, it has a lot of Buddhist influence from being from the kingdom of Bhutan, which is a very Buddhist country. So there's certain things like in the survey, they'll say, " do you believe trees are the home of spirits and deities?"

That's one of their indicators for your connection with nature and ecological well being. Now that would not be as relevant elsewhere, and you could change it, but there's certain things that have come out of place that are beautiful. It's great to have the diversity of the alternative goals, but also the unity.

And I think the doughnut really can be something customizable, but also pretty universal and it's got some validity and rigor to it being connected with these other institutions. 

Emily Race-Newmark: Yeah, [00:16:00] totally hear that. If you were to really break down what you're doing with the California Doughnut Economics Coalition, it's putting it into the visual, which is so powerful, right?

To just be like, "where are we now?" 

And to now provide a new visual model for what that looks like. 

But then what does that second piece look like in terms of, the action? Are we trying to orient California's government around this model now? Or what does that look like?

Della Duncan: That's the creative challenge is doing the doughnut selfie gives us the where we are now, the baseline—so to speak. Part of it is getting partnerships and other people involved, that's why we called ourselves a coalition. Because once you have the doughnut and you're like, "our goal is now to meet human needs and stay within our ecological boundaries," that's the work of all of us. 

And there may be certain nonprofits or groups that are really working on the water piece or the education piece or the housing piece, and so it brings the movement together. So partnerships and collaboration and coalition building is a really big part of it.

The second part, though, that you're [00:17:00] talking about is really shifting the goal. So it's a really awareness around the doughnut as an alternative model. So, yes. Local governments, but also state government, but also schools. Education is a huge component of that too. And then also policies can be another place.

For example, there may be different California's, wide or local policies that having the doughnut be a part of it or a coalition member of it can be supportive for it's success, but also it's holistic sense of why it could be a good thing. 

Emily Race-Newmark: I love that you brought it back to the coalition building and the partnerships and that collaborative element. Because I think, and I will speak for myself, like there's a past based tendency to look at, "oh, change will only happen if my local government or my federal government says so," and part of the intention of this podcast also is to shift that thinking to, "what can I do? Who can I collaborate with? Where's my local sphere of influence?"

So I think you're [00:18:00] really driving that point home. Thank you so much.

Okay, so anything else on alternative economic models that you feel like it's important to highlight?

Della Duncan: So that private ownership of the means of production piece, some alternatives would be worker cooperatives where means of production is owned by the workers, or in non profits sometimes can be very hierarchical and top down.

So a worker self directed non profit can bring more horizontal governance into that space, but also participatory democracy, participatory budgeting, citizens assemblies. Those are also ways to bring more voices and more collaboration into decision making. 

And then in terms of the paradigm level, some that I'll uplift, one of them is indigenous economics.

So I think about Robin Wall Kimmerer and her essay, The Serviceberry: An Economy of Abundance, where she looks at nature and how nature is gift giving and she looks at reciprocity and gratitude in our economic system, [00:19:00] that is one element of it. Also from indigenous thinking the concept of seven generation thinking. 

Economics in the mainstream in terms of capitalism can be very short sighted really, "what is good for me?" Or, "what's good for this year?" seven generation thinking would be like, "how do my actions right now impact the seventh generation from now?" imagine if that consideration was brought into our thinking and our economic activity.

 One more I'll uplift is the gift economy world. So this idea that, we as humans, when we're born really come into our relationship of gift paradigm from our parents.

We really receive as if a gift—food and housing and love and care, hopefully from our parents, from those around us. And we also gift give to our families as well, or those who raise us. And then it's as we're older, that we are socialized into the exchange paradigm to do [00:20:00] something for what it gives to us.

So, "I do something for you because of what it gets me."

The gift paradigm is, "I give to you for what it gets to you."

We are taught the exchange paradigm, and you brought up the commodification or financialization piece. So that's really the exchange paradigm in action. Everything being commodified and financialized that we can meet all of our needs. Isolated individuals. So an alternative to that the gift economy is, "how can I gift give?" Like, "how can I support others through mutual aid and support, but also how can I request what I need?"

How can we create systems that are more reciprocal and more gift economy based? Such as Donna or by donation offerings. If you need child care, creating a child care collective where on Mondays, one person takes care of the kids on Tuesdays, another person takes care of the kids. No money is exchanged and yet kids are cared for and there's the added benefit of [00:21:00] multiple friendships growing and time off for the parents, et cetera.

So there's all these beautiful ways that gift economy practices and paradigm can infuse us with more connection, more reciprocity, and getting our needs met in non financialized, non capitalistic ways. 

