1) that JQ did end with: And then there are the standard questions of incrementalism vs radicalism, issue-oriented politics vs a coherent program and so on. which might be thought to cover this ground, and

2) if not, then that might be because ‘Social Democrat’, though to my eye more of a historical movement than a distinctive political philosophy, is considered to have a sufficiently clear agenda associated with it (or at least sufficiently clearly excludes certain ideas) for at least my comments to be regarded as outside the ambit of the question. If I had to choose I’d go for (1).

On the content, I’d say that besides egalitarianism and environmentalism there’s a distinct ‘anti-consumerist’ set of attitudes which are in a way also common ground between them and could conceivably form a salient rallying point for a coalition around some radical programme for economic reorganisation. There is also the very relevant civil rights agenda which has a big and largely untapped appeal – if only it can be propagated against the tide of scaremongering and doublepluscrimehate.

Now I personally think that here the confusion comes from a natural split in the left, between those who favour egalitarianism as the primary goal of the left and those who see environmental sustainability as the fundamental goal. The left is no more coherent than the right is (and this is not new – this split is at least as old as George Orwell would be) – although I think originally the middle class “sustainability” concern, was more about “alienation”.

I don’t think the left will necessarily disintegrate, it has a common thread, but that thread has first to be sold. What is the common thread in “the left”? I think it has something to do with identification of a common destiny. A world view, that sees competition as at best a necessary evil, not something to be celebrated – because competition creates losers and creating losers shouldn’t be the direction that society takes. The left, takes an inclusive view, the right has a narrower identity (being quite prepared to win at the expense of the “other”).

You seem to accept that there’s a radical kind of group delusion about valuation, but dismiss the idea of trying to eliminate it, on the Sir Humphrey-ish grounds of general difficulty. Certainly this stuff is to say the least tricky, and I’m not suggesting adopting a labour theory of value or something, but the matter is not necessarily intractable – for example, it’s ‘pretty obvious’ that consumption is a more fundamental source of value (or valuation) than exchange, which is some sort of start in trying to reconfigure things in a more humanocentric way.

More generally I don’t think it’s accurate that you are very far from assuming that one has to keep any kind of system. Your remarks, e.g. the usual stuff about ‘such attempts in the past’ and various other very dismissive comments e.g. @54, suggest that you are in fact fairly close to doing so. My comments are part of a different (dissenting?) strand of opinion on this thread that thinks it’s necessary to get some kind of an end in view before arguing about means. Focussing on a piecemeal strategy to the exclusion of formulating clear aims reminds me of someone I know who objected to being called a anarcho-communist on grounds that he was actually an anarcho-syndicalist (i.e. the ‘bosses’ will always be there?). ‘Nothing to be done – now, how shall we do it?’ – the fetishisation of political process, or – Sisyphus turns lithophiliac.

I’ve not taken up foxhunting in order to improve my horsemanship in preparation for Der Tag…I rather mean that it is probably worth studying some of these organisations, or disorganisations, and how they work. Alistair Crooke is wrong about their philosophy being the way forward, but he may have a point about their organising methodology.

In sum, there needs to be a pragmatic distinction kept between essentially social-democratic tinkering at the edges of a basically market economy, and any radically non-market solutions that would have extraordinarily disruptive political and social effects. Note that ‘market’, of course, for any sensible person, does not imply the kind of neoliberal fundamentalism, the putative demise of which is currently the subject of much hope, but little hard evidence…

My apologies for thinking that this was so obvious.

I made a suggestion about political factors like dollar hegemony being responsible for the purchasing power of the dollar, since dollars can be exported and not cause inflation/devaluation. And I suggested that The argument that we’re not producing anything, but if we stopped what we are doing the world would be poorer seems a bit wonky to me – because the underlying economic realities – as distinct from the delusions you described, aren’t affected by ceasing unproductive activity. That was one cue to repudiate that argument and save a lot of chat at cross-purposes.

I’m still not sure what your point was with this money-not-being-real business – you seemed to be describing the/a credit/housing bubble, and suggesting it should/could be maintained so that we can carry on buying things from the third world. To which I wondered whether you were suggesting that the recipients would be unaware of such underlying weakness of the currency (since you don’t seem to think there are other reasons why the dollar holds its value). I asked also whether you think there is no other way of carrying on the same actual, real production that is currently done, without requiring a whole load of people to go and sit in offices without actually producing anything, and without having to keep quiet about a perpetual credit bubble so that it will never burst.

