Re: [ox-en] the commons as the condition for the basic income
- From: "Franz Nahrada" <f.nahrada reflex.at>
- Date: Sun, 28 Sep 2008 09:45:37 +0200
Michel Bouwens writes:
It is the Commons itself, as an institutional form, that is the best
possible solution and way forward to achieve a basic income for the
world's
citizens and thereby eliminate povery.
I see just a commons that is no commons in Kostakis suggestions.
Total separation between "wealth creation" and "wealth distribution".
sorry, that does not work for me.
If we do not seriously target empowerment and autonomous wealth creation
by the commons for the commons, we are doomed.
Enterprises, states, and even
individuals, that pollute the environment through various ways (waste,
nuclear tests, etc.) or television stations and telephone companies that
use
the air (the air consists a means of production for them) for the
transmission of their signals, will pay a large amount of money to a
Commons
fund, as they use or affect, directly or indirectly, part of our common
wealth
This is really interesting: a lot of wealth is not monetized but
considered as potentially monetizeable. The least that could be said here
is that this is a fetishist misperception. Is the author clear that he is
supporting the emergence of a split interest and running us into the
dilemma that we are allready in? The monetary system only works because of
permanent cost externalisation, and yet it is seen as an engine of wealth
creation. If so, we would have to swallow the constant damage it does
because it is our "basic income". That all sounds so familiar to me,
replace "commons" by "national wealth", and you know why I am getting
nauseated here.
Michel, I am really sorry, but I feel this is defiitely not the way to go.
If basic income makes sense, its there to help create the commons (how
long this way is we all know) , rather than have commons consumed by
capital. A commons that is just the imaginary right of all human beings to
natural resources is IMHO not a practical reality, but a very dangerous
ideology.
What do others mean at this point?
Franz
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