TBANZ forum and website now online

Sunday, October 16th, 2011 | EMMA MCGUIRK | 1 Comment

The TBANZ (Time Banking Aotearoa New Zealand) website and forum is now up and running. I’m excited about seeing this website grow and develop as we all make contributions to it. We will be creating a fantastic resource. You can register or log in to the TBANZ website here.

National Time Banking Hui in Lyttelton

Friday, October 14th, 2011 | EMMA MCGUIRK | 3 Comments

If you were unable to make it to the hui this weekend but you have a few questions that you’d love to ask, or comments that you’d like to share, add them here (as a reply to this post) before midday Saturday the 15th and we’ll gladly include them in the open space discussion. We were hoping to get the TBANZ forum up and running for this purpose, but it’s very imporant to get that website right so it’s taken a bit of extra time. For now however, I hope this can serve as a useful space. Looking forward to hearing your thoughts if you get some time today or tomorrow morning. Ngā mihi, Emma.

Dunedin TimeBank

Friday, September 23rd, 2011 | EMMA MCGUIRK | No Comments

Our brand new, emerging TimeBank in Dunedin is gaining momentum. Recently, the Malcam Trust have offered to umbrella us, we have had one meeting so far on their premises and look forward to further developing this exciting relationship. We have also been very fortunate to receive on-going support from Volunteering Otago. We have been putting the word out through our own networks and at our last meeting we formed a Steering Committee of 12 members. Peter has kindly created a brochure for us already (with our thanks going out to the Lyttelton, Otaki and Taita Time Banks for their previous work) and this has been very useful for communicating the concept. We have stated on the brochure that as we’re still getting established it is not possible to join the TimeBank at this stage, however we welcome any offers of support towards the work that we are doing to set one up. We have made appearances at a few public events, the Moving Planet 350.org day held at Dunedin North Intermediate, at a separate event run by the Malcam Trust, and tonight (Thursday 13th October) we will be speaking at Fronting Up to Our Deteriorating World – a public meeting being held here in Dunedin to discuss issues of concern, and practical solutions, around three broad themes: Energy, Economics and Community. At this event we’ll be talking about both the Dunedin TimeBank, and Fleeing Vesuvius – the exciting new publication from Living Economies. Our main focus in attending these events, at this early stage, is to find extra keen volunteers who are able to help us get set up, and just to generally ‘get the word out’ so that when we do launch (hopefully March or April 2012) there will be a few more people around town who are familiar with the idea. We are also really excited about the upcoming hui in Lyttleton this weekend, which looks sure to be an amazing event.

If you’d like to find out more or get involved with setting up the Dunedin TimeBank, contact Peter McDonald on 03 473 1681, or 027 379 4388. Or via email: dunedintimebank@gmail.com, and we also have a google group.

So, where are the ‘bullet points’ from the North Island interviews?

Friday, September 23rd, 2011 | EMMA MCGUIRK | No Comments

Yes, that’s a good question!* It was too ambitious for me to complete a summary for each interview at this stage, however this is what I have been working on in the meantime:

– I compiled a summary of the questions and comments from all interviews and conversations I have had in both the North Island and South Island since February.
– I took this list with me when I attended a TBANZ meeting in Lyttelton, on the 29th of August this year. Some very exciting developments came out of this meeting, including the idea for the upcoming National Time Banking Hui. I was very much in favour of the hui, to further promote the main idea behind the summaries of my interviews – knowledge sharing – as this is best approached in a collaborative way. I am sure that the hui will be a fantastic opportunity for this. The Lyttelton team also were pleased to receive these notes, as it gave them some further ideas regarding the information that new Time Banks need, and also for resources to put up on the TBANZ website (which will be online soon).
– We are also working hard here in Dunedin to establish our new TimeBank, and I’ve been encouraging many of our members to attend the hui, as well as going through my list of contacts in both the North and South Island to promote the hui (especially the availability of travel funding for those further away) to encourage as many people as possible to attend.
– I am also starting to help with the TBANZ forum, which is very close to being launched. The forum will be the ideal means of continuing our conversations that will begin at the hui, and of extending these conversations to include those who were not able to attend.

