A selection of posts written during 2009 has been published as Progressive-Economy@TASC 2009 Review.
The digital edition is available here:
3 comments:
Paul Hunt
said...
The organisers, administrators and contributors to this blog deserve congratulations for assembling this selection. However, having read many of the posts as they appeared, one is left with a feeling of disappointment - even of depression. It is sad that so much excellenet intellectual effort is expended attacking the worng target.
Markets are not the enemy. The enemy are the forces that subverted elegant economic theories about market efficiency based on unrealistic assumptions about human and corporate behaviour not to create a mechanism that would promote efficiency and, ultimately, benefit consumers of goods and services but one that would permit unhindered accumulation of economic and political power and the extraction of monopoly profits. And to compound this subversion the costs of the inevitable financial and economic collpase are being imposed on citizens everywhere - while the forces of subversion mostly escape unscathed. (continues in next post..)
Competitive markets, subject to appropriate policy and regulatory control, are not in conflict with social justice. Both may be combined and be mutually reinforcing. The difficult task is to devise the systems of governance to achieve this.
The subversion of markets in Ireland took place in a peculiarly Irish manner - mainly because markets did not exist in any meniningful sense. A "modern" facade of policy and regulatory architecture was constructed to create and optical illusion. This allowed the traditional subversion of markets to continue undisturbed and unexamined.
Ireland needs and deserves to have a comprehensive debate about the type of society and economy it wants - and the associated system of democratic governance. This would best be conducted during the run-up to a general election. But first, this Government must be removed. All efforts should not be focused on this.
3 comments:
The organisers, administrators and contributors to this blog deserve congratulations for assembling this selection. However, having read many of the posts as they appeared, one is left with a feeling of disappointment - even of depression. It is sad that so much excellenet intellectual effort is expended attacking the worng target.
Markets are not the enemy. The enemy are the forces that subverted elegant economic theories about market efficiency based on unrealistic assumptions about human and corporate behaviour not to create a mechanism that would promote efficiency and, ultimately, benefit consumers of goods and services but one that would permit unhindered accumulation of economic and political power and the extraction of monopoly profits. And to compound this subversion the costs of the inevitable financial and economic collpase are being imposed on citizens everywhere - while the forces of subversion mostly escape unscathed. (continues in next post..)
..continues..
Competitive markets, subject to appropriate policy and regulatory control, are not in conflict with social justice. Both may be combined and be mutually reinforcing. The difficult task is to devise the systems of governance to achieve this.
The subversion of markets in Ireland took place in a peculiarly Irish manner - mainly because markets did not exist in any meniningful sense. A "modern" facade of policy and regulatory architecture was constructed to create and optical illusion. This allowed the traditional subversion of markets to continue undisturbed and unexamined.
Ireland needs and deserves to have a comprehensive debate about the type of society and economy it wants - and the associated system of democratic governance. This would best be conducted during the run-up to a general election. But first, this Government must be removed. All efforts should not be focused on this.
Typo alert! Last sentence should end "now be focused on this."
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