MoneyLab Reader · An Intervention in Digital Economy

MoneyLab is part of a global movement that demands the democratization

of the design of our financial futures. Audacity is essential in times

of crisis. And so we must engage constructively with hackers,

entrepreneurs, and other creators who take up the call for economic

alternatives. One first step is a map of the present: What works and what

doesn’t? What is worth pursuing and what must be left aside? Which

histories bear on the present moment? And what are the limits of our

economic imagination?

The MoneyLab Reader brings developments in crowdfunding, currency

design, technologies of payment, and other economic experiments into

dialogue. The authors of this volume discuss the implications of the

current architecture of global finance, its impact on ever-growing

income disparity, and question money and finance as such. It is not

always clear, for instance, whether genuine alternatives are unfolding

or if we are simply witnessing the creative extension of neoliberalism.

At stake is the full spectrum of technologies of economic

(re)distribution.