Unifying commons-based projects

In a self organized solidarity economy, article here. The following is from the section "Short summary of the concept's essential features."

"The aim is a commons association with a collective economy that is based on needs and contributions. The participants receive primarily non-monetary benefits: goods of all kinds that they need or want.

"Money circulates to the extent necessary, but nobody should be excluded for lack of sufficient financial resources. There can also be fairly paid jobs, but only as long as they are necessary for carrying out the tasks required. The goal is to phase them out completely over time.

"There is no exchange – instead, people contribute to the common pool and costs as well as benefits are shared according to collective agreements (“From exchange to contributions”). To this end, the participating projects draw up their own budgets, which are then combined together in an association-wide budget (including both the monetary and labour needs).


"Who contributes what, and how much, are decided in offer rounds that extend across projects. The goal is a needs-based economy in the old Greek sense of “oikonomia”: the provision of necessary and useful goods (cf. Aristoteles macht aus der Ökonomie eine Wissenschaft [DE]).

"Another goal is to organise a kind of reciprocal trust that enables individuals to participate in collective provision, without compulsion or competition and without the worry of being excluded."