Making sense of a crank case: monetary diversity in Argentina (1999–2003)

Abstract

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. 1996) sees money as a social relation of credit and debt 'which exists independently of the production and exchange of commodities' (Ingham, 2004, p. 12). This is in fact the mechanism through which money is created, whether by banks as loans or by the state as public debt. After it is spent a few times the fact that it was created as debt is forgotten, as is the original social relation between creditor and debtor, and the perception of money as a 'thing' (Dodd, 2014) remains dominant. The view of money as an institution differentiates the structures of various monetary forms and the contexts in which they emerge (Ingham, 1998; The third alternative to the commodity theory is Knapp's state or 'chartalist' theory of money, from the Latin 'charta' for paper, according to which money is anything that the state will accept as payment for taxes According to this theory, money must refer to an authority from which it derives its legitimacy.