A Note on the Future and Dynamics of Economic Democracy

Abstract

It may be useful to begin this discussion with a brief history of the subject; not the whole history starting from Buchez, the Utopians and Rochdale, but the more recent history beginning after the Second World War. Following that war the winning systems were both capitalist systems, one based on private capital ownership, the second based on state capital ownership. That is, both systems were seeking to serve the interests of capital – one that of the private owners, the other the interest of the state – as if the workers were just a resource to serve capital. More concretely, especially with respect to the western private capitalism, the system worked as if profits were to be maximized, that is the incomes and well being of the workers were to be minimized.

Citation

Vanek, J. (2007), "A Note on the Future and Dynamics of Economic Democracy", Novkovic, S. and Sena, V. (Ed.) Cooperative Firms in Global Markets (Advances in the Economic Analysis of Participatory & Labor-Managed Firms, Vol. 10), Emerald Group Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 297-304. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0885-3339(06)10011-3