Unit 2 Paper

OK, so Capitalism in not sustainable.

Now what?!
Hisham El Sherbini

AMSR7

Team 2

December 2016
Table of Contents
1. Introduction .................................................................................................................................. 1

2. Money ........................................................................................................................................... 1

3. The options ................................................................................................................................... 3

4. Gift ................................................................................................................................................ 4

5. The role of Islamic Social Business in Alleviating Poverty and Social Inequality ............................ 6

6. Action/Experiment ........................................................................................................................ 7

7. Conclusion..................................................................................................................................... 7

8. References .................................................................................................................................... 8
Hisham El Sherbini Unit 2 Paper

1. INTRODUCTION

In my first paper, I was keen on exploring different views on whether Capitalism is a

sustainable system. My conclusion was that, in a best-case scenario, it cannot continue in its
current form in terms of relentlessly pursuing growth, accumulating capital and exploiting
human and natural resources. The other scenario, which I am more inclined towards, is that
Alternative Systems need to be explored and developed in order to gradually weaken and
eventually replace Capitalism altogether.

2. MONEY

I could not have agreed more with the Eisensteins (2011) use of the word profane in
terms of money associations. Typically, the use of the words corrupt, filthy and dirty is
associated with money. When we ask Why questions such as Why is there a biodiversity
crisis? Or why are we drilling for more oil knowing that it causes pollution of the
atmosphere? And down a couple of levels of Why if we use a Root-Cause Analysis method
such as the 5 Whys (Jones & Womack, 1996), we always get to money (Eisenstein, 2011).

Growing up in Egypt, money, whether we had it or not, was not important. In my young
years after graduating from college, I was paid pennies and I spent most of it on transport.
There was no way to save but it did not matter, not at all. And friends of mine were even
less well-off but it did not matter. And it did not matter because we valued other things; we
valued each other, we valued each others company and, if anyone needed anything,
instead of going and buying that service or product, we found ways of delivering it
without involving money. For example, if it was a skill then we source a friend of a friend to
do it, without money. If it was a product, we find someone who had it but does not need it.
That system is what we sacred. Basic human interactions were not commoditized. We
were living a life of gratitude and we were Gifting back all the gifts we receive.

It was not until I came to the UK and Europe that I realized that money was given way
more value than people. For example, as part of my involvement with CouchSurfing, a
travellers community that is supposed to bring people together, I remember, when I invite
people to join our social gatherings, some invitees would say I cannot afford it. And I get

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Hisham El Sherbini Unit 2 Paper

so puzzled, what can you not afford? Going and talking to human beings?! If you join us at a
caf, you dont have to buy anything. You can ask for free tap water.

And its not just that but also how everything is turning into a commodity, that has a price.
Who would have thought that asking my neighbour to pick up my kids from school is going
to have a price tag on it? Or if my neighbour can help me with some simple DIY work at my
place that I would have to pay them?

And this is where Capitalism comes in. That relentless need to grow requires the creation
of new goods and services and target new markets hence the need to commoditize anything
and everything that could be commoditized. It had to find something that people used to
get for free or did for themselves or each other and take it away and then sell it back to
them. This is how we get cut off from nature the same like we get cut off from community
(Eisenstein, 2011).

It is interesting to see how Money transitioned from simply being a facilitator of

exchanges to the opposite, the agent of scarcity. But perhaps it is is not something that
has to be invented in order to facilitate exchange between strangers holding pre-existing
specialised goods. It is the very thing that creates the potential for there to be strangers
trading specialised goods in the first place (Scott, 2016).

Anyhow, the question is how, why, what caused that? Its been generally assumed
that Greed, a human nature, has to do with it. I admit that it always crossed my mind and
that we have to implement controls to restrain our greed. After all, there is no such thing as
a free market (Chang, 2010).

At the same time, greed seems to be no more than a perception when we see how that
rich people, sometimes, tend to be less generous than poor people. So, perhaps besides
greed, it is that perception of scarcity? Which is quite interesting, in a world with
abundant resources. So, this illusion of scarcity had to be created, once again by the
financial system of Capitalism, in order to create the need for the system to work. Hence,
money, in its current form, has turned abundance into scarcity which engendered greed
(Eisenstein, 2011).

