Schweicart's thought of economic democracy

下面为大家整理一篇优秀的assignment代写范文- Schweicart's thought of economic democracy，供大家参考学习，这篇论文讨论了施韦卡特的经济民主思想。戴维·施韦卡特是现今美国著名的左翼马克思主义学者，是当代西方市场社会主义思潮的主要代表人之一。施韦卡特认为经济民主就是以工人自我管理为特征的一种社会主义形式。它保留了商品和服务市场，而把劳动力市场和资本市场转换为更负责、更民主的机构，是一种具有民主品格的社会主义市场经济。

"Democracy" was originally a political concept, meaning that the majority holds the right to rule society and requires majority decision based on respect for individual rights. Because economy and democracy are closely related, the term "economic democracy" comes into being.

Although the classical writers of marxism-leninism did not specifically discuss economic democracy, they held a positive and optimistic attitude towards it. As for the promotion of cooperative factories with economic and democratic significance, Marx argued that "no matter how high the significance of these great social experiments is valued, it is not excessive."

In 1919, Germany first established the principle of "economic democracy" in the weimar constitution. So what exactly is economic democracy? "Economic democracy" can be said to be the embodiment of democratic spirit in the economic field. American scholar Cohen believes that economic democracy is the democracy in the economic field. "when social members have the right to choose the economic goals they want to pursue and the economic means to achieve these goals, economic democracy can be considered. American democratic theorist satori believed that the policy goal of economic democracy is to redistribute wealth and equalize economic opportunities and conditions. Canada's famous contemporary marxist theorist Alan wood in the democracy against capitalism - rebuilding historical materialism of Marx's historical materialism not only in rethinking and reconstruction, and put forward the "democracy is not only need to be seen as a political category, but also need to be seen as an economic category". She does not mean "economic democracy" as simply a more equal distribution, "democracy as an economic regulator, as an economic driving mechanism."

Schweicart believes that "economic democracy" is a form of socialism characterized by workers' self-management. It retained markets for goods and services, while transforming Labour and capital markets into more accountable and democratic institutions was a "socialist market economy with democratic character".

Through careful reading of Marx's economic and philosophical manuscripts of 1844 and das kapital, schweicart found an answer that was not clearly stated, but still seemed clear: "the workplace should be democratized!" Thus, schweicart calls: democracy cannot stop at the factory gates! Since 20 century 80 s, he has been focused on the study of the economic democracy, he explained and demonstrated economic democracy pattern is a "synthetic" theory and practice, it is "in the past 30 years is economic system has been formed in the theoretical debate, is in the work place organization mode of empirical research and in the 20th century, all kinds of historical 'experiment' in the form of". Schweicart has great faith in his economic democracy of market socialism, saying, "this economic democracy will have a positive effect. It is more sustainable than even capitalism in its best form. It is more egalitarian, stable and democratic than capitalism. Therefore, economic democracy is of great significance.

"One of the striking anomalies of modern capitalism," schweicart notes, "is that ordinary people are considered competent to elect their political leaders, not their bosses." That is, even though they have a form of political democracy, where they can elect the President of the country, they are even less democratic in the workplace, where they are considered incapable of electing their own managers. Thus, capitalism lacks true democracy. "Contemporary capitalism glorifies democracy but denies our democratic right at the very point where it may work most quickly and concretely: where we spend the most time and activity as adults in our lives." There may be opposition to such an approach to expanding democracy, he argues, but in fact, "as a general rule, workplace democracy works better than ownership tyranny, the capitalist form of workplace organization."

Enterprise democratization is conducive to improving work efficiency. Since the wage system has been eliminated, the profits of enterprises will be directly distributed to workers, and the income share of each worker is closely related to the production benefits of enterprises. In this way, workers' enthusiasm for production will surely be improved, making enterprises under economic democracy more dynamic and efficient. Schweicart argues that the workers' participation in the economy has indisputable advantages when measured against a wider range of criteria, including human, psychological and social aspects. Yugoslavia, China's township enterprises, Spain's "mondragon" cooperatives are proof materials.

