[Van-Parecon] Robin Hahnel Interview, World Peace Forum & More...

[vancouverparecon at resist.ca]

Hello,

In an effort to give you a preview of Robin Hahnel's June 27 presentation
at the Vancouver World Peace Forum we've interviewed Robin on "A
Participatory Peace; Looking Inside the Anti-War Movement". Robin will be
speaking on "War, Peace & Parecon" Tuesday June 27, 1:00-2:30pm at UBC-SUB
212. Click here for the event description:
http://vanparecon.resist.ca/hahnelwpf.html
Click here to register: http://zeus.maxintegration.net/events/fasttrack.aspx

Before getting to our interview with Robin we'd like to invite you to the
Vancouver East Side Commercial Drive Festival this Sunday June 18th. We'll
be at Grandview Park where the CO-Operative Way and Vancouver Parecon
Collective will be hosting events related to the spreading of a
CO-Operative & Participatory Economy. We'll have balloons, lemonade and
information related to Co-Ops and Parecon. Commercial Drive will be closed
to all motorized traffic from 1st Ave to Venables from 10am to 8pm.
Festival programming runs from noon to 6pm. There's expected to be between
25,000-50,000 people attending the festival, if you're among them please
stop by our booth and say hi! For more info on the Commercial Drive
Festival go here: http://www.commercialdrivefestival.org/index.html
For more info about the Co-Operative Way go here: http://cooperativeway.org

Now, here's Vancouver Parecon Collective member Marla Renn interviewing
Robin Hahnel on "A Participatory Peace; Looking Inside the Anti-War
Movement"


Marla Renn: As a veteran of the 1960's anti-war movement, and a
participant in today's anti-war movement, what differences and
similarities do you see between them? What lessons can be taken from the
60's to help build a worldwide movement for peace now?


Robin Hahnel: The most striking difference between the anti-Vietnam war
movement and the anti-Iraq war movement is that the former started much
smaller, only convinced a majority of Americans that we should withdraw
from Vietnam after ten years of organizing in the face of intense
hostility, but grew steadily in breadth and depth until the US government
finally relented and withdrew all US troops from Indo-China. In stark
contrast, the anti-Iraq war movement held its largest demonstration to
date before "operation shock and awe" even began, in less than a year
convinced a majority of Americans the war was launched under false
pretenses rather easily, and has declined in visibility and influence ever
since. If public opinion dictated policy American troops would have long
departed Iraq and the US presence in Indo-China would have lasted even
longer than it did.


As important as public opinion is, it does not determine US foreign
policy. As long as both major political parties are firmly in the pockets
of the military industrial complex, and as long as both major political
parties believe the US should run the world and only disagree over what
tactics to use, it will take more than public opinion to stop imperial
ventures. So until a movement demanding that our government renounce all
imperial ambitions forces those who preside over US foreign policy to
redeploy the vast productive resources currently devoted to expanding our
prodigious war-making capabilities to peaceful purposes, and to embrace
the wisdom of peaceful cooperation and the rule of international law,
anti-war movements in the United States have no choice but to raise the
costs of pursuing particular imperial ventures if we hope to stop them.


While it pains me to say this, I believe the leadership of todays anti-war
movement deserves some of the blame for the movement's growing impotence.
For example, holding off on organizing major anti-war demonstrations in
the fall of 2004 may have made sense since every progressive organization
in the country was understandably focused first and foremost on
re-defeating Bush-Cheney that November. But failing to call for major
demonstrations the following spring was a terrible mistake. In general I
think current anti-war leadership has been too passive and orchestrated
opposition in ways that are too predictable and therefore too ignorable.
In some respects current anti-war leaders have done better than their
counterparts during the Vietnam War: They have made it clear we are not
anti-soldier. They have minimized the inevitable friction between the
anti-imperial and liberal wings of the peace movement. And they have not
gotten suckered into debates over the details of withdrawal. These are by
no means small or insignificant accomplishments. Nonetheless, a majority
of the country wants out. The opposition party continues to sit on the
fence and shows every sign of continuing to do so right into the next
presidential election cycle. It is up to the anti-war movement to make
sure that business in America does not proceed as usual until the will of
the majority is enacted, and we need leadership who understands this is
their job.


