Parecon---Page 3 (cond)

“Abolish the Market System!”

Mainstream neoclassical economics claims that the market, at least under some abstractly possible but never actually realized ideal, allocates scarce resources so as to best satisfy people’s desires. As I see it, this is mere propaganda; the market is actually a system for the allocation of resources by naked economic power. As structuralists, we point out that there are in fact a variety of economic structural features under capitalism that affect allocation – the most important is ownership of the means of production, but also there is relative monopolization of expertise and levers of decision-making power, concentrations of market power, and things like the success of working class cohesion in struggle against the bosses, which augments their bargaining power within the system.

So, a market is basically a system of allocation by bargaining power.

Participatory Economics on the other hand, is market abolitionist; we agree with that part of the “communist” tradition in radicalism. Here I will mention two reasons we’re against the market.

First, markets are in violation of the principle of self-management.

Suppose you drive your car to the local Shell station and buy some gas. Well, the only people who have any say over that transaction are you and the gas station owner; that’s the way markets work. Only the buyer and seller have a say.

But, the thing is, other people are impacted. By driving your car you get to stuff your exhaust into other people’s lungs. They are deprived of any say over that. Currently the capitalist system is destroying the planetary climate system through over-production of carbon dioxide. This affects people throughout the world but the present system gives them no voice over this. A market system is actually dictatorial since it allows the people who engage in the buying and selling of gasoline to dictate what people will breath without them having a say, and so on for many other effects that are external to the buyer and seller of the market transaction.

These “negative externalities” are a pervasive problem of markets.

Secondly, we also believe that if the market is combined with collective, public or state ownership of the means of production, markets will inevitably lead to the entrenchment of a techno-managerial ruling class. The working class will continue to be a subjugated and exploited class. This would be true even if workers started out in control of the various workplaces through workers councils or collectives.

For one thing, a labor market will give free reign for those who have amassed more “human capital,” more expertise in key information about technology or success in the market, to get firms to give them perks and privileges to get them to work for that firm.

Market competition will atomize workers and get in the way of them agreeing to certain common conditions out of self-defense and solidarity. Risks of losses in the market will tend to encourage workers to hand over tough questions to someone else, to let bosses decide.

As workers become increasingly dependent on people with expertise, and management knowledge, they will become increasingly under their control. If someone spends months, day in and day out, working on financial analysis and planning, and someone else just runs machines or sweeps the floor, how are the workers going to be able to question management decisions? How will they have the information and knowledge to be a real factor in the big decisions?

There is more to page 3--to be continued