Reimagining Community, Economics and the Region in Central North Carolina
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“IN EACH OTHER WE TRUST”: REIMAGINING COMMUNITY, ECONOMICS AND THE REGION IN CENTRAL NORTH CAROLINA Jonathan David Lepofsky A dissertation submitted to the faculty of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Department of Geography. Chapel Hill 2007 Approved by: Dr. John Pickles Dr. Altha Cravey Dr. Lawrence Grossberg Dr. James Leloudis Dr. Wendy Wolford ABSTRACT In Each Other We Trust: Reimagining Community, Economics, and the Region in Central North Carolina (Under the direction of Dr. John Pickles) This dissertation examines the creation and circulation of a complementary currency, the PLENTY, within four contiguous counties in central North Carolina. Using a participatory research action model, this dissertation argues that the production of community through the PLENTY’s monetary space and alternative economic function creates an opportunity for residents within this region to rearticulate their relationship to people and places within and outside of the region. This alternative regional form is different than the dominant conception of the region as “the Triangle,” which is based around the global connections that meet up in Research Triangle Park and which have concretized over the past 50 years. The dissertation stresses the ambivalence with which this alternative regional form is realized either in idea or in practice due to the discursive limits PLENTY users put on the geography of community. While the PLENTY provides the possibility to practice a spatial ethics in which one’s sense of responsivess and care follow the complex lines of connection fostered by a diversely global sense of place, this potential remains latent when conventional relations between community, economics and place are not deconstructed. ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS As with any piece of writing, the author is just one of the many people who contributes to the final product. In the case of this dissertation, as in any action- research project with a non-profit organization, acknowledging the contributions of others is especially important. Therefore, it is with deep gratitude that I thank all of the participants in the PLENTY complementary currency project that makes up the bulk of this dissertation’s focus. In particular, the members of the Board of Trustees showed incredible patience and generosity during the years of this study. I am deeply indebted to them for the kindness, unlimited access to information and humor that they provided. In addition to the participants in the PLENTY project, I need to thank the faculty of the Department of Geography at UNC-Chapel Hill, especially Drs. Lawerence Band, Altha Cravey, Wil Gesler, Scott Kirsch, Aaron Moody, Tom Whitmore, and Wendy Wolford for their incredible support. Beyond that department, Lawrence Grossberg has been a model of what a teacher and mentor can be and Julie Graham and Kathie Gibson have shown that academics do not have to be bound by title, position or place to make an impact on the world. Additionally, Barbara Taylor and Nell Philips provided invaluable help navigating the institutional labyrinth of UNC over the past years. I owe a particular debt of gratitude to the librarians at UNC’s Southern Historical Collection and North Carolina Collection as well as those at Duke University’s University Archives. Above all, Dr. John Pickles provided iii remarkable guidance that was always challenging, careful, intelligent, and revealing of his reputation as an academic of the highest caliber. His unwavering faith in this project is the reason it exists. This project is also a child of the work of Doreen Massey, and though I have yet to meet her, her inspiration is the backbone of this work. Until I can thank her in person, this note will have to do. For her, and for those mentioned above and for all of those who have been teachers and contributors along the way, the most valuable lesson of this work remains her simple maxim: “You can’t hold places still”(Massey 2005, p. 125). But no one deserves greater thanks than my wife Sadie Bauer, who, along with our son Owen, has taught me the most important geography of my life: the direction home. iv TABLE OF CONTENTS CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION........................................................................... 1 Community is Disintegrating.................................................................................... 1 Spacing the Politics of Community Through the Relationality of Money ............... 5 “Our Community, Our Economy, Our Money”...................................................... 13 The Power-Geometries of the Diverse Economy ................................................... 15 Locating Myself in the PLENTY’s Relations......................................................... 17 CHAPTER TWO: COMMUNITY, ECONOMY, REGION: SPACES OF ENCOUNTER....................................................................................... 22 Imagining Community in Economic Geographies ................................................. 22 Three Moments of Community Economies in Professional Geography, First Moment: Regional Geographies, Community Economies ..................................... 26 Second Moment: Diverse Economies of Community ............................................ 30 Third Moment: Communities within Community Economies ............................... 47 Reimagining the Region through Community Economies ..................................... 54 CHAPTER THREE: CONDITIONS OF POSSIBILITY: THE BIRTH OF THE TRIANGLE............................................................................ 55 Surveying the Land................................................................................................. 55 The Production of Regional Space ......................................................................... 68 Making it Happen ................................................................................................... 80 More than Just the Park........................................................................................... 87 v CHAPTER FOUR: TERRITORIALIZING THE TRIANGLE……………………...94 Introduction............................................................................................................. 94 Beginnings .............................................................................................................. 95 Planning for the Triangle: 1950s-1964 ................................................................... 99 Realizing the Triangle: 1965-1980 ....................................................................... 106 Managing the Triangle: 1980-1995 ...................................................................... 120 The Global Triangle: 1995 to today...................................................................... 128 Conclusion ............................................................................................................ 134 CHAPTER FIVE: “OUR ECONOMY, OUR COMMUNITY, OUR MONEY”: THE MECHANICS OF A COMPLEMENTARY CURRENCY ............................ 137 Introduction........................................................................................................... 137 Complementary Currencies in the United States.................................................. 139 How the PLENTY Started .................................................................................... 145 How the PLENTY Works..................................................................................... 153 Where the PLENTY Takes Place: Territorializing a Space of Encounter............ 157 Who Participates in the PLENTY......................................................................... 164 What the PLENTY Community Economy Looks Like........................................ 169 Conclusion: Money to Build Community?........................................................... 183 CHAPTER SIX: NEGOTIATING THE LOCAL .................................................... 184 Introduction........................................................................................................... 184 Envisioning a Local Community Economy.......................................................... 188 Arbitrarily Local ................................................................................................... 193 The Lackluster Response to Ambiguously Rendering the Local.......................... 203 vi Conservative or Progressive: Unpacking the Local and the Politics of Community.......................................................................................... 207 Losing Sight of Translocality: The Local as a Good ............................................ 213 Ongoing Negotiations ........................................................................................... 219 CHAPTER SEVEN: OPENINGS: RETERRITORIALIZING THE REGION THROUGH ITS DIVERSE ECONOMIES.............................................................. 223 Introduction........................................................................................................... 223 Tracing Alternative Regionality ........................................................................... 225 Territorializing the Region’s Diverse Economies................................................. 242 Conclusion ............................................................................................................ 246 CHAPTER EIGHT: ON VALUE: CLASS AND COMMUNITY .......................... 248 Introduction..........................................................................................................