On the other hand I do not believe the different trajectories of the
anti-Vietnam and anti-Iraq war movements are primarily due to differences
in leadership. The anti-Vietnam war movement was part of a rising tide of
progressive social activism in the United States during the 1960s and
1970s that began with the civil rights and black power movements, spread
to the new left student movement, and led to the re-birth of the women's
liberation movement and birth of the environmental movement. The anti-Iraq
war movement, on the other hand, has struggled to grow in a political era
when conservative social activism and power has reached its zenith. It is
pointless to blame the leadership of today's anti-war movement for this
underlying problem. The important lesson to draw is that turning the
United States away from the path of empire will not be accomplished by an
anti-war movement on its own. Only in combination with powerful movements
pushing progressive agendas forward in every sphere of social life can the
peace movement secure its goal. Nonetheless, it's high time the US
anti-war movement kicked some butt!


MR: In the 1970's you and Michael Albert began to outline an economic
model known as participatory economics (Parecon). Could you provide a
brief sketch of it and explain why you feel it would be desirable?


RH: When Michael Albert and I were young New Left activists studying for
our PhD in economics in the early 1970s, we came to the conclusion that
the vision of a self-managed economy shared by many anarchists, council
communists, syndicalists, and utopian socialists was essentially sound,
but, unfortunately, these economic visionaries had failed to provide a
coherent model explaining precisely how a libertarian socialist
alternative to capitalism could work. Skeptics accused those, such as
ourselves, who called for democratic planning by producers and consumers
themselves of deluding ourselves and others. The famous British economist,
Alec Nove, issued the challenge succinctly: "In a complex industrial
economy the interrelation between its parts can be based in principle
either on freely chosen negotiated contracts [ i.e., markets], or on a
system of binding instructions from planning offices [i.e., central
planning.] There is no third way." The model of a participatory economy
was initially developed to prove that skeptics like Nove were wrong. There
is an alternative to markets and central planning, a "third way" where
self-managing councils of workers and consumers coordinate their
interrelated activities equitably and efficiently through a participatory,
democratic planning procedure. We went on to argue that this "third way,"
now known as "participatory economics," is not only feasible but highly
desirable.


A participatory economy is designed to promote: (a) economic justice,
defined as economic reward commensurate with effort, or sacrifice; (b)
economic democracy, or self-management, defined as decision making power
in proportion to the degree one is affected by a decision; and (c)
solidarity, defined as concern for the well being of others — all to be
achieved without sacrificing economic efficiency while promoting a
diversity of economic life styles. The major institutions used to achieve
these goals are: (1) democratic councils of workers and consumers, (2)
jobs balanced for empowerment and desirability, (3) remuneration according
to effort as judged by one's work mates, and (4) a participatory planning
procedure in which councils and federations of workers and consumers
propose and revise their own activities under rules designed to yield
outcomes that are efficient and equitable.


Work: In a participatory economy production is carried out by worker
councils where each member has one vote. Everyone is free to apply for
membership in the council of his or her choice, or form a new worker
council with whomever he or she wishes.


Jobs will be balanced for both desirability and empowerment. Every economy
organizes work tasks into "jobs" which define what tasks an individual
will perform. In hierarchical economies most jobs contain a number of
similar, relatively undesirable, and relatively unempowering tasks, while
a few jobs consist of relatively desirable and empowering tasks. But why
should some people's work lives be less desirable than other's? Does not
taking equity seriously require balancing jobs for desirability? And if we
want everyone to have equal opportunity to participate in economic
decision making, if we want to ensure that the formal right to participate
translates into an effective right to participate, does this not require
balancing jobs for empowerment? If some people sweep floors all week, year
in and year out, while others review new technological options and attend
planning meetings all week, year in and year out, is it realistic to
believe they have equal opportunity to participate in firm decisions
simply because they each have one vote in the worker council? Proponents
of participatory economics believe that taking participation seriously
requires balancing jobs for empowerment, just as taking equity seriously
requires balancing jobs for desirability. This does not mean everyone must
do everything, nor an end to specialization. Each individual will still do
a small number of tasks, but some of them will be more enjoyable and some
less, and some will be more empowering and some less.


