Previous Event

October 28, 2007
"Beyond Capitalism - A Vision to Guide and Inspire Us Now"
by Michael Albert

Michael Albert is a long time activist, author and builder of alternative institutions. He was a sixties activist, who helped found South End Press and then Z Magazine and finally the web site he now works at called ZNet.  He has written very extensively, including articles and books, and traveled widely for public speaking.  He is co-author and a tireless advocate of the economic vision called participatory economics, or parecon, and of an encompassing social system called the participatory society. His most recent publication is an extensive memoir titled, Remembering Tomorrow: From SDS to Life After Capitalism.  He speaks widely on many topics, from current events to media to political and social strategy, but his main focus for this presentation will be economic vision.

"What is an economy? What would we like an economy to accomplish for us? Why should we be dissatisfied, even horror stricken, at the economy we now endure? What kind of new institutions composing a new economy, then, might we seek for our future? If we favor such a new economy, what implications does it have for what we do now, in the present? Broadly answering these questions in a presentation, and then discussing whatever issues arise for people, will the aim of this presentation." 

Michael's issue with a market economy is that it rewards antisocial behavior.  It is biased in favor of the wealthy and as such is not really free at all.  In addition, the people who are doing the productive work are being rewarded the least.  In a participatory economy, people would be remunerated based on the amount of hardship inherent in the work they do.  For this reason, a miner, whose job is filled with danger and a disease inducing environment, would be paid more than someone who is working in the front office where conditions are pleasant.  To provide a means to equally share the required though undesirable work, all workers in a given company would rotate jobs.  This setup provides an incentive to devise ways to minimize the hardships of economic activity.  Although we didn't have the time to go into the logistics required to make this kind of economy work, the program was quite well received by all participants.  The link below to Wikipedia provides excellent explicatory material on the subject.  In addition, Wikipedia provides data on other economic systems to facilitate comparison.  Michael was also gracious enough to allow browsers who cannot afford to buy the book to read his book Parecon - Life after Capitalism on line for free.  Just go to http://www.zmag.org/books/pareconv/parefinal.htm.

Wikipedia reference: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Participatory_economics

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