Work in a DisCO is divided into three main income streams: livelihood work (paid work), lovework (pro bono work to contribute to the commons), and care work (reproductive work). Each member’s pay is a combination of these three streams. Value tracking is applied to all DisCO members, in turn influencing decision making, payments, work priorities, and more.
In short: DisCOs reimagine value into three streams - productive market value, pro-bono/commons-generating value, and carework value - that are tracked through complementary value metrics.
Overview
Feminist Economics invites us to value things that are not valued in the market, such as care, nurturing, invisible work, unpaid admin work, mutual support. Conventional economic rationality is profoundly “male-centric” and promotes behaviors like competition and individualism. In contrast, solidarity, care and reciprocity are considered extra-economic and feminine.
DisCOs value and track these “invisible” activities, never acknowledged in the market logic, which are the very base and the heart of a healthy collective.
Furthermore, DisCO proposes factoring in the work that actively creates commons (lovework) through collaboration with other DisCOs, documentation, open-source resources, tools and cooperative practices. As David Bollier explains, "it is entirely possible for markets and commons to “play nicely together,” but only if commoners can have “value sovereignty” over their resources and community governance.
Recognizing different types of value influences payments, work priorities and certain key decisions. This recognition visibilizes and empowers other values left out by the market logic. Tracking and revealing the often invisible streams of value-producing labor challenges the capitalistic mindset and modus operandi. By tracking flows of value we can hack the neoliberal labor classification, hence value exploitation.
Examples
DisCO.coop organizes its own value flows around a Worker Self-directed Non Profit fork of the DisCO governance model. In this model (DisCO.NP) Livelihood Work is composed of funded/specific project deliverables. Lovework comprises unfunded DisCO development work, including some partnerships and DisCO LABS. Care work is the reproductive work needed to keep the collective healthy and thriving.
Cooperation Jackson is working towards fully recognizing care work and repositioning it to reflect the value of worker-cooperatives in building a solidarity economy. This includes caring for marginalised community members, as well as taking special care of those who need more help. Care work in cooperation is at the core.
Why this is important
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Tensions
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Interactions with other principles
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Related Elements
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More Resources
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TLDR
- DisCOs reimagine value into three streams - productive market value, pro-bono/commons-generating value, and carework value. - The transparency and political implications of open-value accounting and tracking makes for a different understanding of value that challenges the ingrained capitalist reasoning. Members of a DisCO get to decide what’s valuable and how to retribute it.