A strong community does more than keep money nearby. It creates pathways for people to become more capable contributors.
We usually picture an economy by watching money move. Customers pay businesses. Businesses pay workers and suppliers. Goods and services move in the other direction.
That picture is useful, but incomplete.
Something else can move through an economy.
People can move between roles.
That possibility sits at the heart of an interesting model proposed by Yannick Schandené. After years of building community projects, he kept meeting the same problem. Projects could create real social value while struggling to remain financially sustainable.
Becoming more commercial might solve one problem. It could also weaken the community purpose that made the project valuable.
So Schandené began exploring a hybrid model.
Community membership could help cover basic costs. Workshops could turn shared knowledge into income. Professional jobs could bring conventional market revenue.
But the most interesting part is not where the money comes from.
It is what can happen to the people.
A Customer Does Not Have to Remain a Customer
Someone may enter a community project because they need something.
Perhaps they use a shared space. Perhaps they attend a workshop. Perhaps they need access to tools, knowledge, or services.
At first, the relationship is simple.
They receive something useful.
But the relationship does not have to end there.
The person may become more involved. Participation can expose them to knowledge. Knowledge can develop into skill. Skill can eventually become useful to others.
A client can become a participant.
A participant can become a learner.
A learner can become a teacher.
Someone who once received value may eventually help create it.
Schandené does not argue that everyone must follow this path. People should remain free to participate at the level they prefer.
That freedom matters.
The point is not to force movement.
The point is to make movement possible.
The Transaction Can Become an Entrance
Most market transactions have a natural ending.
I need something. You provide it. I pay you. The exchange is finished.
That efficiency is valuable. We would not want every purchase to become a long community relationship.
But community economies can sometimes do something different.
They can make the transaction an entrance.
Someone arrives because they need access. Access creates familiarity. Familiarity may encourage participation. Participation creates opportunities for learning.
Learning can develop capability.
Capability creates new possibilities for contribution.
The person who entered because they needed something may eventually have something useful to give.
That is a different kind of economic circulation.
Money moves through the system.
Capability can grow through it.
Local Should Mean More Than Nearby Money
We often praise local economies because money stays within the community longer.
That matters.
But geography alone tells us little about the quality of an economy.
A locally owned business can still treat most people as permanent consumers. Money may circulate nearby while skills, responsibility, and opportunity remain concentrated.
A stronger definition of local should ask another question.
What happens to people as they participate?
Do they only consume?
Can they learn?
Can they take responsibility?
Can they share knowledge?
Can they eventually create something others need?
These questions reveal something financial measures can easily miss.
The strongest resource created by a community may not be money accumulated inside it.
It may be more people becoming capable of doing useful things.
Capability Can Strengthen the Community
Now a deeper pattern appears.
A community creates access.
Access enables participation.
Participation creates opportunities for learning.
Learning can develop capability.
Capability makes contribution possible.
Contribution can strengthen the community.
A stronger community can then create more opportunities for others to enter.
This cycle is not automatic.
Poor leadership can break it. Weak demand can break it. Bad rules can break it. Financial pressure can push professional work to dominate everything else.
Schandené does not present his model as a finished answer. He leaves sustainability and organizational design open for further exploration.
That uncertainty is important.
This is not a formula to believe.
It is a design principle worth testing.
Build pathways, not promises.
Give people ways to move deeper when they are ready.
Then watch what happens.
Contribution Must Remain an Opportunity
There is an important boundary.
Not everyone wants to become a teacher, maker, professional, or organizer.
They should not have to.
Someone may simply want to use a tool library. Someone may enjoy attending workshops. Someone may belong without wanting greater responsibility.
Their dignity does not depend on productivity.
Contribution loses something important when it becomes compulsory.
A healthy community does not say, you received something, now you owe us.
It offers something different.
Come because you need something.
Stay because you find value here.
Learn more if you are curious.
Teach when you feel ready.
Contribute when you have something useful to give.
That is the difference between demanding contribution and enabling it.
Perhaps We Are Measuring the Wrong Circulation
When judging an economy, we usually follow the money.
That makes sense.
Money tells us whether businesses can pay bills. It tells us whether workers can earn income. It helps show whether an organization can survive.
But money reveals only one kind of movement.
We can also follow the people.
Who entered as a customer?
Who became a participant?
Who learned something?
Who began teaching?
Who developed a useful skill?
Who became capable of solving a problem for someone else?
Those movements may reveal whether a community economy is merely keeping transactions local.
Or whether it is developing the people inside it.
That may be the deeper promise inside Schandené’s model.
The best local economy is not simply one where money stays nearby.
It is one where opportunities stay nearby too.
People can enter because they need something. They can participate because something interests them. They can learn because knowledge is shared.
Some may eventually become the people others come to for help.
Money still circulates.
But something more valuable can circulate with it.
Human capability.
And when capability becomes contribution, the community gains something money alone cannot create.
It gains more people able to carry the community forward.
Source and Inspiration
This essay was inspired by Yannick Schandené’s Let’s look into community based economics, published on Medium in August 2019.
The source explores a hybrid community model built around membership, workshops, professional work, and pathways between different levels of participation.
This essay extends those ideas through the themes of human capability, participation, and contribution. Those interpretations are my own.
Tags
#Community_Economics #Community_Building #Human_Potential #Future_of_Work #Social_Innovation
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