Survival and growth-oriented entrepreneurs follow qualitatively different logics. In this article we retrace the scattered previous theorization of this distinction and present a consolidated set of key characteristics of the two types of enterprises, enriched by our own observations in the field. Our main purpose is to typify the different rationalities of the two groups of entrepreneurs. Second, we argue that because most existing interventions are based on the implicit assumption that all entrepreneurs are growth-oriented, they often fail to address the specific needs of survivalists. Finally, we outline an intervention rationale more attuned to the logic of survival entrepreneurs.Les entrepreneurs axe´s sur la survie suivent des logiques qualitativement diffe´rentes de ceux dont l 0 objectif est la croissance e´conomique. Dans cet article nous revenons sur la the´orisation de´jav aguement esquisse´e de cette distinction et pre´sentons un ensemble consolide´des caracte´ristiques cle´s des deux types d 0 entreprises, en nous appuyant sur nos propres observations de terrain. Nous cherchons, en premier lieu, a`caracte´riser les logiques des deux cate´gories d 0 entrepreneurs. Puis, nous montrons que les interventions sont ge´ne´ralement fonde´es sur l 0 hypothe`se implicite que tous les entrepreneurs sont axe´s sur la croissance. De ce fait, celles-ci re´pondent mal aux besoins spe´cifiques des entreprises axe´es sur la survie. Enfin, nous de´crivons une approche d 0 intervention plus en lien avec la logique des entrepreneurs qui sont axe´s sur la survie.

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The humanitarian sector has gone through a major shift toward injection of cash into vulnerable communities as its core modality. On this trajectory toward direct currency injection, something new has happened: namely the empowerment of communities to create their own local currencies, a tool known as Complementary Currency systems. This study mobilizes the concepts of endogenous regional development, import substitution and local market linkages as elaborated by Albert Hirschman and Jane Jacobs, to analyze the impact of a group of Complementary Currencies instituted by Grassroots Economics Foundation and the Red Cross in Kenya. The paper discusses humanitarian Cash and Voucher Assistance programs and compares them to a Complementary Currency system using Grassroots Economics as a case study. Transaction histories recorded on a blockchain and network visualizations show the ability of these Complementary Currencies to create diverse production capacity, dense local supply chains, and data for measuring the impact of humanitarian currency transfers. Since Complementary Currency systems prioritize both cooperation and localization, the paper argues that Complementary Currencies should become one of the tools in the Cash and Voucher Assistance toolbox.

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Based on empirical data, this study discusses the introduction, acceptance and circulation of two complementary currencies in Argentina that do not fit well in the main approaches to the nature of money. These two monetary circuits, provincial and community currencies, were introduced as units of account to denominate the value of debt and circulated as means of payment to overcome monetary stringency during the crisis of 1999-2003. After discussing several theories on the nature of money, we reflect on the institutional significance of currency circuits as concurrent and rather stable pairs of trade and money. We suggest that several theories of money need to be combined to account for the variety and heterogeneity of daily monetary practices in a broad spectrum of countries.

IntroductionThe poor, unemployed, and unpaid workers who suffer money shortages have an inadequate and limited inclusion in the regular markets, which are organised on the assumption that buyers work in paid employment and have money available. These groups do not simply purchase less than better-off buyers. They have other buying practices, face the decision of purchasing goods and services with disparate considerations, visit other outlets and shops, and generally experience their provisioning differently. They participate and often organise alternative institutional frameworks to exchange goods and services öa phenomenon of interest within the diverse economies research programme (Gibson-Graham, 2008).Local exchange networks represent one of the alternatives to overcome the exclusionary mechanisms of the regular market economy. When local exchange networks include the use of a nonstate complementary currency to facilitate payments, they adopt an institutional form known as Local Complementary Currency Systems (LCCSs), described by Ekins and Max-Neef (1986). Among other goals LCCSs are designed to protect the local economy through global economic downturns (Blanc, 2006;Go¨mez and Helmsing, 2008), promote the social and economic development of the community (Seyfang, 2001a;2001b;Thorne, 1996), and offer an environmental alternative to the global domination of money on exchanges (Pacione, 1999). In the English-speaking world the most widespread variant is the Local Exchange Trading System (LETS) which has been researched extensively (

Monetary policies and adjustments during a financial crisis depend on policy-makers’ conceptions on what money is and how it works. There is sufficient consensus among scholars that money is an institution created within the economic system and is in line with other institutions that regulate economic action. However, there are different understandings of what institutions are and how they operate, and these understandings imply differences in terms of monetary enforcement, resilience, responsiveness and stability. This paper discusses the two main approaches that conceptualise institutions as rules and as practices presenting an empirically informed discussion of money as an institution drawing on these insights. It grounds the analysis on the empirical case of Argentina as a monetary laboratory and the plurality of currencies that circulate in its economy. The study argues that while the official currency of Argentina corresponds to the institutions as rules approach, the adoption of the U.S. dollar into a bimonetary economy evolved as equilibrium. In between, the massive community currency systems that rose and declined during the economic meltdown between 1998 and 2002 were a hybrid institution that combined rules and practice. All three of them show various degrees of resilience and stability.

Lockdowns around the world have forced governments to close schools for most of 2020 and they will probably remain closed in several areas and for some time until the end of 2021. Millions of children around the world will not have experienced classes in classrooms for an entire year or longer, which has disrupted their routines and educational cycles. In this chapter we discuss the impact of the pandemic and school closures on the schooling system in Latin America. A rapid shift to digital learning became necessary, but the basic infrastructure to support it was mostly absent, so school closures have exacerbated the digital gap both within and between countries. In Latin America, after decades of expansion of the public schooling system, the pandemic has offset the important progress in terms of poverty alleviation.