Re: [ox-en] Open Money?
- From: Stefan Merten <smerten oekonux.de>
- Date: Sat, 19 Jan 2002 14:56:40 +0100
Hi Keith!
Yesterday Keith Hart wrote:
I'd add that our biggest problem lies in our general inability to
think outside the box of exchange systems at all.<
It is entirely possible to think of economic activities not based on exchange.
Sharing comes to mind. Free gifts have been seen by some as a disguised form of
exchange. And of course there is exchange without money, sometimes called
barter. Sharing, gift exchange and barter exist as alternatives to community
currencies.
Ok. Do you have an example of a economic activity without exchange?
There is a natural link between states and currencies...
This reflects the coercion potential inherent in any sort of money.
Money is nothing but a structural mean to coerce someone to do
something which s/he would rather not to without being paid for it.<
Or, as Adam Smith suggested, money is a way of persuading someone to part
with their property, without having to talk them into it (it's quicker).
Yes.
And BTW: Property is needed for exchange making sense. I.e. you need
to have the ability to prevent someone from simply taking what you
consider your property. Therefore you need force :-( .
Things change dramatically if you do not *want* to prevent others from
taking - as we can see in Free Software.
I would suggest that you do some reading on the history of money (especially
banking), Stefan, or qualify your assertions about what is 'natural'.
Sorry for using "natural". Of course nothing what people do is natural
- it's always cultural. Actually I meant that there are strong reasons
for the link.
Your
discourse is full of generalisations that have no historical or anthropological
basis.
<irony>
Hmm... What a stupid git I am. Never realized that before. Thank you
very much for pointing me at this.
</irony>
Instead on insulting me may I ask you to back your notions with some
substance? And name dropping is not acceptable to me in a discourse
like that. This only leads to not talking to each other any more. And
not talking to each other can be more easily achieved by simply
remaining silent.
Perhaps you prefer to be 'free' to make things up to suit yourself.
What do you think I'm doing here?
How do you think your system can stop these
mechanisms, this invisible hand?<
Most people think the idea of an invisible hand of the market is a pseudo-
religious fiction.
Indeed capitalism at least in our time has a lot of similarities with
religion and money is the god of that religion. Money is the concrete
abstraction of what drives the society - like any other god but more
concrete (at least to us).
Your definitons of money, interest and capital are entirely self-serving.
<irony>
Ah, now I can *feel* that you don't like generalizations...
</irony>
There is no argument with someone says money must be scarce or it is not
money.
We'll sort that out in another thread I hope.
This pops up the question what capitalist means to you.<
Capitalism is an economic system where the owners of scarce commodity money
control the bulk of production, trade and finance.
Ah. With this definition a system relying on non-scarce non-commodity
money can by definition not be called capitalism. That's true.
Because my definition of capitalism differs to a relevant degree from
yours, I guess it's better to not longer use the word and instead make
clear what phenomenon we are talking of exactly.
Mit Freien Grüßen
Stefan
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