Last Saturday January 16th the winner of the Self-Sustaining Creative Economy Award was anounced as being ‘Freedom Coop‘, the latest project with which FairCoop is involved. The prize of €9,500 will be a great help towards the implemention of the final project.
This award was launched by the artists Nuria Güell and Levi Orta as part of their project “Degenerated Political Art, the Patrons’ Debt“, as part of the exhibition cycle “Shots in the Middle of the Concert”, together with FLACC and Arts Santa Mònica. A total of fifteen entries for European projects were presented in response to the call, but the panel came to a unanimous decision about the winner.
Read more about the award and the project: https://www.flacc.info/en
One of the projects that FairCoop has developed during the last months of 2015 is the ‘Freedom Coop‘, a European Cooperative society which aims to be a tool for extending economic autonomy and banking disobedience not only in Europe but also abroad. In the legal form of a European Cooperative Society, it can work throughout the European Economic Area without the neccessity of being registered in each country.
This innovative European legal tool will provide citizens with freedom of operation outside of economic and financial controls, and in this way also enabling all of us to construct fairer social relationships and enjoy more sustainable development through disobedience and self-management.
The FREEDOM COOP project will create social impact through three different kinds of intervention:
1. A LEGAL TOOL FOR EUROPEAN SOCIAL MOVEMENTS AND COMMUNITIES – FREEDOM COOP as a fiscal entity.
Among other things it can be used to:
- Scale up the integral cooperatives‘ economic disobedience practices like tax disobedience.
- All European Integral Cooperatives that aren’t legally constituted will be able to use the FREEDOM COOP’s VAT number.
- Individuals and collectives located in regions without integral cooperatives, and who agree with the FairCoop principles, will also be able to use that legal identity.
- Refugees and migrants without documentation around Europe will be able to become self–employed through the FREEDOM COOP without being under the control of governments nor banks.
2. EXTENDING ECONOMIC DISOBEDIENCE ACROSS EUROPE.
- To make collective purchases at a regional/ European level that require invoices, and with reduced VAT.
- To give legal coverage to any European inhabitant who cannot or does not want to engage in economic activity as an employee.
- To disobey the VAT and income tax laws, with the aim of funding social alternatives.
- To extend the use of Faircoin. The Freedom Coop only will accept payment fees from its members in Faircoin, therefore it will boost the practical use of Faircoin, and also supporting the ongoing cooperative hacking of the traditional monetary markets.
3. ALTERNATIVE BANKING FOR FULL AUTONOMY
Combining different technologies and services that are already provided separately by different collaborators, plus contacts of the FairCoop, we are going to offer a toolkit of banking services to any individual or group.
Included in the toolkit:
- The creation of bank accounts that can receive payments from the current system (bank transfers, credit/debit cards…), which at the same time can be converted directly to Faircoin.
- Moreover, through these bank accounts it will be possible to autonomously manage economic projects, i.e.pay providers and be paid by clients, thus creating a haven for international/european/local relationships beyond the control of the current financial system.
- Additionally, these bank accounts will make it possible for any group to organise a crowdfunding campaign for their specific funding needs without any state control.
- Apps for accessing to the system with any mobile or desktop device will be created.
With this prize we will be able to make these things a reality, and so extend the kind of strategy we have seen work successfully in Catalonia, and create social impact in the lives of thousands of people all over Europe.
Read more about the project: /wp-content/uploads/2016/01/FREEDOM-COOP.pdf
This post is also available in: Spanish Catalan German Greek Italian