I am an author, journalist and financial hacker exploring the intersections between money systems, finance and digital technology. In 2013 I published The Heretic’s Guide to Global Finance: Hacking the Future of Money with Pluto Press. It was a guide to the world of high finance and the emergent forms of alternative finance, alternative currencies and economic activism that are challenging it. I have a new book forthcoming with Bodley Head (PenguinRandomhouse) and Ecco (HarperCollins). I am a Senior Fellow of the Finance Innovation Lab (UK), an Associate at the Institute of Social Banking (Germany), and an advisory group member of the Brixton Pound local currency. I was also a winner of the 2016/2017 Ethics and Trust in Finance Global Prize.
Cash, Kisses and Karaoke: Why the War on Covid must not Become a War on Cash
By Brett Scott, Altered States of Money Consciousness
Covid-19 will be mobilised by the financial industry to push their War on Cash even further, leaving us ever more ensnared within their private digital money empire.
The War on Cash
By Brett Scott, The Long + Short
Our concerns are unfashionable. Without any explicit declaration, the War on Cash has begun.
The Dark Side of Digital Finance
By Brett Scott, The Heretic's Guide to Global Finance
A banker in 1716 had two main tools: a ledger book and a quill pen.
Money is Not a Store of Value
By Brett Scott, The Heretic's Guide to Global Finance
Money is not a store of value. It is a claim upon value.
A Dark Knight is Better than No Knight at All: Why We Need Bitcoin Despite its Flaws
By Brett Scott, The Heretic's Guide to Global Finance blog
It is only by zooming in and out, and considering the interplay between these absolute and relative perspectives that we can start to detect the complex power dynamics within Bitcoin.
Open Source Hacking
By Brett Scott, STIR
The financial sector is a notoriously opaque, alienating and destructive complex.
Show me the real money: Three monetary myths that need busting
By Brett Scott, The Heretic's Guide to Global Finance blog
Money pervades our everyday economic interactions. But, despite its importance, it is also pervasively misunderstood. Here are three common monetary myths – frequently perpetuated by economists that need challenging.
Bringing the Jungle to the City
By Brett Scott, Contributoria
A techno-shamanic quest to reconnect urban life to ecological reality.