From: Wim Nusselder (wim.nusselder@antenna.nl)
Date: Mon Jan 24 2005 - 05:42:31 GMT
Dear Mark H.,
You proposed 23 Jan 2005 11:54:21 -0800 another examination how we might
facilitate movement toward higher quality societies, concentrating on the
question whether our socio-economic systems should be completely free of
government regulation and other forms of intervention.
I don't think so, but it depends on the situation and I'm certainly not in
favour of too much government regulation of the economy. Let me explain.
The economy (the way in which we organize that everyone gets what he/she
wants) can be organized with the help op several principles of which
'enforcement' (the defining principle) is only one. The others I distinguish
are:
- natural order (old being wiser than young, male being stronger than
female, some races supposedly being somehow better than others, the gods
supposedly having gifted some individuals more than others)
- force (from brigands robbing travellers on pain of death to governments
demanding payment of taxes on pain of imprisonment)
- dependence (poor labourers' dependence on land- or capital-owners to
provide them with essential means of production, consumers' dependence on
buying something they need, producers' dependence on outlets for their
product etc.)
- convincement (that cooperating in a specific way under someone's
leadership is the best for everyone)
Each of these principles can be seen as a way to make others work for you.
They can also be understood as BOTH ways to create more collective wealth
and survival chances for a society as a whole AND ways to create a social
elite that gets more than it needs. The balance between these two effects
determines whether it also creates an underclass that gets les than it
needs.
Combining them can help to create balance. Democratic government combines
force and convincement. Calling something 'democratic' doesn't guarantee
such balance however...
Anyway, we need all these principles in modern economies, even though we
would like the role of 'convincement' to grow.
With friendly greetings,
Wim
MOQ.ORG - http://www.moq.org
Mail Archives:
Aug '98 - Oct '02 - http://alt.venus.co.uk/hypermail/moq_discuss/
Nov '02 Onward - http://www.venus.co.uk/hypermail/moq_discuss/summary.html
MD Queries - horse@darkstar.uk.net
To unsubscribe from moq_discuss follow the instructions at:
http://www.moq.org/md/subscribe.html
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.5 : Mon Jan 24 2005 - 05:43:00 GMT