Your work is so much more concise and to the point than my long winded work. But for my brief discussion of this reform issue in 1991, published in 1993, see https://tinyurl.com/WinterOfOurDreams.
Per Walzer's Exodus and Revolution, the quest is liberation from what, and how? I had to by and large stop my work on a book about this after 10/07/03, although I hope to resume and finish this year, but Miliband/Poulantzas debate (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miliband%E2%80%93Poulantzas_debate) was never resolved. Anyone interested in seeing my draft monograph, or who knows a good editor and publisher, please contact me.
That debate had two views of the nature of that very state. Was it a tool of the capitalists or is the state one which has various "regions" which are differentially influenced by influence of capital, labor and other social forces. As a constitutionalist democratic socialist (among other ists I discuss), I am convinced that evolutionary change by determined advocates of constitutional amendments and legislation can in fact transform society.
In fact, smashing institutions leads to the kinds of vacuums, per Timothy Snyder, that can lead to genocide and mass starvation not liberation (Both Stalin and Mao had their own versions). I seriously need a good editor and feedback to help me finish my argument that just plain wishy washy social democracy is utopian as is allegedly non-utopian scientific socialism.
What is needed is a revolutionary-democratic but pragmatic form of democratic socialism committed not to state bureacracy but to the what I call the minimum necessary social (including state) intervention. My full employment plan for policy analysts--of which Max was/is a great example--is determine, in each policy sector--what is the best mix of the public, nonprofit/religiuos and market sectors in order to address basic human needs, in a way consistent with human rights, in order to achieve human liberation and global ecosytem flourishing.
It stimulates the mind. Franklin felt there was a natural right to personal property as would conduce to reasonably comfortable life and to "the propagation of the species." All else, he says, is a legal fiction. I recall a related issue. the transformation of labor into serious and not so serious creative work. Fishing to the higher hermeneutic. But a bad penny must turn up, some would say. Would human services be an exception to freedom from labor?
At your prompting here, I found an article by AP in Politics and Society in 2021 where he remarked on what of Marx is still important, despite much that he rejects. After critically recounting Marx's economic description of Capitalism, he says about inequality,
"I am not making an argument against allocating resources by markets: with all their
inefficiencies, markets are the best-known mechanism of resource allocation we know.
What Marx directs us to rethink is the structure of ownership and the corresponding
distribution of power within firms. ... this is what we should be thinking about. Increasing taxes on high incomes or wealth to redistribute or support public services is attractive and should be easy in a country as unequal as the United States: a 2 percent tax on huge fortunes would finance a lot of what many people urgently need. But mitigation is not transformation, and without transforming
property relations, the need to mitigate inequality is eternal."
Let's see if I got this straight. A good socialist believes in the Messiah, but a practical socialist isn't counting on it.
Max, Keep it coming! Another great piece: https://sawicky.substack.com/p/przeworski-socialism-is-freedom
Your work is so much more concise and to the point than my long winded work. But for my brief discussion of this reform issue in 1991, published in 1993, see https://tinyurl.com/WinterOfOurDreams.
Per Walzer's Exodus and Revolution, the quest is liberation from what, and how? I had to by and large stop my work on a book about this after 10/07/03, although I hope to resume and finish this year, but Miliband/Poulantzas debate (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miliband%E2%80%93Poulantzas_debate) was never resolved. Anyone interested in seeing my draft monograph, or who knows a good editor and publisher, please contact me.
That debate had two views of the nature of that very state. Was it a tool of the capitalists or is the state one which has various "regions" which are differentially influenced by influence of capital, labor and other social forces. As a constitutionalist democratic socialist (among other ists I discuss), I am convinced that evolutionary change by determined advocates of constitutional amendments and legislation can in fact transform society.
In fact, smashing institutions leads to the kinds of vacuums, per Timothy Snyder, that can lead to genocide and mass starvation not liberation (Both Stalin and Mao had their own versions). I seriously need a good editor and feedback to help me finish my argument that just plain wishy washy social democracy is utopian as is allegedly non-utopian scientific socialism.
What is needed is a revolutionary-democratic but pragmatic form of democratic socialism committed not to state bureacracy but to the what I call the minimum necessary social (including state) intervention. My full employment plan for policy analysts--of which Max was/is a great example--is determine, in each policy sector--what is the best mix of the public, nonprofit/religiuos and market sectors in order to address basic human needs, in a way consistent with human rights, in order to achieve human liberation and global ecosytem flourishing.
For my taxonomy of ideologies--and to some extent state formations--see: https://tinyurl.com/TaxonomyOfIdeologies. And for my update of my early 2019 theory chart on human injustice, basic needs and human liberation (now called flourishing), see https://tinyurl.com/InjusticeNeedsFlourishing.
It stimulates the mind. Franklin felt there was a natural right to personal property as would conduce to reasonably comfortable life and to "the propagation of the species." All else, he says, is a legal fiction. I recall a related issue. the transformation of labor into serious and not so serious creative work. Fishing to the higher hermeneutic. But a bad penny must turn up, some would say. Would human services be an exception to freedom from labor?
At your prompting here, I found an article by AP in Politics and Society in 2021 where he remarked on what of Marx is still important, despite much that he rejects. After critically recounting Marx's economic description of Capitalism, he says about inequality,
"I am not making an argument against allocating resources by markets: with all their
inefficiencies, markets are the best-known mechanism of resource allocation we know.
What Marx directs us to rethink is the structure of ownership and the corresponding
distribution of power within firms. ... this is what we should be thinking about. Increasing taxes on high incomes or wealth to redistribute or support public services is attractive and should be easy in a country as unequal as the United States: a 2 percent tax on huge fortunes would finance a lot of what many people urgently need. But mitigation is not transformation, and without transforming
property relations, the need to mitigate inequality is eternal."