#SWAP: Emanuele Braga (Macao Center)
Channel: iMAL Brussels
Date: 2017-11-22

So, what about Politics? - #SWAP
Symposium @ iMAL, Brussels, November 2017
http://imal.org/en/activity/so-what-about-politics-swap

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Emanuele Braga (Macao Center)
Macao and its Commoncoin: the question of value
The Milano-based Macao center is a self-organised Center for Art and Research. It has released its own community cryptocurrency, the Commoncoin. Governance of the Commoncoin project is decided by consensus of a general assembly. At the end of every month, all members of the Center’s assembly receive an equal basic income in Euro generated by the income of the activities of the organization. Emanuele writes, “In a plausible future in which algorithms might control our economical, relational and spatial behavior, it will be a challenge to find a way to question these systems without creating a democratic deficit as a collateral effect. As automation begins to replace more of the work once performed by humans, how will it be possible to keep purchasing power? In the past, wealth was redistributed through salary, and the salary was the focal point of the workers’ struggles and the union’s demands. But what happens when income is no longer the central issue? What new models of struggle and organization can we imagine?”

About the speaker
Emanuele is co-founder of the Macao center, an artist, researcher and activist. In addition to his work at Macao, he co-founded the dance and theatre company Balletto Civile (2003), the contemporary art project Rhaze (2011), as well as Landscape Choreography (2012), an art platform questioning the role of the body under capitalism. His research focuses on models of cultural production, processes of social transformation, political economy, labor rights and the institution of the commons.

- http://www.macaomilano.org/


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(intro & outro music: The Choice by The Black Square (■), licensed under a Attribution License http://freemusicarchive.org/music/The_Black_Square_/The_Choice)