Resource distribution

The resource distribution area governs how resources flow between the nodes of the network. It is central to enable a cycle of deepening relationships. It includes protocols for:

Solidarity contributions – how resources flow between network members of different means, with what transparency, governed by what contribution and distribution criteria.

Needs-based co-budgeting – how shared resources are allocated through participatory process. Example protocols include:

• Enspiral’s Cobudget, where any member proposes projects and participants distribute pooled funds transparently
• Greaterthan’s Happy Money Story, where a team that completed shared work collectively distributes its budget through rounds of appreciation, individual proposals, and refinement until every participant is genuinely satisfied – treating financial distribution as a relational act rather than a calculation

Mutual aid – how members support and call on each other in times of need.

Each protocol requires ritual, critique and contemplation attending to: whose labour is invisible, whose needs go unmet, and whether resource flows are prefiguring alternatives or reproducing extraction.

This area is sketched at the principles level; its specific protocols remain to be developed.

Sources

• Cobudget as participatory resource allocation from the Enspiral network; see Enspiral Foundation (2016), Enspiral Handbook
• Happy Money Story practice adapted from Davies’ bill-splitting game by Greaterthan; see Pick, Arora & Bumke (2022), “Happy Money Story: Decoupling Remuneration from Calculation” (greaterthan.works)