by Frederick Mann - September 21, 1993
The Problem
If you read certain books (like The Great Reckoning by James Dale
Davidson and Lord William Rees-Mogg; Bankruptcy 1995 by Harry E.
Figgie, Jr.; The Death of Money by Joel Kurtzman; The Downwave
by Robert Beckman; and How You Can Find Happiness During the Collapse
of Western Civilization by Robert J. Ringer) and you examine "societal
health statistics" (like crime, divorce, suicide, literacy, inflation,
government spending deficits, etc.), you might reach conclusions like:
The Build Freedom Solution
One of the basic ideas behind Build Freedom is that we create free-market
institutions to replace the coercive monopolies of the public and private
sectors. I distinguish three economic sectors: public, private, and free-market.
The public sector operates mostly on the principle of compulsion or coercion.
The private sector mixes voluntary exchange and coercion. People in the
private sector tend to finance the public sector through paying taxes.
Many also run to "big daddy government" for "special favors"
involving coercion (licences, tariff protection, special interest legislation,
etc.).
The people in the free-market sector practice real, true, or pure free-enterprise - voluntary exchange, voluntary competition, voluntary cooperation. They reject coercion: the initiation of force, fraud, violence or threat of violence against person or property; or the use of violence or threat to overwhelm the will of another. In short, they respect people and their property.
The "Build Freedom shift" is the shift of economic activities from the public and private sectors to the free-market sector. To accelerate this shift we need to create free-market institutions to make it easier for individuals and groups to shift their assets and economic activities into the free market. The most important free-market institutions we need to create are free-market currency and financial service systems, that are independent from public coercion. The people operating these systems don't recognize the "authority" of public sector coercion. They find practical ways to escape coercion.
Build Freedom thinking is that rather than trying to reform existing systems, we simply create our own alternatives. If you have to beg others to please change their system, you aren't in a very powerful position - you operate from weakness, you surrender your power. If you create your own system, you can operate from power - though you have to take security measures to prevent the elephant of coercion from trampling you into the dust!
A major consideration is that we need free-market alternatives for people to shift into, in case the public/private banking system collapses overnight.
TELICUR
ALH & Co. in Orange County, California is an "embryonic TELICUR"
that has been in operation since 1976. It uses gold as currency. It interfaces
with the current U.S. banking system. It can be used as a model to expand
from.
Ideally, TELICUR needs to enable individuals to conduct financial transactions in a number of currencies (including gold and silver) from anywhere to anywhere in the world in privacy, safety, and security. Interfaces with current banking systems are necessary.
Apart from making a pivotal and decisive contribution to the expansion of freedom, the principals who launch TELICUR have the opportunity to become millionaires and billionaires. Imagine all or most of the financial services of the public/private sector shifting into the free market. That is a measure of the potential!
Personally, I'm not interested in being a banker. However, I am interested in helping to bring together a team that will design and implement TELICUR. There could also be several teams implementing competing systems. I am available to provide project design and management support.
ECO - Earth Council Organization
The following appeared in The International Harry Schultz Letter
of July/August 1993 (edited):
"Our "mental nation" concept landed on solid ground, piloted
by our friend and subscriber of 28 years, Hans Schicht, of South Africa.
We lunched in central Europe the other day and he explained his idea, tentatively
called ECO, Earth Council Organization. It ignores national borders by
being a passive, non-political, data communication-linked entity; philosophical
yet practical; immune to the usual burdensome nationalistic limitations.
It's in the mode of multinational corps that are sort-of above or apart
from normal national rules. Many international organizations operate in
the same mode. But ECO would be more invisible, thanks to an electronic
network, not as a gadget application but on a similar level as the world's
airlink systems. A global organization (mental nation?) without real estate,
built on "floating" communication. ECO would create border-free
laws and a code of conduct. International finance doesn't need a home base
anymore. Neither do we, says Hans. ECO's purpose: to free the individual
from his bondage to the oppressive state; to give him a new sense of belonging
and a solid anchor of morals/ethics to get the world back on a positive
track and away from intrusive governments that have become suffocating
monsters. ECO will not only use gold as a standard but use it as the exclusive
means of exchange and store of value. ECO bookkeeping will be electronically
transparent into all details. ECO will stand for open and free communication
channels, trade, finances and information flow. Hardware needed initially:
a personal computer with a modem or fax. If sufficient support shown, ECO
plans to install a general combination service for bulletin boards, videotext,
audiotext and cable TV access. Existing TVs and digital phones will get
access to the system. If this ECO idea appeals to you, please write to
Hans at PO Box 781507, Sandton 2146, South Africa (send a copy of your
letter to me if you like). Hans is obviously an idealist, but that's what
starts every useful cause." (The International Harry Schultz Letter,
PO Box 622, CH-1001, Lausanne, Switzerland. For information, fax or phone
fulfillment office in Belgium (24 hour service): Phone 32-16-533684, Fax
32-16-535777. One year subscription: $275.)
I wrote to Mr. Schicht, sent him some Build Freedom materials, and suggested cooperation. He wrote back that ECO is explained in a book to be reprinted some time in the future, And Thou shall inherit the Earth. I don't know how far developed ECO is, nor the probability that it will come to fruition.
Getting Started
Please let me know if you are interested in helping to launch TELICUR.
Write to me your qualifications and what role you want to play or what
contribution you would like to make. I will publish a Directory of people
interested in TELICUR. This will enable anyone to contact anyone else.
Consider signing on as a Build Freedom Patron and/or Professional Liberator.
We need practical business people with sound freedom philosophies. We need a leader for each TELICUR system (assuming there will be more than one). We need people with banking, financial, and related legal experience. We need people with electronic communication experience. We need people with computer systems design and programming experience (including encryption).
Interested people need to form themselves into a TELICUR project team (or multiple teams). The team focuses on quickly developing a product and/or service that can be profitably delivered. The project is designed so that a sequence of relatively small steps will gradually lead to a comprehensive TELICUR system. The first product might be a report that describes phase one of the TELICUR system.
Urgent!!! Urgent!!! Urgent!!!
It is absolutely vital that TELICUR, ECO, or several such systems be created
as soon as possible. Please contact me if you are interested. The people,
technology, knowledge, skills, and experience already exist to create TELICUR,
ECO, etc. We need to immediately help the competent practical idealists
to get together and to get going! Help expand freedom and make a fortune
You are welcome to copy, duplicate, or publish this report and distribute it as you like.
Postscript (February 15th, 2002)
A small team was put together in 1994 to develop and launch World Trade Clearinghouse. Unfortunately this initiative failed. That's the bad news. The good news is that e-gold and other similar systems are succeeding and growing rapidly. See:
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