Peter Etherden, Cliff’s End Signalling Company
Studies of usury and the public response to the abuse of money suggest centralised systems are undesirable for the management and control of the issue of coinage (metal, paper & digital). Academic study is needed into the structure and modus operandi of decentralist Mints and Exchanges serving the money needs of ordinary people in the real economy.
The Real Pound Project was first at the Radical Consultation in September 2001. The paper is the third of six research papers…the others are Birmingham as Number One (1986), The Wealth of CountiesEnergy Currencies (2006) and The Future of Local Money (2008). A sixth paper on The Doctrine of Usury based on historical research into public usury policy is due out next year.
Decentralised public and private mints and exchanges conduct their business in a structure of legal statutes such as the Usury Law of 1571 or the Legal Tender Act of 1862. Money is political and the division of power and means of enforcement are in the small print. The paper explores the way The Real Bank of Wiltshire might operate under licsence from a publicly accountable Real Bank of Wessex.
Sources
All papers available online at
http://www.cesc.net/serifweb/scholars/shepherd/irvine/manuscripts/Writings on the Real Economy by William Shepherd
- Birmingham as Number One (1986)
- County Wealth (2001)
- Real Bank of Wessex (2001)
- Energy Currencies (2006)
- The Future of Money (2008)
- The Doctrine of Usury - available 2009
Historical Research edited by Peter Etherden
- Usury and the English Church by Henry Swabey (2008) - http://www.cesc.net/serifweb/scholars/swabey/
- Wilson’s Discourse Upon Usury by R.H. Tawney (2008) - http://www.cesc.net/serifweb/scholars/tawney/
William Shepherd’s Blogs
- What I Do All Day (2006) - http://williamshepherd.blog.co.uk
- Shepherd on Climate (2007) - http://climate.blog.co.uk
About the author
Peter Etherden is a radical economist who writes under the nom de plume of William Shepherd. For 25 years he has been a regular contributor to the London-based political journal Fourth World Review. In 1993 he co-founded the Cliff’s End Signalling Company, an independent policy and strategy development forum. cesc maintains a website for discerning radicals and publishes the work of cesc scholars.
