How do you begin to encourage cooperation and a social conscience in a
society that is hostile to those ideas? Don't you have a chicken/egg
problem here?
Doug
Doug Henwood [[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
Left Business Observer
212-874-4020 (voice)
212-874-3137 (fax)
On Mon, 19 Sep 1994, Jim Devine wrote:
> At the URPE conference, Frank Thompson gave a paper in which he
> described John Roemer's scheme for "coupon socialism" (a kind of
> "market socialism" in which all people own coupons giving them
> claims on corporate profits). Besides being
> quite an unattractive goal to fight for, this type of "socialism"
> turned out (according to the discussion) to have a draw-back that I
> found surprising. JR's scheme doesn't seem to deal with the
> principal/agent problem any better than capitalism does. That is,
> there's no reason why the managers should obey the owners (in JR's
> scheme, the people) if they can get away with padding expense
> accounts, etc. Under capitalism, there's a similar problem, and
> Michael Jensen's market for corporate control doesn't seem a
> solution.
>
> In a society that emphasizes atomistic individualism, the p/a
> problem seems universal. Perhaps the solution is to develop
> institutions that encourage the development of social
> conscience (to use a now-unpopular term). Unfortunately, JR's
> scheme doesn't seem to do this at all, but rather encourages
> atomism. (Whatever one things of Albert & Hahnel's scheme,
> at least it tries to address this problem.)
>
> Gil Skillman presented a paper which dwelt on the importance of
> the voters paradox (the Arrow Impossibility Theorem) in the
> way socialism is organized. While I don't deny that this
> paradox is important, would not it be made less important in
> a society that encourages social conscience?
>
> BTW, I'm not talking about self-denying "altruism" here, since
> I doubt that such could ever exist. Social conscience involves
> the realization that in many cases, what's good for society is
> good for me.
>
> Hope this stimulates discussion.
>
> in pen-l solidarity,
>
> Jim Devine
> [EMAIL PROTECTED] or [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> Econ. Dept., Loyola Marymount Univ., Los Angeles, CA 90045-2699 USA
> 310/338-2948 (daytime, during workweek); FAX: 310/338-1950
>