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Hisham El Sherbini
3. THE OPTIONS
Being a newbie, I wanted to start by, at least, understanding the options. There are many
ways to change money as Table 1 below illustrates.
Table 1 - Ways to Change Money
Method
Change how we interact with
the ledgers
Change the power dynamics
of who controls the ledgers
Change who gets to issue it
Change what it is
redeemable for
Unit 2 Paper
Key Features Example
One big public ledger rather than a series of Fintech &
privately-controlled bank ledgers Mobile
Payments
A decentralised network of techno-clerks that
process the transactions, rather than a closed
cartel of banks
The key feature of this system is that rather Cryptocurrency
than X owing units to Y in particular, X owes
them to anyone who is on the system and Y can
claim from anyone in the system. These units
are essentially money socially constructed
claims upon value
An interest-free credit system based on Mutual credit
reciprocity where someone claim goods or
services from you. It is noted down in a central
ledger and they return them in exchange over
time.
The Brixton Pounds are essentially vouchers Brixton Pound
issued by the Brixton Pound organisation that
are completed backed by normal pounds. This
makes the system easy to understand and safe
but it means that it is essentially a localised
version of the British Pound. There is no credit
system.
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Hisham El Sherbini Unit 2 Paper

Change the internal Reversing the interest, becoming negative Demurrage

properties of the money interest

Find ways to bypass it Sharing systems and not keeping score Gift Economy
entirely

Alter the financial
institutions that dominate
the standard money system
Approach 1: Change the mission of the bank Social banks +
social banking financial reform
initiatives
Approach 2: Change the ownership structure of
the bank cooperative banking

Approach 3: Change the geographic scale &

focus of the bank local banking

(Adapted from Scott, 2013; 2016)

4. GIFT

It is becoming more and more obvious to me that one of the solutions, rather than the
solution, is to go back to our roots, to our nature, to go back to Gift Relationships. I am also
intrigued and convinced that one of the most effective ways to intervene in a system is by
challenging the mindset or paradigm out of which the system its goals, power structure,
rules, its culture arises (Meadows, 1999).

The fundamental principles of a Gift Economy roughly correspond to those of a Monetary

system as Table 2 suggests.

Table 2 Gift Economy vs Monetary System

Gift Economy Monetary System

Connecting the provider of a gift with the person who Medium of Exchange
needs that gift

Acknowledging and honouring those who give Unit of account

generously of their gifts

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Hisham El Sherbini Unit 2 Paper

Coordinating the gifts of many people across space Store of value

and time in order to create things transcending the
needs or gifts of any individual.

(Adapted from Eisenstein, 2011)

I now recall and realize that I have been part of many Gift paradigms, without specifically
knowing that thats what it is. I always loved to be part of them and I always kept looking for
them. To me, it seemed common sense to live in similar communities like the ones I used to
experience back in Egypt. Some of them are shown in Table 3 below:

Table 3 - Some Gift Paradigms

Gift Paradigm What its about

StreetBank 1. Give things away

(www.streetbank.com) 2. Share things

3. Share skills

CouchSurfing
(www.couchsurfing.com)
1. Travel the world you can stay with locals in every country on
earth.
2. Rediscover your city There's a community of Couchsurfers
near you. Make new friends.

3. Become a host Give back and open your home to travellers.

Streetlife To help people make the most of where they live by connecting
with their neighbours and sharing practical information, advice
(www.streetlife.com)
and resources.

Freecycle A grassroots and entirely non-profit movement of people who are

giving (and getting) stuff for free. It's all about reuse.
(www.freecycle.org)

But it now seems to me that every one of them had issues:

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Hisham El Sherbini Unit 2 Paper

StreetBank has relatively little penetration even though its been there for a while
and even though it acquired another community (JustForTheLoveOfIt).
CouchSurfing has changed from being a non-for-profit organisation into a Certified
B Corporation. Since then, there has been a revolt in the community with a lot of
members expressing their frustration at that change and some leaving it all together.
Streetlife has a business side of it. Some people used it to advertise their local
businesses which would conflict with those providing free services or skill-swap.