Emily Race-Newmark: So beautiful. When I hear all of these different models, I get very excited and it also can easily teeter over into overwhelm of, "what do we do with all of this?" my brain almost wants to figure out a plan. 

How do you relate to all these models, and how do you recommend folks who are sinking their teeth into this relate to everything that you're sharing here? 

Della Duncan: So there is your own life— how you consume, the energy, your car, in every action in our day-to-day life, we can make alternative choices that are unhooking ourselves from capitalism and more engaging in gift economy, solidarity economy, cooperative economy, etc.

For example, moving our money from an extractive exploitative bank to a [00:22:00] cooperative bank, like a credit union. Shopping at a cooperative grocery store. Going to the library or supporting a small local independent business instead of an Amazon book purchase. There's alternatives to Uber and Airbnb. There's renewable energy cooperatives for our energy needs. There's babysitter collectives or child care collectives that have emerged. There's share shops and community fridges and little free libraries.

Just there's all these different ways that we can meet our needs in non capitalist ways. So that's one realm. 

However, I wouldn't want folks to stop there because it's also good to expand to the systemic level and to see what are the systemic changes that you want to support or change? So that would be movements, movement building.

 For example, the movement for public banks—moving our city and regional money from corporate banks to public banks that are accountable and transparent and [00:23:00] open to the public, and that can bank in more in alignment with the needs of our communities. Also changing laws, changing policies, political organizing.

 All of that really shifts these ideas on a larger level. The degrowth movement, for example, abolishing planned obsolescence, moving to the four day work week, moving to end food waste. 

There's the circular economy, how do we make it so that we don't just throw away things, but we reuse them? Moving from ownership to usership is another example. 

There's all these different things that we can do on different levels. And I would just encourage us to not stay with our own consumptive individual lives, although that is important, but to also say, "what are the larger movements for economic systems change that you'd like to either lead in or be an ally or advocate or support in?"

Emily Race-Newmark: if you were to wave a magic wand and create the world you'd like to see, perhaps influenced and inspired by the many conversations you [00:24:00] have with others, what would that look like?

Della Duncan:  It would look like a turning towards life and to life flourishing and life thriving. 

In our individual lives, it would be turning towards one another—calling each other in. It would be a lot of love and forgiveness and compassion and having difficult conversations out of love. 

In terms of our neighborhoods or ecological systems, it would be much more reverence and respect for the waterways, the health of water, the health of the bees and the butterflies and the birds and the trees.

It would be just so much more living with not power over the more than human world living in relationship and reciprocity and connection. It would be in general humans having a much smaller ecological footprint, but a much larger ecological handprint. So we would really be stepping into our role as stewards of place and supporters of living ecosystems and [00:25:00] human and planetary flourishing, instead of trying to be like, "smaller and smaller and reduce and reduce," but really coming into our role as that.

 It would be a world where we're within the doughnut. A world where our human needs are met, where we feel not a sense of scarcity or lack or fear or mistrust or precariousness, and instead we feel abundance. We feel joy. We feel celebration and ease. We may also feel a sense of calling and hard work and effort and endeavor.

I don't think that would go away, but I think that it would be really more in alignment with that, which brings us joy rather than that which do because we have to to meet our needs.

Emily Race-Newmark: What are some examples that you have seen or have lived through that bring that vision to life already?

Della Duncan: The last person who I got to interview for the Upstream podcast was Mia Birdsong who wrote a book called How We Show Up, [00:26:00] and she described her neighborhood.

And so I'll use that example. She said that when she starts cooking, she doesn't have to worry about having all the ingredients because she knows that if she's missing something as she makes the meal, that she can reach out to her neighbors and ask them for whatever it is, whether it's a cup of sugar or lemons or white wine.

That metric really struck me. Another way that she visualized that is that she knows all the names of her neighbors. When they arrive into the community, she leaves them cupcakes with her name and her family's names and her phone number. She said that the first time that she speaks to her neighbors is a more casual, kind time. It's not when you have to tell your neighbor to turn the music down or you have some sort of conflict.

 I also think about in Portland, The City Repair Project and the work of Mark Lakeman, where he gets groups of neighbors out to transform the [00:27:00] intersection to paint a mural and create a little free library and a solar panel tea station. 

This sense of creating place together. Place that's based on acknowledging ancestor and indigenous peoples and native plants, maybe, and also acknowledging the people who currently live here. Really celebrating them and diversity and unity and all of that too. 

Emily Race-Newmark: What came up for me also is just an orientation around time, perhaps shifting. When I think about connecting with my own neighbors, this underlying current of hurriedness of, "I don't have enough time to chat. I have to get on this work call or drop this child off."

