"Central "Planning is really Holistic Planning.

Charles Brown CharlesB at cncl.ci.detroit.mi.us
Fri Jan 18 13:03:24 PST 2002


"Central "Planning is really Holistic Planning.

^^^^^^^^^

CB: The logical paradox for the anti-centralized planners is as follows. "Central" planning really means planning the whole thing, holistic planning. Why on earth would the informational flow or anything else of the WHOLE be more orderly and coordinated by the interactions of a few PARTS which are explicitly forbidden to consider the WHOLE , ALL of the parts ? The communications regarding parts between parts will not miraculously make a better plan for the whole than an explicit effort to coordinate the communications of the whole, all the parts.

In fact , a fundamental Marxist criticism of the market is that it is anarchic, i.e. the coordination of the exchange between the parts does not work out, rather there are inevitably breakups in the smooth flow of supply and demand in a price system.

It's almost as if Hayek or whomever just takes the Marxist criticism of the market and turns it around and pretends like the problems of the market in matching supply and demand are actually the problems of more conscious attention to the WHOLE ( not the CENTER)



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