Colonization of time

[andrew at cee.hw.ac.uk]

Monte Davis writes:
> Commerce is indeed a powerful system, but a voluntary one.

How voluntary is it for those with no capital. I have been reading a
very interesting book called `Economics of the environment and natural
resources' which documents the various attempts to extend economic
models to incorporate resource usage, waste production and valuations
in terms based on other criteria than economic efficiency. One of the
most interesting critiques was of market economics - the idea that in
any market a natural balance or level will automatically establish
itself between producer and consumer. As economists the authors stress
that they are not interested in the particulars of where the level is
set rather the dynamics of the various forces which lead to it and the
opportunities to assess and measure the total costs and benefits in
the market rather than the direct ones.

So far, so good. We are merely looking at the problem of attention to
detail, proper accounting. But the major determinant of where
production and pollution (whether material or spiritual) reach a
compromise is `property rights' i.e. who has the right to do what. And
this is why the introduction of better valuation systems becomes
important. Those who own property are in a position to pollute it
should they want to and need to be coerced into stopping this abuse by
some form of remuneration. Conversely, those who wish to pollute other
people's property need to pay for the privilege. Payment is not
necessarily in money. It can in any medium of currency, producing
goods, services, well-being or whatever meets the needs of those who
must be payed.

But when you look at the distribution of property rights it is clearly
loaded in favour of a wealthy minority. Those who have the least
suffer the most from the depredations of those who have the most. In
order to stop the few from despoiling their personal resources, common
resources, even other people's resources, the majority have to
sacrifice from their individual small piles to add to the large piles
of the minority. Even where the poor hold critical resources (e.g.
Brazilian oil, uranium from the Congo) the monopoly power of richer
people and richer nations over most produce is used to downgrade the
cost of these resources or to coerce the producer countries into
handing over most of the profits to be made from exploitation of the
resources. This is all still part of the natural balance of the
market, finding its own level - no economic shibboleths challenged
here.

Slavery is just one point on this spectrum of (ab)use. There are many
different ways in which those with property and power can dominate
those without. Economic theory argues that this abuse will reach its
own equiibrium. Looking at the current situation the equilibrium seems
to be towards an extreme disparity in wealth, power and opprtunity
(and it appears that this polarisation is getting worse).

But slavery represents one of two marked points of moral (if not
economic) deterioriation. With slavery a man's liberty is valued at
less than his productivity. The economic calculation of the slaver is
that more can be obtained out of a man by forcing him to labour than
by letting him form part of a commonwealth where the membership
imposes communal duties. Such a calculation usually occurs when the
person with power wants to screw more out of the person without. In
the end all there is left to screw out of slaves is their labour.

The second moral junction is the gallows. The economic calculation of
the hanging judge is that the net benefits accruing from a man's life
and labour amount to less than the costs (not just in money terms but
also according to the judge's social and moral calculus) of keeping
him alive. A society which condones the gallows is one in which people
are regarded as being cashable into a system of credits and debits
and, if found wanting, disposed of as a waste commodity. Exactly the
opposite of the corss which implies that everyone is redeemable, taht
everyone can be restored to worth through self-sacrifice.

Now ask yourself whether our society has given up on the idea of a
commonwealth and whether it has accepted the notion that an
individual's net contribution to that commonwealth can be negative. I
know that I would like to say no to both questions but what do our
legal, cultural and economic institutions answer to these questions? I
don't hear anything but a resounding yes.

> To forget that
> is to trivialize not only the plight of real slaves, past and present, but
> our own ability -- however rarely exercised -- to choose how far to buy
> into it.

No, to explain the continuity between existing institutions and
slavery is to show how close we are sailing to the wind. What we have
now is more humane than slavery but, doubtless, there are good market
reasons for that. Just wait till the market gets a bit more
overcrowded and hope that slavery still stays out of the equation.


Andrew Dinn
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How do you know but ev'ry bird that cuts the airy way
Is an immense world of pleasure clos'd by your senses five