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An initiative by the Native Allies Society of Malaysia
Last Updated: November 2025
We long for a future where communities, systems and economies primarily exist to serve and sustain life.
Where humans live in right relationship with one another and with all beings, where resources are not hoarded but held as gifts to be shared, and economies driven not by supply and demand, but flow to the rhythm of mutual gifting and receiving. Where wealth is measured not by the accumulation of money, but by the density of interdependence in our relationships.
We think this is a world we would be proud to pass on to the next generation, and we’re convinced this world is within our reach - each of us carries the power to weave it into being.
Kesalingan Kommunes is our effort in this imagining.
Designed as a series of public gatherings that point towards the possibility of this world - where abundance, reciprocity, and mutual care determine how we relate with one another and how resources flow in societies, this is us on a journey of becoming, as well as unfolding - it is an attempt at renewal and intentionally creating spaces to serve life by standing by our fellow beings. It is also our invitation to all Malaysians to walk alongside us as we collectively tend to the nurturing of a better world.
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🌿 Kesalingan Kommunes: A series of public gatherings rooted in the spirit of reciprocity. Intended for all who desire to connect with others while exploring alternate ways of communal living and society building.
🌿 Kesalingan: Malay for ‘reciprocity’.
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Remember to imagine and craft the worlds you cannot live without, just as you dismantle the ones you cannot live within. - Ruha Benjamin
The spirit of reciprocity is the heartbeat of Kesalingan Kommunes. A powerful and all-encompassing concept, we are convinced that practising reciprocity is critical in enabling us to envision, create, and be part of a future rooted in relationality.
Listed below are ‘Pointer Star’ Principles, a list of guiding principles that inform all that we do at Kesalingan Kommunes.
🌌 We live in deep interdependence with one another and the natural world.
Collective thriving happens when we orient our lives around the truth that we are part of life’s great ecosystem - intricately woven in relationship with all beings, not apart from them. Mutuality is the pulse of this ecosystem.
🌌 Abundance is the original design. There is enough for all.
When we observe the quiet intelligence of nature, or listen to the ancient wisdom held within Indigenous knowledge systems, we will see that abundance is all around us. Inequality and injustice emerge when resources are accumulated and not shared, when growth is measured solely by scale and profit but not by resilience or the degree to which life is served. Extractive mentalities does not honour the design of abundance, is not sustainable, and will only perpetuate harm to the planet and her inhabitants.
🌌 Resources are gifts. They are meant to flow, not accumulate.
The steady flow of resources ( eg: emotional, relational, financial) keeps this ecosystem of life alive. All resources are meant to be honoured as gifts, to be received with gratitude, and released with generosity. Gifts deepen in value and sweetness when circulated through these networks of interdependence - and as resources find their way to where they are most needed, we defy the myth of scarcity, proclaiming: When my brother thrives, so will I.
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🌿 Gift Economy: What we practice and aim to model out at Kesalingan Kommunes.
Defined as a system of exchange and circulation based on mutual giving and receiving, not supply and demand (scarcity), creating a web of social commitments and mutually beneficial relationships that will coevolve over time(versus relationships that are extractive and transactional, as tend to be cultivated in market economies). A gift economy doesn't involve trading goods for services — or even goods for other goods: these are given freely without the expectation of immediate remuneration, with the mutual trust that needs will be met over time.
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All gatherings( Communes or Convenes) at Kesalingan Communes will strive to honour principles of the gift economy by running on a sliding (pay-what-you-can)scale. The invitation is for you to consider money not as a currency of exchange, but as a gift. If you can, we invite you to consider gifting a little more to contribute to the spot to another; and if not, all that is required is just a minimum fee to help us cover basic costs. We trust that there will be enough to keep us going.
Money is like water; it’s a precious, life-giving resource. Money should be a tool of love that facilitates relationships and helps us thrive, rather than something that hurts and divides us. If we use it for sacred, life-giving, restorative purposes, it can be medicine. - Indigeneous wisdom, as quoted by Edgar Villnueve, author and activist