There is no such thing as an average Englishman. Some people are identified with their job by some others...many of course therefore are not. Whether anyone forgets about work in the evening depends on a multitude of factors and is, in any case, not something that can be reliably quantified. I have never lived in Japan, but I have a good friend who has. There is of course an often repeated mantra about Japanese men and their work, but as in all countries there are many who privately take a very cynical view about corporations. As I said in an earlier post I don't think any large population can be reduced to a common outlook on anything much.
I think we are getting a bit sidelined if we try to fit this into our current world order. My points were intended to be general. I have not seen much evidence that humans as a whole are resistant to hierarchies. They exist wherever a society becomes complex. You cannot run a large organisation without a structure. I am not aware of many complex human societies where it is not accepted that you have a chain of authority. It might be that different cultures are more or less comfortable but if we know it is necessary for something to function we accept it. Because though you have a personal dislike of the concept of another being superior in some way (and no criticism is made here) your ideal society is one that is distorted to avoid it. Unfortunately to me that means you can never have a very complex structure. You will not have large factories producing consumer goods - nor probably doing research into scientific or medicinal areas. I saw that you say that cooperatives are not just for agriculture an rural way of life - but they will most likely be for cottage industries. I cannot imagine in your ideal society Ford, Microsoft, Apple, Amazon or Pfizer would exist.
I will come back to this when I have more time Theo, because I have to work now until late. I can say though that nearly a third of all executives sent to other countries to work, come back prematurely because of cultural difficulties - these are often a bigger problem than language. Different cultures have different norms on politeness - often unconsciously, and are often absorbed without our knowledge. I will come back with a few examples of how an Englishman can make an idiot of himself in Germany, and vica versa when I have more time.
My ideal society would be able to produce all the things man can imagine. I am not hung up on one form of structure or another. People can and will own things. People will be bosses and workers. People will use banks in order to facilitate complex economic arrangements - and interest will be paid. All of those things are not evil in themselves. If there is a problem at all though it is when anything good is allowed to run to excess - so that one person can be rich beyond sense in a world where others starve.
Theo - it is great to have your input to this. The more multi-dimensional discussions on this forum become the more interesting they are. There are very few personal comments we make that are not at least food for thought for others.
Reading up on them they seem impressive although I note ***or -part of the foundation of the group filed for bankruptcy in 2013. Also it seems they have nice ideals but still essentially operate on relative corporate principles. They are worker owned (John Lewis) but not worker managed recruiting external managers and of course they have a traditional structure of management. They operate to create a profit, operate in the financial sector partially and in many respects are indistinguishable from their competitors. I can see they have higher ideals and a cooperative structure which is good. I am not sure if the world were made of Mondragons though it would be so very different.
I do not think it is clear what I mean by disliking hierarchies Art. Short term hierarchies which are goal related, and which do not extend beyond that particular goal are ok. Also hierarchies which are voluntary cannot be prevented. The difference between voluntary and the opposite being that if I choose to work for you and to accept you as the boss in a particular project/work etc. then I still have control over the situation. If however I have to sell my labour to you in order to live then it is not voluntary. I was not aware from the title of the thread that I had to provide a World system, or even one for a country. I do not want a World government. I believe that you can only start with your immediate surroundings - if it catches on then great, if not then you have at least remained true to yourself. If I were to think on a larger scale I would say that I am a Marxist - in as much as that my end goal is very similar. but my means of achieving it are different. For him the final stage of Communism was the dissolution of the state, when all power, both political and economic, had been transfered to the base of the pyramid, and where the state was then only a voluntary confederation of communes. Needless to say, in practice it never reached that stage, but never got beyond the 'dictatorship of the Proletariat' or rather the Party representing them. Because 'power' is 'power' and nobody ever relinquishes it voluntarily. So, my way is from the bottom - where all true revolutions begin. I believe in a system of collective ownership - some communal, some direct ie. from the workers, and perhaps some larger industries held at the national level (If there is to be a nation), with some smaller private enterprises in non essential products. One last point - if I had the power I would ban all sophisticated weapons, bring those that declare the Wars to the front and make them fight alone with swords !
Cooperatives can take many shapes and forms. There is nothing to stop a cooperative employing an external manager. In which case he may be paid a wage which is independent of being part of the ownership structure - and may have some 'hierarchical' position over his employers.
First, you misunderstand me. This thread is perfect for your setting out a vision - even if it applied to one tiny village. Equally though in commenting on it I can talk about how whether it could be universal or not - that was the intent - to provoke discussion not to inhibit. If nobody commented on such things as practicality, your views would simply be noted and the discussion would end. I am not sure many people want a world government do they? I have not seen anyone advocate it. I happen to believe an awful lot of people would rather "submit to" a hierarchy of bosses etc in order to have what they perceive as a high standard of living as opposed to one where they have to live on whatever they and those they cooperate with can achieve. I suspect for most of us hierarchies are not a problem at all and we do not have to volunteer to be in one. Where we find one oppressive we tend to switch where we work. I do not believe Marx's ideal would ever come about. Human nature will always make wolves and lambs out of people - Marx's ideas would only work where humans were perfect. Not greedy, not lazy, not power hungry, not aggressive and so on. As soon as those traits exist they will be used to exploit. Although I admire your bottom up approach I am not sure there would ever be much above the bottom layer and society would exist in what we now regard as poverty.
