No Bosses: A New Economy for a Better World

by Michael Albert

Overview

Providing hope and direction to sustain commitment on the path to change, No Bosses is about winning a new world. Life under capitalism. Rampant debilitating denial for the many next to vile enrichment of the few. Material deprivation, denial, and denigration. Dignity defiled. Michael Albert's book No Bosses advocates for the conception and then organization of a new economy. The vision offered is called participatory economics. It elevates self-management, equity, solidarity, diversity, and sustainability. It eliminates elitist, arrogant, dismissive, authoritarian, exploitation, competition, and homogenization. No Bosses proposes a built and natural productive commons, self-management by all who work, income for how long, how hard, and the onerousness of conditions of socially valued work, jobs that give all economic actors comparable means and inclination to participate in decisions that affect them, and a process called participatory planning in which caring behavior and solidarity are the currency of collective and individual success.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781782799467
Publisher:	Hunt, John Publishing
Publication date:	11/01/2021
Pages:	240
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.40(h) x 0.80(d)

About the Author

Michael is a long-time activist, writer, and organizer known primarily for his affiliation with Z Communications and his original writing on and support for Participatory Economics and Participatory Society. He has written hundreds of articles, over twenty books, one novel, one screenplay, and has initiated numerous institutions and projects. He lives in the US.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments viii

Preface To No Bosses Noam Chomsky 1

Preface to No Bosses Yanis Varoufakis 6

Introduction: Beyond Depravity, A New Economy 13

1 Values for A Better World 20

Finding Worthy Values 21

A Value for Decision-Making 22

A Value for Benefits and Burdens 24

A Value for Human Interrelations 27

A Value for Range of Life Options

A Value for Environmental Relations 28

A Value for International Relations

A Value for the Applicability of Our Values 29

What's Next?

2 Who Owns What? 30

That's Mine, Dammit

That's Our's In Common, Dammit 33

3 Who Decides What? 36

Whys and Hows of Self-Management

Problems and Virtues of Self-Management 39

We All Decide 44

4 Who Does What? 46

Out with the Old Boss, In with the New Boss

Out with the Old Boss, in with No Bosses 52

Empowerment Equity 58

Is This for Real? 65

We All Do Balanced Jobs 68

5 Who Earns What? 69

Equitable Income

The Measurement Problem 78

The Incentive Problem 82

The Anarchist Objection 88

Conclusion 96

6 Who Likes Markets and Central Planning? 98

Allocation As We Know It

Rejecting Central Planning 100

Rejecting Markets 103

Our Allocation Problem 109

An Anti-Academic Addendum 110

7 Who Allocates What? 113

Participatory Planning Take 1: Requirements 114

Participatory Planning Take 2: Bare Bones 116

Participatory Planning Take 3: Adding Some Texture 118

Participatory Planning Take 4: Making Plan Proposals 120

Participatory Planning Take 5: Some Preliminary Judgments and Questions 122

Participatory Planning Take Variations 127

Participatory Planning Take 7: Information and Communication 130

Participatory Planning Take 8: Allocation Organization 138

Steps of Participatory Planning 139

Preparing First Proposals 140

Proceeding from One Proposal to Another 143

Flexible Updating 146

Converging On a Plan 149

Participatory Planning Take 9: Some Additional Features 151

Collective Consumption and Externalities

Income Via Allocation 161

Investment 166

Conclusion 168

8 Participatory Economics and Other Sides of Life 171

Participatory Polity and Participatory Economy

Participatory Kinship and Participatory Economy 173

Participatory Culture/Community and Participatory Economy 181

Participatory Ecology and Participatory Economy 182

Participatory Art or Artistic Economy? 184

9 Winning A New Economy: Between a Rock and a Hard Place 187

Vision and Reforms

Vision and Organization 190

Vision and Winning 196

10 Origins, Prospects, and History of Participatory Economics 199

Selected References 217

Predecessors

Origins 218

Presentations/Elaborations/Parallel Efforts 219

Some Websites 220