5. THE ROLE OF ISLAMIC SOCIAL BUSINESS IN ALLEVIATING POVERTY AND SOCIAL INEQUALITY

One of the main issues of Capitalism that angers me is Social Injustice. Social business and
enterprise are some of the contemporary innovations that suggest the world should be
diverted from selfish capitalism to selfless social capitalism.

Interestingly, many of these are embedded and compulsory responsibilities for Muslims that
I have experienced myself. One of the teachings of Prophet Mohammad (PBUH) is that the
rich cannot sleep contentedly while his neighbour sleeps hungry. Islam does not only
require the payment of Zakat, which is considered as a right of the poor people to the
wealth of rich Muslims, but also highly encouraged the practice of Qard Al-Hasan (interest-
free loan), and the spending of Sadaqah (charity) and Waqf (donation) to alleviate poverty.
It is not surprising then that Muslims are Britains top charity givers (Gledhil, 2013).

Due to the religious commitments, IFIs (Islamic Financial Institutes), compared to the
traditional financial ones, should play a greater role in ensuring social and economic welfare
through the equitable distribution of income and wealth, social justice, environmental
balance and promoting economic development. In the last three decades, the Islamic
finance industry has been experiencing continuous development and growth all over the
world, which proves its effectiveness. But since the objective of this industry should not only
be about making profit but also to serve humankind, it is perhaps the right time for them to
take responsibility for the poor in the society and to attempt to solve the social problems.

In addition, many Islamic charity organizations such as Islamic Relief, Islamic Aid, Muslim Aid
and more are allocating Qard Al-Hasan, Zakat and Sadaqah and mobilizing these funds to
contribute to mitigating social problems and reducing poverty (Aziz & Mohamad, 2016).

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Hisham El Sherbini Unit 2 Paper

6. ACTION/EXPERIMENT

I reached out to a friend of mine who always posts about Sustainability. His name is Chris
Agnos. I did not realise how much what he writes about and talks about resonate with me
until I interviewed him for an hour long (and I recorded the interview). He totally agrees that
Capitalism has to go and the best way to do that is to weaken it by attracting people to
other systems hence moving naturally away from it causing it to seize to exist.

His Transition Consultancy, Sustainable Human (http://sustainablehuman.com/) is exactly

about Gift Economy and hes championing a system called COPIOSIS
(https://copiosis.com/). It uses a different kind of money called net benefit reward (NBR)
which is the reward that society gives people for creating a net benefit. A net benefit is
created when the positive aspects of a certain activity outweigh the negative ones.

7. CONCLUSION

A lot of people are really doing something about all the damage that Capitalism has brought
to our planet and our lives. They are putting a lot of time, energy and passion. Many
systems of Gift economies are emerging and many other alternatives of traditional money
systems as well. This is becoming way more real to me than any other time and Im very
optimistic that the transition will occur.

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8. REFERENCES

Aziz, M. N., & Mohamad, O. B. (2016). Islamic social business to alleviate poverty and social
inequality. International Journal of Social Economics,43(6).

Chang, H. J. (2012). 23 things they don't tell you about capitalism. Bloomsbury Publishing
USA.

Eisenstein, C. (2011). Sacred economics: Money, gift, and society in the age of transition.
North Atlantic Books.

Gledhill, R. (2013). Muslims are Britains top charity givers Retrieved 11 December, 2015
from http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/faith/article3820522.ece

Jones, D. and Womack, J. (1996) Lean Thinking: Banish Waste and Create Wealth in Your

Corporation, New York: Simon & Schuster.

Meadows, D. H. (1999). Leverage points: Places to intervene in a system (pp. 1-19). Hartland,
VT: Sustainability Institute.

Scott, B. (2013). The heretic's guide to global finance: hacking the future of money. Pluto
Press.

Scott, B. (2016). Brett Scott - Finance Innovation Lab presentation.

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