> What is your view about how society would work. Do you think on some
> kind of particpatory economy, an Hahnel-type of society?
Something like that would be my choice, but perhaps that's not the most practical.
> Galbraith (John K) argues that the demise of the real socialism was
> because they could not solve for the "consumption problem". How would
> you handle that issue?
My sense is that it would 'handle itself'. But I don't agree that was the reason the USSR failed, despite Galbraith. My impression -- and that of another woman socialist, on another list, who grew up in Soviet-dominated Hungary -- was that the USSR failed because it was a totalitarian, highly-classist state with a thin veneer of socialism on. And too many people saw through the sham.
G*r*d*n and then Doug wrote:
>>It would depend on what you thought the notion of ownership-
>>or-control was in "means of production owned or controlled
>>by the working class, or by the people generally." Most of
>>the proposals for socialism I've seen suppose familiar
>>liberal ideas of o-o-c, but I would think that if socialism
>>were constructed in a community without a liberal history,
>>such as China, Iran, or New Guinea, it might look quite
>>different. Anarcho-socialists find no role for government
>>at all, of course.
>
>Yeah, I was going to say the role of government under socialism would be
>working towards its own dissolution - admittedly difficult if you've got a
>deposed bourgeoisie gunning for you.
The word 'government' is so loaded, now, that perhaps I derailed the conversation by using it. Feel free to pick a better term: what I had in mind was not the bureacratic and political aristocracy of today, but rather the people, taken as a body, who would act as impartial public functionaries. The 'civil service' in its literal meaning.
Perhaps they'd be largely coordinators and facilitators, rather than having ex-officio power?
What would be the best way to get effectiveness, efficiency, and not risk re-creating the current monster?
And what should their remit be?