permaculture

[Bob Howard <rmhoward@OMNINET.NET.AU>]

John Schinnerer wrote:

Aloha,

> I want more alternatives proposed for social and economic organization.
> Currently, we suffer under a lot of contradictory language.

Seems more propagandistic than contradictory to me.  The cultural norm of
using generalizations and buzzwords ('the mainstream', 'capitalism',
'socialism', 'democracy', etc.) rather than precise descriptions of
existing or desired processes and consequences is probably not accidental
on the part of those seeking/holding power.
 

Ludwig Wittgenstein might be worth a mention here. He stated that words
don't have meanings per se, their meaning is defined by their usage. Hence
a chemist saying "water is h20" is using the word differently from a thirsty
person saying "water!". Similarly it's not so much the buzzwords per se
that is the problem but how they are used.We use words in what LW called
'language game' and the confusion and arguments that arise often do so
because people are playing different games i.e. using the words differently..

[snipped a bit that i generally agree with..]

We can start 'fair marketplaces' (whatever that may mean) any time.  I
think some of the alternative money systems (LETS, Hours, etc.) are
examples of this, as well as the even less formal barter that is always
going on here and there (especially in areas where the 'economy' is
categorized as 'depressed', it seems to me).

The question IMO is what will be the responses from the 'free marketeers',
or for that matter anyone who decides to feel threatened by something
different?

Actually the question that this thread has raised for me criticlly revolves
around the use of LETS and local barter systems (see also Jamie's alast
post). The critical issue is not so much how the economically powerful
respond. They don't have to as long as it is local and there is no means
of interaction between LETS schems. This is a general problem that applies
on a national level as well. The current global currency market is a recent
invention of the last 30 years ( following the collaspe of the gold standard
in the early 70's) - the control that the IMF and the US Treasury exert
on this 'market' determines the trading capactiy of local(national) currencies.
(and consequently corrupts them etc..) .

At a smller scale, although there have been some attempts in places like NE NSW to create tradeblity between LETS schemes. There is no real theory about how this should work and how one currency can be prevented from overtaking another. I don't have a good answer to this but I think it's the critical question to ask.
 

> If you have a very small group of warriors with very
> limited means and
> wish to take over and dismantle the castle, it would seem unwise to
> walk
> right down the middle of the road leading to the drawbridge waving
> brightly colored banners saying "here we come, we disagree with how
> you
> run the kingdom, we're going to change all that...".
>  
I once saw this guy called Nelson somehting or other do just this..mind
:-). Change can often happen quickly. The only good thing I ever saw from
Disney was a Donald Duck cartoon where Donald was the world's greatest
demolition expert and, confronted with a medieval castle, he took out his
pea shooter and shot a pea at precisely the right point and the castle
fell down...

Some brief thoughts about capitalism and democracy -- they both operate in a market place and are based upon assumptions about competing ideas or products. The critical thing that is missing from many peoples ideas about competition is that competition only works where there is a defined set of rules. Free for alls don't work whether it's a market, sporting field or parliament. When animals compete for mating or grazing rights it is usually to determine who is best amongt equals. The weakest and strongest don't need to compete. In fact the weakest often survive with the protection of the strongest.

The rules of markets and parliaments are of two forms - written and unwritten. Often it is the unwritten rules that ensure stabity as much as the written rules. Either way it is the rules that determine the nature of the competition. It is only in the minds of aggressive, greedy and arrogant people that rules are seen as an impediment to markets. Unfortunately there is a lot of this about these days :-(.

Bob Howard
 
 
 
 
 

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