Presenters

What are the key ingredients for a successful sustainable development model during an Information and emerging Knowledge Age? How does today’s conventional monetary system serve or hinder such a development? What monetary innovations are already operational to remedy the development problems caused by the conventional money system? Over 4,000 new monetary innovations are now being implemented all over the world. Money affects the nature of transactions and the sensibility of relationships. This talk is not about theory, but about practical on-going monetary projects that demonstrate how values are shaping the development process, and how those values are in turn shaped by choices in monetary systems.

BIOGRAPHY:

Bernard Lietaer is one of the original architects of the European single currency, and an expert on monetary systems. For thirty-five years he has worked with European and Latin American governments, central banks and private investors to understand and optimize the performance of monetary trading systems.Bernard served as head of the Organization and Computer Department at the Central Bank in Belgium, as well as President of Belgium's electronic payment system, considered the most inclusive and cost effective payment system in the world. Later he served as co-founder of one of the first large-scale offshore currency trading funds. During his three year tenure as General Manager and Currency Trader of Gaia Hedge II, the fund was rated by the Micropal survey as the top performer among 75 currency hedge funds and among all 1800 offshore funds worldwide. Eventually Bernard became more interested in the deeper issues underlying currency trading and monetary systems, and he turned to teaching. He wrote The Future of Money while a Fellow at the Center for Sustainable Resources at the University of California at Berkeley. At Sonoma State University he explored the psychological dimensions of money systems, and wrote The Mystery of Money as wel as Access to Human Wealth: Money beyond Greed and Scarcity. He is currently a visiting Professor at Naropa University.