I Buoni di Riace: A complementary currency as a strategic tool to resist the mafia and transform the migration crisis into an opportunity

Abstract

I Buoni di Riace (Riace Vouchers) was a community currency, a series of thirty-six colorful paper banknotes that circulated between 2011 and 2018 within the city of Riace in the south of Italy. In this paper, I consider the visual strategy Domenico Lucano employed, as mayor of Riace, with I Buoni di Riace, an initiative developed in response to two significant social issues in the city: depopulation due to mafia activity and massive increases in migratory fluxes. Lucano’s tactic was to manipulate money to make it an instrument of social cohesion and inclusiveness within the small Calabrian city of Riace.