Effort, or sacrifice, is rewarded in a participatory economy because any
other system of compensation is unfair. In capitalism people are rewarded
according to the value of the contribution of the productive capital they
own as well as the value of the contribution of their labor. This means in
capitalism a Rockefeller heir who inherits large amounts of productive
capital but never works a day in his or her life enjoys an income hundreds
of times greater than that of a skilled brain surgeon. In market socialism
"capitalist injustice" may be eliminated, but people would still be
rewarded according to the market value of the contribution of their labor.
Since the market value of the services of a skilled brain surgeon will be
many times greater than the market value of the services of a garbage
collector no matter how hard and well the garbage collector works,
remuneration will be unjust in market socialism as well. Only if people
are rewarded according to sacrifices they make will the distribution of
burdens and benefits in the economy be equitable. Only if someone works
longer or harder, or at more dangerous, strenuous, or unpleasant tasks,
does economic justice require greater remuneration. Unlike capitalism or
market socialism, a participatory economy rewards people according to the
effort, or sacrifice they make in work as determined by a committee of
their coworkers according to procedures established by each worker council
for itself.


Consumption: Every individual, family, or living unit belongs to a
neighborhood consumption council. Each neighborhood council belongs to a
federation of neighborhood councils the size of a precinct. Each precinct
federation belongs to a city ward, or rural county federation. Each ward
belongs to a city consumption council, each city and county council
belongs to a state council, and each state council belongs to the national
consumption council. The major reason for "nesting" consumer councils into
ever larger federations is to allow for the fact that different kinds of
consumption affect different numbers of people. Some decisions affect only
local residents, while others affect all who live in a city, county,
state, or nation. Failure to arrange for all those affected by consumption
activities to participate in choosing them not only implies a loss of
self-management, but, if the preferences of some who are affected by a
choice are disregarded or misrepresented, it also implies a loss of
efficiency as well. One of the serious liabilities of market systems is
their systematic failure to allow for expression of desires for social
consumption on an equal footing with desires for private consumption.
Having different levels of consumer federations participate on an equal
footing with individual worker and neighborhood councils in the planning
procedure described below prevents this bias from occurring in a
participatory economy.


Individual members of neighborhood councils present their consumption
requests accompanied by the effort ratings they receive from their
co-workers. Using opportunity costs generated by the participatory
planning process described below, the social cost of each consumption
proposal is calculated to determine if the cost to others of a person's
consumption request is commensurate with the sacrifices he or she made for
the benefit of others in work. While no consumption request justified by a
work effort rating can be denied by a neighborhood consumption council,
neighbors can express their opinion that a request is unwise, and
neighborhood councils can also approve requests on the basis of need in
addition to merit.


Participatory Planning: The participants in the participatory planning
procedure are the worker councils and federations, the consumer councils
and federations, and an Iteration Facilitation Board (IFB). Conceptually,
the planning procedure is quite simple. (1) The IFB announces current
estimates of the social opportunity costs for all goods, resources,
categories of labor, and capital stocks. (2) Consumer councils and
federations respond with consumption proposals. Worker councils and
federations respond with production proposals listing the outputs they
propose to make and the inputs they need to make them. (3) The IFB then
calculates the excess demand or supply for each final good and service,
capital good, natural resource, and category of labor, and adjusts the
estimate of the opportunity cost for the good up, or down, in light of the
excess demand or supply. (4) Using the new estimates of opportunity costs,
consumer and worker councils and federations revise and resubmit their
proposals. Individual worker and consumer councils must continue to revise
their proposals until they submit one that is accepted by the other
councils. The planning process continues until there are no longer excess
demands for any goods, any categories of labor, any primary inputs, or any
capital stocks -- in other words, until a feasible plan is reached.


