We are publishing an open directory for independent projects that have innovative approaches to the implementation of universal basic income (UBI). These diverse projects fall at the intersection of economics, law, governance, financial technology, and social justice. Note that included projects are not necessarily affiliated with UBI Research. UBI Research seeks to monitor and produce critical analyses of such initiatives for the benefit of all.
Please contact us if you are interested in listing your project here. To view or add your project to the original OpenUBI directory, click here (note that some information may be out of date).
Directory
The directory currently includes UBI currencies, community currencies, complementary currencies, decentralized digital identity systems, and projects at the intersection of these categories. Please note: Many of these are still in an early testing phase.
| Project Name | Currency | SSI | UBI | Scope | Launched |
| Circles | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | glocal | live |
| Monnaie Libre Ğ1 | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | glocal | live |
| Manna | ✓ | no | ✓ | global | live |
| SwiftDemand | ✓ | no | ✓ | global | live |
| GoodDollar | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | global | live |
| Raha | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | global | beta |
| UBIC | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | global | live |
| Idena | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | global | live |
| Aura | ✓ | no | ✓ | local | live |
| Seeds | ✓ | no | ✓ | global | live |
| Project Greshm | ✓ | no | ✓ | global | no |
| Encointer | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | local | no |
| Grassroots Economics | ✓ | no | no | glocal | live |
| HumanityDAO | no | ✓ | ✓ | global | obsolete |
| BrightID | no | ✓ | no | glocal | live |
| Trustlines Network | ✓ | ✓ | no | glocal | live |
Category Information
Currency
This category indicates whether the initiative seeks to provide its own currency, medium of exchange, value mechanism, or similar feature.
SSI (Self-Sovereign Identity)
These are initiatives that seek to integrate with self-sovereign identity solutions. For more information on this topic, please refer to the Self-Sovereign Identity (SSI) github repository maintained by Rebooting Web-of-Trust. Some initiatives take this one step further and seek to provide users with a fully decentralized digital proof of personhood. SSI is considered necessary to enable participation in alternative economic models.
Here is some context on the term “self-sovereign identity”:
In a decentralized world, then, a user will have many systems, sites, or organizations which help them maintain their public identity, and the identities will be linked together. Decentralized does not mean blockchain. A user can have many IDs, some grounded in DNS, some grounded in the Blockchain. A “self-sovereign” identity is a relatively recent word for an identity which a user has which they have control over, without having to use a large central social network.
“A Public Identity,” (Tim Berners-Lee, 2018).
UBI (Universal Basic Income)
Initiatives in this category are primarily seeking to distribute value to their users in the form of a UBI.
Scope
Projects are categorized as being either local, global, or “glocal.” This is based on whether the initiative is meant to have a wide, interconnected community, or instead made up of autonomous, independent communities. Local projects may be replicated but the focus of each implementation is to remain within a definted community. Global projects are meant to be globally inclusive. “Glocal” projects retain some aspects of both local and global goals.
Stage
Many of the highlighted projects are still in an early testing phase, even those categorized as “live.” This is important to note, since the nature of these projects tend to set high expectations. However, all of these initiatives remain highly experimental, and users are cautioned to engage with them primarily as co-creators.