Of course, schweickart recognizes that economic democracy can be inadequate. "Democracy cannot solve all the problems of alienation," he said. "democratic decision-making is not a panacea. Losers in democratic debates can become painful, especially if they continue to lose. But still, democratization of the workplace is the direct answer to Marx's critique." But in an economic democracy, production belongs to those who are producing. Thus, "they have formed their control over production, and there is room for common action, which is far more extensive than it existed under the conditions of capitalism."

From the 1950s to the 1980s, Yugoslavia carried out democratic practices such as workers' self-management enterprises. Schweicart points out that a democratically managed economy can be efficient, as evidenced by the efficiency created by the bold experience of yugoslav workers' autonomy. "Between 1952 and 1960, the yugoslav economy recorded higher growth rates than any other country in the world. From 1960 to 1980, Yugoslavia ranked third among all low - and middle-income countries in per capita growth." The former Yugoslavia was a poor and backward country. The economy grew at an average annual rate of 6% for 30 years.

However, the practice of market socialism of yugoslav workers' autonomy later failed. The experience of Yugoslavia in the 1980s and the problems of the country itself have arisen. Why is that? This, of course, is the basis for an ill-informed argument against worker autonomy, which is what distinguishes the yugoslav economy from all other models, both capitalist and socialist. "It has sometimes been said that the autonomy of workers in a wide range of enterprises cannot be established. Yugoslavia is a case in point. Such assertions have been repeated since 1989, when eastern European societies were plotting to restructure their economies." In any case, there is no really credible research to support this view. Even Harold lederer, who wrote widely critical articles about the yugoslav economic system, as a pro-capitalist economist, did not see worker autonomy as a problem, but rather the opposite. In his view, it was clear that the cause of the failure was the failure of the yugoslav party and government to consciously pursue a policy of macroeconomic constraints, in particular the restriction of the supply of money, which, in combination with the design of macroeconomic policies, expanded opportunities for enterprise, incentives for enterprise and efficient work. What is needed is more free and independent decision-making in a free market by smart autonomous enterprises, combined with tightly controlled domestic supply. Lederer justly rejects the notion that worker autonomy is an issue. What was the chief cause of the turn in Yugoslavia? In schweicart's view, "the error is related to another feature of the yugoslav model -- its investment allocation." The reason for the failure of market socialism in Yugoslavia lies not in the autonomy of workers but in the allocation of investment. Schweicart pointed out that Yugoslavia had not properly implemented investment controls. "Yugoslavia, like many low - and middle-income countries, was lured into borrowing large amounts of petrodollars, which accumulated until the end of 1970, when Opec prices soared in order to avoid domestic difficulties. When low interest rates suddenly turned higher in the early 1980s, Yugoslavia found itself, like many other countries, in the midst of a financial crisis." This policy error was in large part compounded by the autonomy of the central government to allow the production and distribution of too many federal members of investment. Richer areas are richer; poorer ones are far behind. This widening gap is the economic basis for the regional and ethnic tensions that have exploded. As dijana pristina's research points out, "the main reason is more likely to be economic than racist in nature." Looking at the history of Yugoslavia, she observed that "despite usually having 'good intentions' and a relatively favourable domestic and international environment, when regional economic interests conflict, they usually give priority to enhancing their own regional interests."

Yugoslavia's factory democracy and market introduction played a positive role, and the main reason for its final failure was that the state did not control the investment well, and the large amount of foreign investment aggravated the development differences between the original regions. In addition, Yugoslavia is a multi-ethnic federalist country, which is relatively loose in itself and has prominent regional conflicts of interests. As a result, in the great depression of the world economy in the 1980s, the conflicts were finally intensified and the socialist reform failed. Schweicart argues that the breakup of Yugoslavia has not refuted the argument that economic democracy is a viable economic order; "The yugoslav experience may have important implications for China, where workplace democracy is not a lesson in failure," he said.