The IFB does not dictate what workers or consumers can do. The IFB bears
no resemblance to GOSPLAN in the former Soviet Union which was a central
planning bureaucracy that did have power over who would produce what, and
how they would produce it. In participatory planning workers and consumers
propose and revise their own activities in a process that reveals the
costs and benefits of their proposals for others. Not only does each
worker and consumer council make its own initial proposal, they are
responsible for revising their own proposals as well. The planning
procedure is designed to make it clear when proposals are inefficient or
unfair, and other workers and consumer councils can disapprove of
proposals when they are unfair or inefficient. However, revisions of
individual proposals are entirely up to each individual worker and
consumer council. This aspect of the participatory planning procedure
distinguishes it from all other planning models, and is a critical means
of providing workers and consumers with the opportunity for
self-management. Participatory planning gives individual groups of workers
and consumers power over their own activities. They are only constrained
by the legitimate interests of others whom they affect. As long as what a
group proposes to do is fair to others and does not misuse scarce
productive resources that belong to all, it will be approved by the other
worker and consumer councils because it benefits them to do so.


The participatory planning procedure protects the environment as no other
system ever has. Federations of all affected by a particular pollutant are
empowered in the participatory planning process to limit emissions to
levels they deem desirable. A major liability of market economies is that
because pollution is what economists call a "negative externality," i.e.
pollution adversely affects those who are "external" to the market
transaction, market economies permit much more pollution than is efficient
even by the dubious standards of mainstream economics. The participatory
planning procedure, on the other hand, guarantees that pollution will
never be permitted unless those adversely affected feel the positive
effects of permitting an activity that generates pollution as a by-product
outweigh the negative effects of the pollution on themselves and the
environment. Moreover, the participatory planning procedure generates
reliable quantitative estimates of the costs of pollution and benefits of
environmental protection whereas markets generate no quantitative
estimates whatsoever, giving rise to the need for makeshift surveys in
market economies that polluters and environmentalists argue over
endlessly.

In brief, a participatory economy is not only feasible, it is the best way
to secure economic justice and democracy while protecting the environment.


MR: What is the relationship between capitalism and war?

RH: This question has long been debated. Many Marxists argued that once
capitalism became the dominant economic system in the world, it also
became the root cause of war in the modern era: "Capitalism means
imperialism and imperialism means war. Eliminate capitalism and you will
eliminate imperialism and war." I have always believed this is too
simplistic. I believe capitalism does drive societies to war in a number
of different ways that are important to understand, and I believe
achieving world peace will remain difficult, if not impossible, until we
replace the economics of competition and greed with the economics of
equitable cooperation. But the roots of war run deeper than economic
dynamics alone and replacing capitalism will not guarantee world peace.


Having said this, it is important to understand how capitalism contributes
to war. Capitalism legitimates the pursuit of greed through power.
Capitalism drives corporations to expand their access to sources of raw
materials and cheap labor. Capitalism drives corporations to seek
customers overseas. And capitalism grants these same corporations ample
means to influence those who guide a nation's foreign policy. Capitalism
concentrates economic wealth and power in the hands of large corporations,
permits these corporations to own and control the major media, and allows
these corporations to use all their wealth and power to ply politicians to
act in their interests. This has proven to be a disastrous recipe time and
time again, leading the governments of many capitalist countries to pursue
imperial foreign policies that serve the interests of their major
corporations not only at the expense of the citizens of the countries
falling under their dominion, but also at the expense of a majority of
their own citizens who shoulder the lion's share of the costs of empire
and receive little of the benefits.


