An Anniversary Note — BIEN’s Twenty-fifth

Abstract

Anniversaries are poignant human moments, points on a journey, never an end in themselves. Twenty-five years ago, on September 4–6, 1986, a small group of us held a workshop on basic income and on September 6 decided to set up a network, BIEN. The memory is blurred; the documentation is scattered. However, this twenty-fifth anniversary is a testament to several aspects of BIEN, and it is perhaps acceptable to reflect on the journey so far.

Editor’s Note: The attached was sent to the Basic Income European Network (BIEN) membership via email on September 4, 2011. A flurry of complimentary emails followed. I wish to thank Guy Standing for permitting his statement in its entirety to be included in this volume. Bracketed text [] was added by me for informational or clarification purposes only.