And this is not only for me, but also experienced in others. 

Can you take what I'm saying and then connect it to your vision around how might we orient time and the physical design of space itself?

Della Duncan: Oh my gosh, yes. Just to first uplift some teachers for me around time and visioning, so Kristen Godsey and Everyday Utopias, Oliver Berkman in 4000 Weeks, and then Jenny [00:28:00] O'Dell in her book Saving Time. Those are some great teachers and references around this beautiful point that you're making around time. I also feel like uplifting the Bayo Akomolafe quote, "These times are urgent. Let us slow down. These times are urgent. Let us slow down."

So absolutely, I'm going to borrow from your vision and say that in my vision too, there would not be a sense of rush or hurriedness.

 I have this dance teacher—Lucia Horan—who has taught me that I can slow down to the point where I'm easeful and peaceful in my body and then speed up and still be easeful and peaceful. So there may still be times when we're quick and when movement is needed and galvanization and effort, but it's not hurried. It's not rushed. 

 The larger level of what you're asking is, this vision would be more in alignment and in tune with seasons and sense of place. One thing I learned from Jenny Odell is that the concept of four [00:29:00] distinct, discrete seasons that are the same everywhere on the planet, but opposite in Global North, Global South is an element of colonization of the mind.

And actually, places have many different seasons, different lengths, and different indicators. We have a plant that's called Farewell to Spring. And we also have a plant called Footsteps of Spring. How beautiful is that? And Jenny Odell offers that in an indigenous culture in Australia, she learned that they had all these different seasons, some of which were seven years long, the flood seasons 28 years long, and then the different seasons had things like the first baby eels.

It signified the beginning of a new season. So I would say more awareness and alignment into the seasons and the places that we're in and even a celebration of them. Returning to a celebration of things more in alignment with pagan traditions or indigenous traditions like the equinoxes or the solstices.

[00:30:00] So that's part of what I'm hearing in your question around slowing down. Is this like coming into more harmony and more relationship with rhythms of place, as well as our own bodies. 

Emily Race-Newmark: Yeah. Amazing. You also mentioned this in that answer, but earlier as well, that it's not that this vision is one where we're not exerting effort or there's hard work doesn't exist at all, but perhaps it's in service of something that feels more in alignment for us or in service of, let's say, the planet as an example.

Tell me about that balance and how that also in this vision counters how capitalism has conditioned us to think around effort. 

Della Duncan: As I mentioned, one of the assumptions in capitalism about who we are as humans is that work is a disutility, that we actually try to work as little as possible.

And I also can recognize that sentiment, especially when I think about Sarah Jaffe's book—Work Won't Love You Back: How Our Jobs Keep Us Exploited, Exhausted, and Alone—in which she chronicles all the ways that jobs and [00:31:00] workplaces are really making us feel precarious and exploited and exhausted and alone.

So I'm not denying that I can really feel that and recognize that. And yet I'm really inspired by the movement for right livelihood coming from Buddhist economics.  What if our work in the world was our spirituality off the cushion, like the way in which we contribute to this time. And there's so many different ways that we can contribute.

And I mean this beyond the paid work. Including our parenting, our art making, our activism, caretaking of place as well. That all of this, these things are part of our right livelihood path. They are part of our endeavors. I love that because it feels much more balancing that yes, we do have resting and being and quieting, but we also—at least I have —moments of energy or of inspiration or wanting to exert and contribute.

And so that rhythm [00:32:00] feels more healthy and helpful when our work in the world can be in greater alignment with service and our values for the world. 

A more specific zoom in of my vision of the future is that there are no for profit businesses anymore. We're in a post profit world. That doesn't mean there's not—as I said—hard work, endeavor, even enterprise. It's just that people are paid living fair wages—the supply chains are ethical, sustainable, regenerative, circular economy, and everything—but that any profit that is generated is redirected for the mission driven work, the social and environmental work.

I've learned from Jennifer Hinton, and the work of the post growth post profit world is there's ways to meet needs where you have profit generating activity or we could say economic growth, but that that is harnessed or redirected to mission driven work or work that's beneficial for [00:33:00] humans or for the environment. 

Emily Race-Newmark: In the practical terms, right now, care work is really undervalued. In your vision, how might we value or uplift care work? What does that look like? 

Della Duncan: One thing that folks might come to in this way of thinking is universal basic income— that then all our labor and efforts, including parenting would be valued, or we could do that work without having to worry about the payment for it. That's one. 

