Sunday, August 9, 2020

The Sweet Spot Between Laissez-Faire and Centralized Planning — David Sloan Wilson interviews Tim O’Reilly

This is a must read carefully to the end, even though it is longish. while it is not about MMT specifically, it has implications for the development and application of MMT in designing a socio-economic system capable of seizing emergent opportunities and approaching emergent challenges of fast-changing times owing to technological advances.
Also note that the third way between laissez-fair and central planning does NOT refer to the political "third way" of the corporate Clinton-era Democratic Party establishment. It is based on evolutionary theory applied to systems design and entrepreneuring in the digital age in order to create value for all rather than extract value for some.

Tim O'Reilly has really thought this through and presents an outline based on system design (open) instead of management (closed) as the chief organizing principle. He gives many good examples to illustrate his point.

The thesis of the Third Way is that when it comes to positive social change, all three ingredients of an evolutionary process—the target of selection, variation oriented around the target, and the identification and replication of best practices–must be managed at a systemic scale. This is in contrast to the two dominant models of social change, laissez-faire and centralized planning. Laissez-faire doesn’t work because it simply is not the case that the lower-level pursuit of self-interest robustly benefits the common good. Centralized planning doesn’t work because the world is too complex for a group of experts to formulate and implement a grand plan.
Evonomics
The Sweet Spot Between Laissez-Faire and Centralized Planning
Evonomics
David Sloan Wilson, SUNY Distinguished Professor of Biology and Anthropology at Binghamton University and Arne Næss Chair in Global Justice and the Environment at the University of Oslo, interviews Tim O'Reilly, founder and CEO of O'Reilly Media.

9 comments:

NeilW said...

I avoid Third Way as it is rapidly morphs into Third Wave.

Why co-operative systems always degenerate into authoritarianism is what we really need to understand.

Matt Franko said...

Because someone qualified and in authority has to dictate “ the target of selection” someone qualified and in authority has to dictate the “variation oriented around the target” and someone qualified and in authority has to dictate “the identification and replication of best practices”

These things don’t happen by themselves...

Somebody competent is put into authority and Darwinist libertarians pee their pants...

Matt Franko said...

“ Laissez-faire doesn’t work”

LOL It’s straight out of Darwin and has been synthesized into social theory.... “survival of the fittest!”...

Matt Franko said...

Here:

https://www.icr.org/article/darwins-influence-ruthless-laissez-faire-capitalis/

Once Darwin was dead his survivors synthesized his theory into social theory...

Rinse and repeat..,,

Matt Franko said...

“ Many capitalists did not discard their Christianity, but instead tried to blend it with Darwinism.”

They did more than try.... this is textbook Platonism 101.... once the theorist dies his survivors are free to synthesize his thesis into other formerly anti-thesis...

If the guy was still alive he could deny the synthesis... so the guy has to die...

“The ration of sin is death” ... the whole process is somehow feeding off of death.... surviving off of death...

You guys are really into some dark shit....

Peter Pan said...

Only sweet spot I know of exists on a baseball bat.

edzimmer said...

And the above are idiots from the last century. So some do not evolve.

Marian Ruccius said...

In a decade, this is the only Tom Hickey post that I have read that truly falls under the category "waste of time". Really, if you want to talk about monopoly, and it merits/demerits and possibilities for regulation, just watch or read Steve Keen (as a starting point). yawn.

Andrew Anderson said...

Centuries of boom-bust cycles, despite innumerable attempts to regulate, are strong evidence that there is no sweet spot when it comes to government privileges for usurers.

But keep trying to mock God*, eh?

*e.g. Deuteronomy 23:19-20