Report from Z Media Institute 98 (fwd)

Doug Henwood dhenwood at panix.com
Tue Jun 23 13:27:11 PDT 1998


William S. Lear wrote:


>On Tue, June 23, 1998 at 16:04:00 (-0400) Doug Henwood writes:
>>jf noonan wrote:
>>
>>>What is ParEcon? Is this a formal model or is it a catchy name for
>>>an old fashioned democraticly run coop? Anybody know?
>>...
>>Albert & Hahnel have 2 books about this model, one academic version and one
>>pop version. Plus Albert writes about it all the time in Z. It's supposed
>>to be antihierarchical, with everything planned democratically. Nancy
>>Folbre (now a MacArthur-certified genius) said their vision of life was as
>>one long student council meeting.
>
>Does this mean you agree with her? What do you think of their
>ideas?

I haven't read either of their books, but from what I've read of Albert's model in Z, Folbre does have a point. It's hard to imagine any society emerging out of this one where people do so much face-to-face meeting; I have to confess I can't imagine away delegation and the division of labor. But like I say, I haven't immersed myself in the literature, so I'm not about to declaim on the topic.

Doug



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