Money is not neutral.
I am Nicolas Franka.
I work on money as a central institution shaping value, power, and collective action.
My work starts from a simple observation: while societies debate democracy and justice intensely, the monetary and economic systems that structure these debates remain largely unquestioned. I analyse the limits of the dominant monetary system and work on concrete alternatives — combining research, field experimentation, and public debate.
My goal is clear: to help restore the capacity to act to territories, communities, and citizens, in order to build a fairer, more democratic, and more resilient economy.
Money structures action before intentions
Money is not a simple technical tool.
It organises priorities, structures incentives, and drives human action.
To understand money is to understand:
- how value is defined, determined
- how contributions are recognised, visibilised and acknoledged
- and why certain forms of wealth concentrate while others are being depleted
This is why I treat money as a central institution of social organisation which can take many forms, and not merely a veil on the economy that can be discarded out of public discourse
Critique without experimentation is symbolic !
I start from observable limits of the dominant economic and monetary system: concentration of wealth, fragile collective initiatives, and persistent gaps between economic value and social contribution.
Let us roll-up our sleeves !
Rather than stopping at critique - as so many do nowadays -, I work on designing, testing, and analysing alternative frameworks of money that allow communities, territories, and organisations to act differently and sustainably.
Research, experimentation, and public debate
We make every moment count with solutions designed just for you.
Innovative Ideas
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Books to read
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Timeless Quality
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The evolution of our company
I am the founder and director of Monetary Diversity, an international network bringing together more than 60 organisations working on complementary currencies, local monetary systems, and monetary innovations.
The network provides a space for collaboration, learning, and institutional dialogue, grounding analysis in shared experience rather than abstract models.
Areas of work
Supporting the development of real-world monetary systems
I contribute to the development of dozens of monetary initiatives across Europe by supporting their design, governance, and long-term viability — often at the intersection of monetary experimentation, public policy, and emerging technologies.
This includes coordinating and contributing to large-scale European projects, where local and complementary currencies are tested under real institutional, technical, and political constraints.
Researching money as an institution
My research focuses on money not as a neutral instrument, but as an institution that structures value, incentives, and collective capacity to act.
I work across economic theory, institutional analysis, and empirical observation to understand how different monetary arrangements affect democracy, cooperation, and long-term resilience.
Designing innovative monetary and institutional systems
Beyond analysis, I work on the design of monetary and institutional frameworks: local currencies, complementary systems, mutual credit arrangements, and hybrid payment mechanisms.
The focus is not technology for its own sake, but institutional coherence — ensuring that monetary tools align with collective goals, governance structures, and real-world constraints.
Engaging in collective and territorial projects
I am directly involved in collective projects — commons-based initiatives, eco-villages, and land or forest governance experiments — where questions of value, contribution, and responsibility are lived rather than theorised.
These contexts provide essential feedback: they reveal where institutional designs hold, where they fail, and what democratic and economic conditions are required to sustain collective action over time.
Teaching, transmission, and public debate
A central part of my work consists in teaching, speaking, writing, and developing public-facing formats — including conferences, workshops, publications, and video content.
The objective is not simplification, but democratisation: making monetary and economic questions discussable, contestable, and accessible beyond expert circles.
Democracy cannot transform the economy if money itself remains undemocratic.
I do not see economics as the distant theory I was taught about.
Rather, I see it as a set of institutions setting functions through properties of systems that shape our collective futures.
My work is driven by a clear commitment:
to contribute to the democratisation of money and economic institutions, and to test, in practice, what makes collective action possible over time.