| For the past three years, we have been experimenting with an unusual way of offering our courses and other offerings: we give them away.
To be more precise, instead of charging "market value" for our courses, or asking people to pay what we think they are "worth", we instead request that people gift us an amount they feel they are willing and able to contribute. We offer a recommended range, and ask for a minimum deposit to cover our out of pocket expenses, but otherwise we make it clear that any amount is ok for us. Even zero.
This "Gift Economy" approach is a practical step we have chosen to take toward living the change we want to see in the world. Our experiment has been a little uncertain, even uncomfortable, at times...and yet, it is an approach that we have found to be rewarding, exciting, hopeful and life changing.
Why we choose to give our courses away
Simply put, a gift economy approach is an attempt to recreate a world where we care for each other and where we acknowledge that our well-being is inextricably tied up in each others'. It is a way that we have found to have some agency in creating a world that is focused on need (not greed).
The gift economy is an attempt to reimagine how we might be able to bring about the kind of deeply caring world we long for while also acknowledging the current reality of the economic system we are embedded within. It harks back to our traditional, ancient roots when we lived in interconnected communities and each of us cared for all of us.
This is very different from the world and economic system we currently operate within (which, in order to function, relies on widespread jackal ideas and beliefs like “deserving”, punishment and reward, “power over” or the use of force).
If you are interested in hearing more about the gift economy approach we use at Peace Talks and why we do it, have a look at our recent blog on the topic. |