In investigating universal basic income, what I've come to is, actually what would be more supportive is universal access to services and universal access to commons. Meaning that we have access to place where we could grow food, we have access to adequate free healthcare that's quality.

We have access to adequate education. We just take these things off the market and we universalize them and that they're care filled. I think those would be some ways to support folks who are parenting that that is part of their [00:34:00] livelihood garden, in so many ways.

Emily Race-Newmark:  You're sharing all these different economic models, but where does money fit in, in your future vision?

Because right now, resources and money almost seem to be inextricably linked, they're one in the same, but what would be your vision for money, income and currency? 

Della Duncan: So if we were to have in that vision, public or collective conversation on what is it that we want on the market and privatized, and what is it that we think should not be on the market should be a right or available to all?

Then money would come in for that part that is the market part. And again, the market could then, if it did generate profit could then go to these not for profit businesses. So other benefits that maybe we don't say should be universal, but we do think are important. 

A few other fun things around money that I think about one of them is abolishing usury. So the idea of if somebody [00:35:00] borrows money, they have to pay interest. Which really, encourages the growth and the busyness, the hurriness that we talked about.

 There's a great metaphor of the economy as a game of musical chairs by Charles Eisenstein and Jimmy Eisenstein. There's a video of that about how having that interest rate and the usury is really propelling this game of musical chairs and there's always losers in that game. So abolishing that. 

There's another idea of having demurrage currency, this idea of money that expires. So imagine if you don't spend the money, the value goes away and that would discourage hoarding. 

And then one more is the idea of complementary currencies or local currencies. So when we go into a Starbucks in our towns or cities, a lot of that money, a lot of those dollars leaves the local economy and goes to Starbucks HQ and the shareholders, [00:36:00] etc.

But when we buy from a local or independent store, more of that money circulates locally. And so a complementary currency or a local currency is one in which we can only spend it at local and independent places. And they're often beautiful. They're designed by local artists. They're exactly equal to— whether it's a pound or a dollar or whatever—it's exactly equal, but it stays and circulates within the local economy.

One fun fact in Bristol, in the UK, the mayor was paid 100 percent in Bristol pounds. Imagine that sense of commitment to the local economy from that idea. And then there's credit unions, public banking, there's other things too. But yeah, those are some of the fun, inspiring alternatives to the way that we deal with money that I can think of right now. . 

Emily Race-Newmark: Mhm. Beautiful. Thank you so much. So I'd love to close out with if there was something someone could do in this moment if they paused this podcast and took an action right now, what would that be? [00:37:00] 

Della Duncan: I would invite you listening to pause and to reflect on what are your needs right now in your life? How do you currently meet those needs? What are the ways that you pay for things or people or places or ways that you meet those needs? And then to ask what are also the alternative, maybe gift economy or collaborative solidarity economy ways that you meet your needs?

And then look at the ways that you meet your needs and say, "are there any things that they brought up in this podcast that I might want to just explore about how I can meet my needs in more solidaristic and cooperative, collaborative ways?"

And then if there's anything too, that you're like, "not just for myself, but I actually want to make sure that that invitation or endeavor or systemic change is more available to all, not just me, then how might I get involved in that movement to shift that larger perspective so that more people know about [00:38:00] child care collectives or community fridges or share shops or complementary currencies, et cetera?

Emily Race-Newmark: Beautiful. Well, Della, this was truly a joy. I have left so inspired and a lot of clarity in areas that I was previously cloudy.

So thank you so much for all the wisdom that you've shared and also the resources to other folks that have inspired you that you've passed on for us to dig more into. So thank you. 

Della Duncan: Thank you so much. And thank you for this offering of this podcast and inviting me on in conversation.

Emily Race-Newmark: Thank you for listening to this conversation. If you want to stay connected with Della, visit her on Instagram at @dellazduncan or @upstreampodcast. 

Della also offers Right Livelihood Coaching by donation, and is also leading a course called Cultivating Regenerative Livelihoods through Gaia Education, as an extension of this conversation today.

For folks in California, if you want to work with the California Donut Economics Coalition, you can reach out at caldec.Org.

All of this is linked in the show notes of our website, just visit thisishowwecare.com, [00:39:00] where you can also sign up for our newsletter to receive weekly prompts and practices from each of our guests with the intention of bringing deeper reflection and playful experimentation of these ideas into your life.

If you think the messages from this episode will speak to someone that you care about, please share it with them. This is just one of the many ways that you can help us co create a world of embodied collective care. 

This episode was produced by me, Emily Race, co produced by Kimberly Anne, with editing by Andrew Salamone, and music by Eric Weisberg.