#liberal #anticapitalism

An #EconomicDemocracy is a market economy where most firms are structured as #WorkerCoops.

#liberalism
#coops #cooperatives

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Cake day: July 18th, 2023

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  • Capitalism is a system of property relations and labor relations. It is conceivable to not have those property relations and labor relations in a firm. However, a corporation doesn’t do that as the employer solely appropriates the entire positive and negative result of production i.e. the property rights to the produced outputs and liabilities for the used-up inputs. In a worker coop, the workers jointly appropriate the fruits of their labor. Capitalist property relations aren’t present @memes







  • What I am suggesting is using a license that disallows capitalist firms completely from using the software not AGPL, which still allows them to use the software as long as they provide source code. In other words, copyfarleft that only extends use rights to non-capitalist commons-based economic entities-like worker coops. The project can then dual license to capitalist firms charging them for the right to use the software. This would give them a source of funding to fund any legal fights @linux



  • J Lou@mastodon.socialtoAsklemmy@lemmy.mlDeleted
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    7 months ago

    Perhaps, but there isn’t a good reason to place such a restriction on worker co-ops. Worker co-ops shouldn’t be forced to buy the entire thing when a segment of its services would do.

    Liberals as a group tend to support capitalism. Liberalism as a political philosophy can have implications that claimed adherents don’t endorse. After mapping out all the logical implications of liberal principles, it becomes clear that coherent liberalism is anti-capitalist @asklemmy



  • J Lou@mastodon.socialtoAsklemmy@lemmy.mlDeleted
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    7 months ago

    Worker co-ops don’t necessarily have full worker ownership of the means of production because a worker coop can lease means of production from a third party. It is not socialist. Nor do I mean to suggest it is capitalist. It can’t be capitalism as it has no capitalists as you correctly point out. Since you recognize that it is technically correct to say a worker co-op market economy has private property, you recognize

    Capitalism ≠ private property @asklemmy


  • J Lou@mastodon.socialtoAsklemmy@lemmy.mlDeleted
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    7 months ago

    When I said capitalists there I meant liberal defenders of capitalism.

    A market economy of worker coops has private property, so can’t be socialist. Market socialism is a misnomer and unnecessarily associates with a label people already have preconceived notions about @asklemmy


  • J Lou@mastodon.socialtoAsklemmy@lemmy.mlDeleted
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    7 months ago

    The normative basis of private property, which capitalists claim to adhere to, is people’s inalienable right to appropriate the positive and negative fruits of their labor. Capitalism routinely violates this principle in the employment contract. Satisfying the principles of private property would require that all firms be worker cooperatives. The principles of liberalism imply anti-capitalism. It is entirely compatible to be a liberal and an anti-capitalist @asklemmy



  • J Lou@mastodon.socialtoAsklemmy@lemmy.mlDeleted
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    7 months ago

    Many liberals are anti-worker, but the political philosophy of liberalism is not inherently anti-worker. Liberal anti-capitalists like David Ellerman illustrate this using liberal principles of justice to argue for a universal inalienable right to workers’ self-management and abolition of the employer-employee relationship @asklemmy





  • Capitalism is the opposite of democracy. In a capitalist firm, the managers are not accountable to the governed (i.e. workers). The employer is not a delegate of the workers. They manage the company in their own name not in the workers’ name. Managers do not have to have dictatorial control. It is entirely possible to have management be democratically accountable to the workers they govern as in a worker cooperative.

    Capitalism v. Communism is a false dilemma. There are other options.


  • J Lou@mastodon.socialtoMemes@lemmy.mlCome on Barbie lets go Party
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    7 months ago

    Capitalism is not just when the means of production are owned by individuals. For example, in an economy where all firms are democratically-controlled by the people that work in them, the means of production can be owned by individuals, but such an economy is not capitalist because exploitative property relations associated with capitalism are abolished