Agreed - but they then become so similar to "ordinary" enterprises. The only difference is how "profits" if any are distributed.
Whilst I would say I may be a radical, I am not a fundamentalist Arturo. There are a number of 'halfway houses' which I can accept. I'm being a bit like a market trader here - asking for a hundred but being prepared to accept half of that. The society I have pictured will never happen in the UK, but is geared more towards those countries for whom Capitalism has become little more than a form of cultural imperialism - countries which we like to call 3rd World - which will remain in that condition if the West has its way. Having said that - Spain does have a lot of cooperatives in many areas of the economy, and not just in rural areas, but also in Barcelona and Madrid. Are the Spanish so very different from us ? Restricted to the UK. I would like to see more public ownership - if necessary nationalized, preferably more localized. The problem in the past was that the people never felt that nationalized industries really belonged to the people - had they done so then their theft would have been bitterly opposed. I want this not just for ideological reasons but also for environmental ones. It is easier for a system to coordinate reduction in Co2 levels with a more planned economy. People must realize that the 'state' is not something remote on a hill, something alien to the population - but belongs to you and me - we are the state. Another change I would want is with the mobility of capital - a British firm which relocates in search of more 'business friendly conditions' should know that they will never have free access to the home market again. These things are possible in the UK. Together with the expansion of things like the transition town network, and regional self sufficiency initiatives. I would like to see radical decentralization of power in the UK. All of these changes are possible there, as anywhere else. Other than that my ideal is not so different from yours. A good society is measured by 3 things - hope of a better future for the young, security for the old, and a sense that justice has been done for those in between. Any further dreams I have are reserved for somewhere else. One last thing. If the extent of hedgerows, and mixed organic farming is going up, and the Bumble Bees are returning in swarms then I can accept almost anything else.
Arturo is good . Whilst my list for the UK would be rather different to yours I can go along with a measure of what you advocate on this latest post. In particular I support your "3 things" I will come back to you with some thoughts about ownership. Re Spain - no I don't think things are so different but equally although they may have a little more use of cooperatives I think generally the economy is also very like ours. You have said elsewhere about when you live in the same world it is impossible to be too different.
Enlarging on that Arturo If I can cast aside my Kropotkinist cap for a second, and accept that private wealth exists, and will exist. Then I can go on to say that I want to see a society which has rediscovered the value of work. There is no work which is too humble if it is done well - a good toilet cleaner is higher in my esteem than a bad doctor. Work should be the only possible source of private wealth differences - and that within one generation. We need to rediscover what work is as distinct from play. If my only object in life is to move money from someone else's pocket into my own then this is not work but rather play, no different from gambling or poker. Work should produce something (or part of something) which is usefull either to others, or to the environment. It is also something which exists independently of its reward, at least whilst actually working. A good doctor would rather lose his fee than his patient - rather put in a good days work for no reward, than the opposite.
My first quick thought then is that is the end of professional football in your world as it is only moving a bag of air around. It is certainly just play.
Well, don't we all love watching amateur football ? It does raise a question mark over the priorities of a country when Troy Deeney earns more per month than the Prime Minister per year, or just over 30 times more than an MP in Westminster. Of course there are many professions which are difficult to classify according to 'production'. Nursing, teaching etc. but they all contribute to production because without them the entire infrastructure would collapse. The entertainment industry is also productive, in that it produces happy workers (unless the team loses). I must admit that I would be quite happy watching amateur football. I forgot to mention one team that I still follow (from another thread) and that is Porlock (more famous for the hill). I used to watch them and their pay was a pint in the Ship Inn, but only when they won. Don't we all miss football at that level ? At it's other level (like the World Cup, or Champions League) we see it used as a distraction so that millions of poverty stricken Brazilians, or bankrupt Argentinians can forget their worries for a day - like Marx said about organized religion 'Opium for the masses'. Even in Germany success of the national team is a distraction from all the other problems there. Some people actually win elections because of the 'feel good' factor associated with football teams winning things. We need to tone it all down a little.
I have been giving some thoughts to the French Revolution, something that has guided many of the Marxist thoughts and theories. In very simple terms it came about through oppression of the working classes. Much more complex than that, and students still cannot agree on many of the details, but oppression will do. If ever there was a bottom up change, it was there, but it didn't last long as those with different views on what the next step should be were not in agreement. It has certainly made a huge difference to what the country is today, socially and politically, yet over the centuries what do we see? A political elite have risen to the top, and today we see protests that fill the streets just as they did in the 18th century. Quite often I see reports of disputes, and because of the Revolution they do take more notice of the effects on the workers than is seen in the UK, but at the end of the day the politicians have now taken over from the royalty and church, but at the end of the day what started off as something for the people has moved back to a group of people who have power.
