Mission

The Collaborative has emerged from a growing recognition that changing attitudes and behaviors about money, understanding the social need for and benefits of leveraging and releasing wealth, alleviating poverty, lifting the taboo about money, opening up conversations about money, and bringing money awareness to young people across the educational spectrum, are all necessary strategic activities to foster long term societal health.

The work of the Collaborative is to bring people and organizations together to articulate approaches, practices and principles for changing consciousness and behavior around money, financial practices, and money system—ranging from personal finance to socially responsible investing, to philanthropy, community banking, consumerism, tax policy and new forms of currency, among others. Activities of the Collaborative include hosting conferences and dialogues on topics such as money, class and race, conscious consumerism, social investing, complementary currencies, and designing initiatives to impact on these and other issues (Catalyzing the Release of Wealth, Sequoia Principles, Complementary Currencies Funding Circle). The Collaborative also intends to bring the transforming money conversation across class, race, age and gender differences to open new pathways of trust and communication in our financial transactions and bring values-based principles into practice.

This project furthers RSF’s goal of developing the capacity of individuals and organizations to explore the social implications of financial practices. From RSF’s experience, increased awareness of the relationship between intention and action when it comes to economic decision-making is at the heart of social finance.

Core Purposes: Connecting the Field, Expanding the Collaborative Community, Social Transformation

• Identify and map the wide range of domains engaged in social finance and transforming money
• Create and maintain an Internet portal as a resource, and an organizing and communications tool for the emergent field of social finance
• Continue to serve as a bridge builder, and hold forums for learning and sharing of work
• Continue to convene and foster dialogues on money, class, race, spiritual and religious perspectives
• Support further development of innovative approaches to money, such as complementary and alternative currencies, sustainable banking, etc.
• Articulate a set of principles and practices that will inspire personal, organizational, and systemic change in working with money
• Work toward understanding the key transformative elements to alleviating poverty, inequity and class discrimination
• Create and maintain an innovative administrative infrastructure that supports initiatives in social finance