But it would be a mistake to reduce the logic of empire to economic
calculus alone. Many who fight in imperial wars do so because they believe
their country is threatened. Many who fight believe they are helping those
whose country they invade and occupy. Many who fight do so because they
believe those they kill or subjugate are racially inferior to themselves.
Many who fight believe there must always be wars and warriors, and being a
warrior is part of what it means to be a man. And finally, many who fight,
or who work in the military industrial complex, do so because they have
few alternatives and that is where jobs are to be found. In other words,
imperial war is as much the result of misguided patriotism, racism,
sexism, militarism, and individual self-preservation as it is the result
of corporate self-interest.


MR: How can peace movements impact economies governed by competition and
greed? Why have peace movements thus far not been able to end war?


RH: Peace movements cannot stand idly by and wait for the economics of
competition and greed to be replaced by the economics of equitable
cooperation. Peace movements must rage against war and all its causes in
societies waging unjust wars, which are most often societies who also
practice the economics of competition and greed. This means one job of the
peace movement is to dispel the myth that empire benefits the average
citizen. It is pointless to deny that there are material benefits of
empire. But it is usually the case that the distribution of the benefits
and costs of empire is such that, on balance, ordinary citizens are worse
off. Moreover, the dynamics of empire invariably shift the internal
balance of power further in favor of the ruling elite. So it is important
for peace movements to explain that an accurate material calculus reveals
that ordinary people are usually worse off and further disempowered when
their governments pursue imperial ambitions.


However, peace movements should never make this material calculus their
major argument against empire. It is the first responsibility of citizens
to prevent a government that purports to speak for them from engaging in
imperial policies because imperialism is wrong. It is wrong to subvert the
sovereignty of other nations. It is wrong to intervene in the domestic
affairs of other countries -- undermining regimes that strive for
sovereignty and propping up regimes that acquiesce to domination. It is
wrong to use military, economic, and political power to seize the lion's
share of the benefits from international investment and trade from less
developed countries. Moreover, empires never last forever, and chickens
always come home to roost. And we can all live much better in a world of
peaceful coexistence ruled by international law where the benefits of
international economic cooperation are shared equitably than we do in a
world of rising and falling empires.


There is no reason to believe ridding the world of war is an easy task.
Humans have waged war on one another from time immemorial. As we become
more numerous, and our weaponry becomes more deadly and environmentally
destructive, the consequences of failing to kick this uniquely human habit
become ever more frightening. But we are a species capable of reason and
we can and do learn from our mistakes. Nor is the peace movement without
its troops. Phyllis Bennis, who heads a team of anti-war activists at the
Institute for Policy Studies in Washington DC, likes to point out that
there are still two super powers in the world today. The Soviet Union is
gone, but the United States is not a super power without a world-class
challenger. The world peace movement is the other super power, and we
should never underestimate our potential and our power.


MR: What insights can Participatory Economics offer those working within
the anti-war movement? Does it offer any strategies in terms of movement
building and achieving world peace?


RH: Participatory Economics is based on the conviction that people can
manage their own economic activities and cooperate with others efficiently
through fair and democratic procedures. Moreover, when we do so we can be
more effective than when a small elite tells the vast majority of us what
to do. That lesson applies to the peace movement as well. The peace
movement is made up of millions of individuals and tens of thousands of
peace groups and organizations. When peace groups initiate their own
activities, and when peace groups form organizations and coalitions
governed by participatory, democratic procedures to coordinate their
efforts, the peace movement is more powerful. But this is not the way most
people are used to working together. People are used to hierarchy. People
come into the peace movement with racist and sexist attitudes whether or
not they realize it. Just as participatory economics builds institutional
correctives for habits that are socially dysfunctional -- like balanced
job complexes and minority and women's caucuses -- the peace movement also
needs to develop correctives for predictable weaknesses people bring with
them from their life experiences outside the movement.


Marla Renn lives in Vancouver and is a member of the Vancouver
Participatory Economics Collective. This interview can also be viewed on
our website at http://www.vanparecon.resist.ca