FYI, no, as you will have guessed, I’m not an economist; I’m a philosopher by training and inclination (like several of the contributors and commenters to this blog – it’s a kind of PPE crowd I’d say). Perhaps that’s why I’m willing to consider the possibility that group irrationality based on the herd effect of mutually reinforcing expectations isn’t an inevitable feature of economic organisation. You (an economist?) seem to be assuming that there is no alternative to keeping all the institutions which were at least in large part responsible for the latest economic disaster – not to mention the so-called ‘business cycle’, acquiescing in which I regard as a bizarre way for an advanced society to conduct itself.

So yes there undoubtedly were some misunderstandings going on, but I don’t think all of them were mine nor that they involved being unaware of how the money supply is expanded (M0, M1 all that jazz wasn’t it?) in capitalism, or that it’s all about expectations. It’s just that I don’t presupppose that the institutions involved are eternal and immutable. Maybe all this is still well shy of the mark. Either way, don’t come the old acid with me, alright sunshine?

I do think John is right at 28, reducing labour is better done in lumps. Amount of hours a week is too much of a fetish. A broad entitlement to ‘time credit’ I think is better. It is anti-discrimatory (nobody can be expected to be there for years on end, so women are no longer the only ones withe the 3-6-12 month out surprise) and more adapted to non-production labour. Also, it avoids the tedious regulation of hours worked. In the end it should be free to work longer hours if that’s what pleases. Only the amount of time that is spent in the actual office should be regulated; that’ll break the peer pressure of being in the office the last man standing (next to the boss).

‘Tother Alex @ 50 – Hamas? Only half joking, or is there a kernel in your thought that thinks the ‘military’ dimension is really a route for progressives?

I suspect this is what you are thinking of:

As Penny Ciancanelli (1992) nicely put it, during the debt crisis of the 1980s the First World banks got a Minsky bailout while the Third World suffered a Fisher deflation. Domestic banking crises in Third World countries over the last decade or two have been far more intense than in the First, with losses ranging from 10% to 25% of GDP. Those countries, however, were unable to mount the kinds of rescue operations seen in the North, and their economies have, in many cases, suffered depressions, sparked and propagated in the classic Fisher manner. But the experience of successful First World bailouts shows that Marx (1981, p. 621) badly underestimated the power of the state when he said that crises could not be avoided by “allowing one bank, e.g. the Bank of England, to give all the swindlers the capital they lack in paper money and to buy all the depreciated commodities at their old nominal values.” Central banks and governments need not go that far; prudential supervision (forgotten in the 1980s, but more or less remembered in the 1990s, with the occasional exception) and multibillion dollar rescue packages have done their work.

Still, credit has made it possible for expansions to exceed what would otherwise have been their natural limits, and the threat of crisis arose when those limits became clear. The S&L disaster ripened (leaving aside the pure swindling, the yacht parties with their cocaine and call girls, the thrift presidents stealing money to expand their personal art collections, etc.) when it became clear that the shopping centers and condos that were built on its lines of credit proved economically pointless; the junk bond crisis ripened when the corporate buyouts and restructuring that junk originally financed were revealed as the Ponzi units they were. Money of the mind had an uncomfortable collision with matter. But thanks to the Resolution Trust Corp. and Alan Greenspan, these crises never became generalized, unlike their ancestors 60 years earlier. No one can proclaim that it will work this way forever, but so far, this has to be counted a major innovation in the state management of capitalism. (Wall Street, 235-36)

If required, especially in the early stages, explanation of the policy options and possible/likely consequences by hired specialists with exceptionally good communications skills—eg very good and entertaining lecturers, cheerful economic journalists etc.

Massive investment in research and development to help to reverse the long-run decline in industrial productivity in the mature capitalist economies, in this way increasing the potential for automation and thus bringing down working times still further, without damaging living standards. Massive investment also in a new schools and university programmes in which these subjects—which will become more interesting to the populace, because they will, on average, be seen to be direct practical relevance to their everyday lives—are well represented, so that the need for the lecturers and journalists declines, as people develop their own expertise in these areas.