Organizer: Doughnut Czechia & Regenerace fund Czechia
Event location: GreenTable by Veolia | Na Florenci 2116/15, 110 00 Nové Město
About the event:
Resilience costs money, and the usual question is where to get more of it. This afternoon, we’ll ask a different one: We begin with what can be achieved with no new money at all, only with better visibility and coordination of what already exists. We then ask what becomes possible when new capital is introduced, and on what terms. And we end by mapping the current monetary system and its challenges: where money actually comes from, and why it remains invisible to almost everyone.
This event is in English.
Program
Jakub Lanc - Wealth lying idle: Municipal & regional financial innovation (30 + 15 min)
In networks of firms that owe each other money, a large share of that debt can be cancelled without a single crown entering the system - just through closing the loops of obligation no individual firm can see. The same holds beyond invoices: most towns hold capacity invisible to them: buildings used a few hours a week, procurement flowing straight out of the local economy, savings idle while local projects can't raise finance etc. Not every problem that looks like a shortage of money is one: Often what's missing is visibility, connection, and instruments. In the talk, we map various kinds of idle capacity and the mechanisms through which these can be unlocked (including mutual credit, Community Wealth Building etc.), hinting at possible municipal financial architectures of the future. We’ll introduce cases and data from where these already operate and close with an invitation: Atelier Loci, a living lab for testing these instruments in Czech conditions.
Lukáš Rolf - Smart Capital for a Resilient Society: How we’re building the first Czech venture philanthropy fund (20 + 15 min)
If the first talk asks what can be done with no new money, this one asks where to invest what is already available with an impact that sends positive ripples through various levels of our systems. We introduce Nadační fond regenerace - the first fund in Czechia to combine the principles of venture philanthropy with deep systemic change. We approach not-for-profit projects like an impact investor: seeking out bold initiatives and offering them smart capital - a combination of finance, strategic mentoring, leadership and team-culture development, and connection into our network. We open the question of non-financial societal return, show how we work with the framework of eight forms of capital, and argue why supporting these returns is one of the most sensible de-risking strategies available to us.
Goran Jeras - Towards Regenerative Banking (30 + 15 min)
If the first two talks ask where money can come from, this one asks who should own the institution that holds it. Goran Jeras has spent over a decade building alternatives to extractive finance - founding Croatia's largest cooperative, ZEF, and now working on the European Ethical Bank through Echoes, a stewardship-owned digital bank being built to serve communities across 30 EU and EEA countries. The model is deliberately integrative: local member organisations - cooperatives, development agencies, municipalities - become co-owners and manage their own credit portfolios, while the centre handles compliance and infrastructure. It is designed to accommodate both patient philanthropic capital and the collaborative-finance instruments discussed earlier in the afternoon.
The Monetary System Collage (by Katy Shields)
Where Does Money Come From (and Why Doesn't Anyone Know)?
A collaborative, Climate-Fresk-style workshop building a shared picture of how monetary system came to be, how money is created, who creates it, and why that process stays invisible - including to most people who work with money professionally. Katy Shields is an economist and educator in Vienna, Course Director of the Regenerative Economy Lab, co-founder of Doughnut Wien, and co-producer of Tipping Point: The True Story of the Limits to Growth. No prior knowledge needed.