The market socialism proposed by schweicart is socialism in a broad sense, which is "any kind of economic system not characterized by private ownership of the means of production". He advocated the social ownership of the means of production in order to better realize the purpose and value of socialism. In his model of economic democracy, market socialism, corporate assets are public property, derived from social investment funds. The government uniformly collects a certain percentage of capital asset tax to form a social investment fund, and then gives the enterprise investment fund according to the regulations. The collection and distribution of investment funds must be conducted in accordance with democratic decision-making and supervision procedures. By taxing firms rather than relying on private savings to generate investment capital, the main source of capitalist inequality can be eliminated, so that firms can get rid of their dependence on capitalist investment or private savings.

In the view of contemporary western market socialist thinkers, public ownership is a means to realize the value of socialism, while public ownership itself is not the essence of socialism. Most of them advocate public ownership of means of production, especially social ownership of means of production, but they advocate social ownership mainly to emphasize democracy in ownership, get rid of the dependence on private ownership of capital, liberate alienated labor, and serve the purpose of realizing socialist equality and democracy. In order to better realize the goal of socialism, they opposed capitalist private ownership and advocated the establishment of democratic social ownership. However, in their eyes, public ownership is not the end of socialism, but only the means of socialism, and the value of socialism is to achieve greater equality and greater scope of democracy. Schweicart believes that the best ideal and value of the socialist tradition is "the producer controls the economy rather than the economy controls the producer". Socialism, he argued, should be "a society in which the economy is controlled by the direct producer", an organization in which enterprises are characterized by the self-management of workers rather than the authority of capitalists.

In the eyes of contemporary western market socialists, social ownership is different from state ownership and does not equal planned economy. Schweicart believes that the realization of public ownership is not equal to the realization of democracy. His former Soviet union and eastern Europe, for example, pointed out that "there, although the public ownership of means of production, but because the state ownership and linked to the centrally planned economy, the democratic rights of the workers did not actually get the guarantee", "but inequality still exists in the very great degree, the larger the range of democracy has not really implemented."

Of course, the market socialism of economic democracy designed by schweicart is based on developed capitalist countries, which is just a "pure theoretical model", as schweicart himself said. He also devised an extension model that allowed for savings and loan associations and for a small "private component" of capital, "for-profit partnerships that deal with these kinds of things."

Schweicart regarded socialism as an economic system and China's practice of socialist market economy as market socialism, and took the achievements of China's reform and opening up as the supporting materials for the economic democratic market socialism he advocated. However, objectively speaking, his economic democracy of market socialism and China's socialist market economy is not the same, especially in the ownership of means of production is very different. At the present stage, China is implementing a basic economic system with public ownership as the main body and diverse forms of economic ownership developing together. And he thinks more about his native America when he thinks about alternatives. The single public ownership that he envisions does not necessarily suit the developing socialist country at the present stage.

The establishment of socialist public ownership in China has laid the material and institutional foundation for socialism. The basic system of ownership, with public ownership as the main body, cannot be changed, privatization must not be carried out, and the situation in which a few people control social resources and the gap between the rich and the poor is serious cannot be changed.

The main body position of public ownership cannot change, do not mean the form of public ownership can be invariable only, do not need to undertake any perfect. Our country once carried out the "majority public" highly public ownership, the facts prove its low efficiency, "big pot rice" incentive effect is seriously insufficient. Traditional state-owned enterprises in China have inherent problems of "low efficiency mechanism" such as "soft budget constraint", "principal-agent", "information, incentive, enterprise innovation, centralization", etc. Therefore, we need to improve the ownership system with public ownership as the main body under the guidance of economic democracy. The original meaning of public ownership is to replace economic autocracy with economic democracy and exploitation with fair distribution. Therefore, the ownership of China's public economy needs to be constantly improved to make it develop toward democratization and better reflect the economic rights of the people to be the masters of the country.

In order to activate the vitality of the economy, China needs to continue to implement the ownership of means of production with public ownership as the main body and multiple forms of ownership coexist. At the same time, in the public economy, state-owned enterprises and the collective economy also need to implement the public ownership as the main body, carrying out the joint-stock reform. For example, state-owned enterprises can be composed of state-owned shares, legal person shares and employee cooperation shares, so that employees can own a small part of the shares and employees can be encouraged to have their own shares. This is more suitable for the development of productive forces than schweicart's market socialism of social ownership, which can better realize our socialist economic democracy and better improve the rights of workers

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