Alternative Money Systems

At the moment I am researching some alternative Money Systems for use as an online software system for a LETS job agency in Groningen in the Netherlands (Dutch: LETS uitzendbureau). We will work under the name LETSwerk.nl

Looking at the following softwarelist (http://www.complementarycurrency.org/software.html).

The system should be able to have multiple currencies. We will use time (like time-banks), LETS (local barter units) and conventional money (Euro). 
After lots of research we will begin to use Cyclos as our main banking and administration software. Before this I tried CuroMuto.com as a test environment but I could not get this barternetwork to work.

Just before this post I joined http://stroomgeld.ning.com/ (dutch) aiming at an ecosophical approach using Bernard Lietaer's book 'The Future of Money'. A good portal-page about complementary economics in the Netherlands (including international links) is: http://complementaire-economie.startpagina.nl/

There are many web sites dealing with alternative money systems and related issues. The following are some of the most interesting (list from: http://www.ces.org.za/misc/links.htm)

Alternative Money Systems

• Access Foundation (Alliance of Complementary Currencies Enabling Sustainable Societies)
• Alliance of Complementary Currencies Enabling Sustainable Societies
• Alternative Money Systems
• Altruists International
• CC Information Technologies WorldWide (CCIT)
• ccPedia - an open collective knowledge centre on complementary currency systems
• Crom Alternative Payment System
• Local Exchange Systems in Asia, Africa and Latin America
• Community Information Resource Center (CIRC)
• Complementary Currency Resource Centre
• Creating Community Currency
• EF Schumacher Society
• Forum for Stable Currencies
• Ithaca HOURs Online
• International Journal of Community Currency Research
• Letslink UK
• LETS-Linkup
• LETS.net
• Living Economies
• Local and Interest-Free Currencies, Social Credit and Microcredit
• The Money Fix
• Online Database of Complementary Currencies Worldwide
• The Open Money Project
• P2P Foundation
• Reinventing Money.com
• Community Exchange System
• Strohalm for a change
• The Terra - Trade Reference Currency (TRC)
• Time Dollar Institute
• Transaction Net - Enabling Markets Online
• The Transitioner - TheTransitioner.org brings together those who want to marry the economy and Collective Intelligence in order to build a fair world.
• UniteDiversity Wiki
• Workgroup on Solidarity Socio-Economy - Social Money

The following resources are to help you understand the nature of money-as-we-know-it and why we need a new money system.

Documents, Books and Articles

• Altruists International Money-Related Downloads
• Bibliography of Community Currency Research
• Community Currency Materials, Information and Resources, compiled by Appropriate Economics
• Complementary Currency Bookstore
  
• Complementary Currency and Exchange - The Movement to Reinvent Money, by Thomas H Greco, Jr. [HTML] [PDF] [PowerPoint]
• Community Currency Guide by Bernard Lietaer and Gwendolyn Hallsmith
• Flight from Inflation, the Monetary Alternative, by E.C Riegel. A posthumous compilation of his essays, Los Angeles, CA, The Heather Foundation, 1978 (PDF 488K)
• Interest and Inflation Free Money, by Margrit Kennedy
• History of the CES, by Tim Jenkin, June 2004
• I Want the Earth Plus 5% - the story of money
• Money and its Alternatives - Strohalm Foundation (PDF 575K)
• Money, Bona Fide or Non-Bona Fide, by Dr. Edward E Popp, 1970 (PDF 685K)
• Money and the Crisis of Civilization by Charles Eisenstein, March 2008
• Money: A New Beginning by Charles Eisenstein, April 2008
• Money - Understanding and Creating Alternatives to Legal Tender, by Thomas H Greco, Jr. (PDF 893K)
• The New Approach to Freedom. Together with Essays on the Separation of Money and State, by E.C. Riegel, 1949 (PDF 244K)
• The New Approach to Freedom, web site hosting the writings of E.C. Riegel
• Poor Because of Money - Strohalm Foundation (PDF 941K)
• Private Enterprise Money. A Non-Political Money System, by E.C. Riegel (PDF 537K)
• Reinventing Money. The emergent path toward peace, harmony, and equity.
  Presentation by Thomas H Greco, Jr. [HTML] [PDF] [PowerPoint]
• The Great Cookie Jar - Taking the Mysteries Out of the Money System, by Dr Edward E Popp, 1978 (PDF 774K). HTML Version
• The Monetary Philosophy of E.C. Riegel, by Thomas H. Greco, Jr. (MS PowerPoint 35K)
• The Money Myth Exploded - The Financial Enigma Resolved, by Louis Even
• The Natural Economic Order, by Silvio Gesell
• The Nature of Money, by John Kutyn, 5 March 2000
• The Nature of Money, by John Kutyn, 16 March 2005
• The Nature of Wealth, by Fred Lundgren, August 2002
• The New Money Text Book - Economics Made Simple, by Doctor Edward C Hamlyn, May 2007
• The Politics of Money, by EC Riegel
• Private Enterprise Money: A Non-Political Money System, by E. C. Riegel, 1944.
• The Credit Theory of Money by A Mitchell Innes, The Banking Law Journal, 1914
• What is Money? A history of credit by A Mitchell Innes, The Banking Law Journal, May 1913

Monetary Reform

• The American Monetary Act and the Monetary Transparency Act, 21 September 2006, American Monetary Institute
• The American Monetary Institute
• British Association for Monetary Reform
• COMER - The Committee on Monetary and Economic Reform
• Forum for Stable Currencies
• Foundation for the Advancement of Monetary Education (FAME)
  FAME is a not-for-profit educational organization whose sole mission is to educate people about the benefits of honest monetary weights and measures and the harm caused by our current fraudulent fiat money monetary system
• Global Research.ca. Centre for Research on Globalization
• James Roberston, working for a sane alternative
• The Money Reform Party
• People for Mathematically Perfected Economy
• Prosperity. Freedom from Debt Slavery
  Prosperity is a monthly Money Reform journal based in Glasgow, Scotland, which is dedicated to spreading understanding about the nature of our debt-based money system, and campaigning for publicly-created debt-free money.

Monetary History

• American Monetary History
• FX Micheloud Monetary History
• Gold: prices, facts, figures & research. Monetary episodes from history
• Monetary history documents
• Money - Past, Present & Future, Information on Monetary History, Contemporary Developments, and Electronic Money
• Money, Value, and Monetary History after Milton Friedman

Miscellaneous

• Money, Banking and Credit. This site is devoted to the issues of money, banking, fiscal, and monetary policy and their impacts on families and the nation as a whole
• The People vs The Banks - Class action suit on behalf of the people of Canada alleging that financial institutions are illegally creating money.

Peak Oil

• Association for the Study of Peak Oil & Gas
• EnergyBulletin.net
• Peak Oil Clock
  
• The Wolf at the Door

Video

• CC Video. Collection of videos on complementary currency systems
• Money as Debt [Google video]
  Paul Grignon's 47-minute animated presentation of "Money as Debt" tells in very simple and effective graphic terms what money is and how it is being created. It is an entertaining way to get the message out. The Cowichan Citizens Coalition and its "Duncan Initiative" received high praise from those who previewed it. I recommend it as a painless but hard-hitting educational tool and encourage the widest distribution and use by all groups concerned with the present unsustainable monetary system in Canada and the United States.
• The Money Masters [Google video]
  How International Bankers Gained Control of America
• Monopoly Men - Federal Reserve Fraud (1999)
• Suzao Media
  A good collection of videos on money and debt

[this post was updated on december 3, 2009.]