I wouldn’t say economics is particularly ideogical, Scott Sumner says that back in the day even Chicago had an even split between Republicans and Democrats. His blog is the Money Illusion.

Hell, even Paul Krugman argues economists have done 2 Good Things: demonstrating that markets work (Smith, Bastiat, Say, Marshall, Mill, Friedman) through price theory; and that business cycles can be tamed (Keynes qua Keynes). None of which is particularly unobjectionable.

Regarding maths: it’s just a tool used to perfectly understand, and ensure the truth of, the path from the if to the therefore. A lot of the time it’s just addition (accounting identities and the like) – taking scarcity of resources seriously.

Perhaps the left has so few policy reccomendations simply because they aren’t correct. There might might be wiggle room (see Paul Krugman on this) within the “markets are good for prosperity, and social organisation” paradigm, but nothing really radical. A trade off between humanity and efficiency and humanity perhaps? Perhaps there is one way to organise society to maximise human happiness, and the way of the Fabian society simply isn’t it.

Economics for people who Hate Capitalism is supposed to be a very good effort at “economics for lefties”, trying to show the lots of mainstream economics is perfectly amenable to left wing thought (and indeed, useful). (I’m not suggesting you need to read it Paul, but perhaps you might recommend it to lefties)

and this book review by the mighty Robert Solow contains what I thought was an extremely useful discussion of economics from first principles, and why mainstream economics isn’t inherently right wing.

Unfortunately many of blog debate come in the form of a right winger like Tim W trying to explain economics to a left winger, which does not make left wingers very receptive. I’m frequently taken to be a right winger by LC commentators

Dunc – I was actually a student of Chris Brooke’s when he put all that stuff up. Guess what degree I was studying?

“The Oxford School of Politics, Philosophy and Economics is based on two unalterable principles: first, everything written about politics and philosophy by Karl Marx (1818-83) is out of date and dangerously biased, while everything written by John Stuart Mill (1806-73) is modern, vigorous and untainted by bias; secondly, everything written about economics by Karl Marx (1818-83) is out of date and dangerously biased, while everything written by Alfred Marshall (1842-1924) is modern, vigorous and untainted by bias.”

– Paul Foot, The Politics of Harold Wilson (1968)

Chris Brooke has the entire 1968 ‘The Poverty of PPE’ article on his blog.

http://virtualstoa.net/2008/03/03/the-poverty-of-ppe-editors-introduction/

Ten years ago I got very close to persuading the political leadership of a large city council to break up and mutualise (create social enterprises from) all its in-house services.

It would have been very easy to do under existing legislation. Here’s how. [But first, as size matters in limiting the tendency for hierarchical and bureaucratic practices to develop, it helps that the commissioners of services are broken up and decentralised.]

So, imagine a small neighbourhood, say based on the area around a park or a school catchment area or an urban village i.e. a place that already has an identity, a shared sense of place among its residents. Give that community a chance to elected an accountable group of citizens to make decisions and a devolved budget. The only stipulation is that for the first (say) five years the neighbourhood council has to ‘buy’ services from the local social enterprises/mutuals in that area.

Now, take the Council’s existing operations, split them up, mutualise them, with each ‘worker/member’ having a share each, encourage people to ‘join’ mutuals in their own neighbourhood, provide them with capital, working finance, advice and training in running their own concern (as a mutual) and give them a start-up five year contract to provide services to the neighbourhood council.

Simples.

Quizz Question: what links Stanley Spencer to John Lewis Partnership? Hint, it’s a place … oh! and Christine Keller.

P.S. I am not an Aristotlean, Paul S, even though I do think that active citizenship is humanising and, if that is not tautological, authenticating.

“this problem of the left’s just having no coherent or concrete proposals about what to do regarding the great big economic mess was prominently on display there as well”

I would add that they need to achieve somehow their vague reconstruction of the world economy WITHOUT ANY FISCAL RESOURCES. Which will be interesting.

Also, I think you are somewhat charitable about the soft ideas like JOhn Lewis and their ability to bear much weight. How would a employee-owned idea replace, say, industrialised farming? Oil distribution? Concrete? All these vast industries, many of them just don’t suit a restructuring along some communistic ideas. And they are mostly ignored by far-out thinkers, because such thinkers are much more familiar with funky service industries than hard, efficient-use-of-capital businesses.

Also, by what means would a reconstruction take place? Suppose somebusybody worked out that Tescos should be like John Lewis. Would it be forcibly changed? What sort of expropriation would we have in mind?

I now have to ignore this thread as I have work to do . .. . where do you find the time??

Re 1. you certainly appeared to be, from your initial post.

Re the rest: look, much of what you say is true. But im incredibly busy. I don’t have the luxury of time to read through libertarian documents and then sit down and provide you with detailed refutations of each one. All I can do is tell you that PERSONALLY in my experience I find this stuff unconvincing. If you feel differently, fine.

And maybe I’m missing out. maybe the libs are getting it all right. But right now I don’t have the time or inclinatio to pursue the issue further than I have, or to provide you with detailed counterexamples. Frankly, I’ve got better things to do with the little free time I have right now than to think about libertarians. So yes, intellectually, your points against me stand. I’m fine with that; I need a life as well as a disposition to political enquiry.

2. roderick long says this about megacorporations:

“The ability of colossal firms to exploit economies of scale is also limited in a free market, since beyond a certain point the benefits of size (e.g., reduced transaction costs) get outweighed by diseconomies of scale (e.g., calculational chaos stemming from absence of price feedback)—unless the state enables them to socialise these costs by immunising them from competition – e.g., by imposing fees, licensure requirements, capitalisation requirements, and other regulatory burdens that disproportionately impact newer, poorer entrants as opposed to richer, more established firms.” http://www.cato-unbound.org/2008/11/10/roderick-long/corporations-versus-the-market-or-whip-conflation-now

3. “contrary to much observed experience of profit-driven entities” – what’s his research if not “observed experience of profit-driven entities”? also your own experiences may not be 100% relevant becausewhat we have in the uk at the moment is not a free market, but corporatism (as long says in the above article). when firms are shielded from competition it’s not surprise they treat people badly etc.

it’s ok it’s fine if you find tooley “pretty unpersuasive”, but your personal feelings are not an argument against him – tell me where his analysis has gone wrong. you criticise the articles for being “ideologically-driven partisan ravings”, but sometimes (not saying this is necessarily the case here) pro-state lefties are just as guilty – extreme closed-mindedness – eg refusing to consider the arguments that the poor would be better off under free markets – just repeating “but you’d leave people to die in the streets”.

“obscure Internet pamphleteers” – they’re not all, roderick long is associate professor of philosophy at auburn university, for example.

and accepting this kind of stuff isn’t an easy way out – i don’t even properly accept it, but even now i’m feeling so so angry/frustrated/depressed by the fact that we’ll never see anything approaching a just society in this world. and i can’t do anything about it! for anarchists (as far as i can tell) working through the political system is futile and probably even wrong. some are more optimistic than me about the chances of persuading people through education etc, but status quo bias (and other biases) are immovable obstacles.