Parecon, Michael Albert's proposal, is consistent with anarchism/ libertarianism (as I understand the terms), but distinguished in quite a crucial way from marxian socialism. I think this statement, from a recent Znet interview gets to the heart of the matter. Intellectuals in the tradition of Marx what to preserve what Albert calls the "coordinator class". Presumably because these intellectuals are or hope to be part of this class, the class that gets to tell the working class what to do, i.e.* -- ********************************************************** A worldwide system of production needs coordinaton. This does not mean that coordinators cannot be delegated to do what the associated producers want them to do and to be subject to removal. The concept of "coordinator class" automatically assumes bureaucratic control of production/consumption a la the old USSR. A grassroots, democratic co:operative commonwealth is perfectly consistent with what Marx wrote about in terms of socialism. With common ownership of the means of production, producers could just make goods and services consumer/producers needed, as opposed to the current wages system, where we produce them for the profit of our employers. The wages system just reproduces wealth and therefore power inequalities and leads to the production of goods and services, we don't want or need e.g. nuclear weapons and climate change. We need to get rid of it, so that we can democratically control our societies. The more workers who know that and act on it, the better our future will be.
Mike B)
An injury to one is an injury to all http://www.iww.org/
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