*In case you are wondering what this means, I visited some wonderful people all around the North Island in June this year, members and co-ordinators of the following Timebanks: Wellington South, Taita (in Lower Hutt, Wellington), Otaki, Kapiti, Whakatane and Kaitaia. During these interviews it was suggested that a useful idea would be to produce short bullet point summaries of each interview and post them here on the blog, to facilitate knowledge sharing. I am still going to write these up, and now that the teaching semester is over and we’re moving into the Summer break here at Otago, I am looking forward to re-visiting these interviews during this calm, relaxed period between semesters.

Time Banking Literature – a few interesting bits and pieces

Friday, September 23rd, 2011 | EMMA MCGUIRK | 5 Comments

On the literature side of things, I’ve finished a review of around 70 articles and book chapters on Time Banking, LETS (Local Exchange and Trading Systems), and other Community Currencies such as Ithaca HOURS. Most of these are international studies, and there have also been some studies done in New Zealand including Lucie Ozanne’s research with the Lyttelton Timebank which I think you are all familiar with, Lisa Geary’s report for the University of Canterbury (contains a great FAQ for start-up TimeBanks, with answers written by Julie Lee, from page 18 onwards), and Peter North’s work on Green Dollars.

Here are a few brief highlights from my literature search:
– There was a comprehensive review, Community Currency Research: An analysis of the literature published this year in the IJCCR (International Journal of Community Currency Research). The authors of this review have also made an extensive online database available. Click on ‘databank’ to search the literature that they have compiled.
– I found a few good overviews of the similarities and differences between Time Banking and LETS, and although it is an older article (2001) I really enjoyed this short piece On LETS and Time Dollars by Edgar Cahn.
– A fascinating book that I came across in February this year was Clue to the Economic Labyrinth, written by Michael Flurscheim, discussing many of the same issues that we are concerned with now – and published in 1902! A long text but well worth the effort. I still haven’t finished reading it but I intend to, and would be very excited to have somebody to talk to about this book. Why not make a large cup of tea or coffee and download the pdf 🙂
– Another interesting piece of writing is Elizabeth Miller’s PhD thesis Both Borrowers and Lenders: Time Banks and the Aged in Japan. Go straight to chapter four to read about the life of Teruko Mizushima, who created Time Banking in Japan decades before Edgar Cahn independently designed the same system in the United States.
– In his chapter The Longevity of Alternative Economic Practices: Lessons from Alternative Currency Networks Peter North lists the following key factors that he has observed amongst long-lasting alternative currency networks: The existence of at least one key and committed activist; strong management systems – including the delegation of tasks to a team, and the utilisation of the collective resources of this team (time, money, bicycle-power, creativity, personal computers and printers etc.); a supportive local state or voluntary body providing funding, worker time, or in kind support on a long-term basis; commitment building mechanisms – e.g. buddy or mentor systems for new members, regular pot luck dinners, newsletters, clothes and goods ‘freecycle’ parties, members feeling part of a community of like-minded people, and/or part of a wider political project; finally, a large and dense enough network of like-minded people getting what they need and with skills to share (North, 2010:38-42).

Let me know if there’s anything else in particular that you’d like to know from the literature and I can add further links and comments. I looked at studies of Timebanks in New Zealand, USA, Japan, Taiwan, the UK (Wales, Scotland and England), and Sweden.

Welcome!

Thursday, September 8th, 2011 | EMMA MCGUIRK | 2 Comments

Welcome to my research blog, set up to record and share what I am learning as I conduct research with members of Time Banks around New Zealand. I hope you will find the information and resources that I upload here to be useful and informative. I will be updating this regularly, so check back regularly to catch up on the latest posts! Ngā mihi nui, nā Emma.