Calls Against Big CEO Pay Grow Louder

Fund managers and individual investors alike are campaigning for a "say on pay" rule giving shareholders a vote on executive compensation at major corporations, especially America's biggest banks. This is the latest salvo in the battle against Wall Street's exorbitance, and this time it appears shareholders might stand a chance.

 

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Some 100 companies — from General Electric Corp. to Wal-Mart Stores Inc. — will be voting on "say on pay" proposals, but the odds might not be in shareholders' favor. The average level of support for 51 say-on-pay-type resolutions in 2007 was 43 percent, according to RiskMetrics Group.

 

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Musical Innerlube: 'Amelia' - La la la Human Steps

Participatory Economics

From: Paths Toward an Anti-Capitalist Liberation by Chris Spannos

A participatory economy is comprised of social rather than private or state ownership; nested worker and consumer council's and balanced job complexes rather than corporate hierarchy; remuneration for effort and sacrifice rather than for property, power, or output; participatory planning rather than markets or central planning; and self-management rather than class rule.

The balanced job complex is a redefinition of our concept of work. Basically, jobs are organized so that everyone has an equal set of both empowering and un-empowering tasks. Jobs are balanced within each work place and across work places. Balancing jobs within work places is done to prevent the organization and assignment of tasks from preparing some workers better than others to participate in decision-making at the workplace, or what would be the result of our standard work place corporate division of labor. Balancing work across work places is equally necessary so that disempowering and menial work places are not ruled by empowering ones. The outcome of the participatory balanced job complex is that everyone has an equal share of both desirable and undesirable tasks, with comparable empowerment and quality of life circumstances for all.

Another key element is remunerative justice, or pay for effort and sacrifice. This method of pay insures that unequal outcomes are not produced and reproduced, due to ownership of the means of production, bargaining power, output, genetic endowment, talent, skill, better tools, more productive coworkers, environment, inheritance, or luck. Of all these factors people control only their effort. So, effort and sacrifice is the remunerative norm in parecon, tempered by need as appropriate in cases of illness, catastrophe, incapacity, etc.

Participants are organized into federations of workers and consumers councils who negotiate allocation through "decentralized participatory planning". Workers in worker councils propose what they want to produce, how much they want to produce, the inputs needed and the human effects of their production choices. Consumers propose what they want to consume, how much they want to consume and the human effects of their consumption choices. "Iteration Facilitation Boards" (IFB) generate "indicative prices", using both quantitative and qualitative information, which is used by workers and consumers to update their proposals for further rounds of iterations. The IFB whittles proposals down to a workable plan within five to seven iterative rounds. A plan is chosen and implemented for the coming year.

A participatory plan is a feasible and desirable choice distributing the burdens and benefits of social labor fairly. It involves participants' decision making inputs in proportion to the degree they are affected. Human and natural resources are used efficiently providing a variety of outcomes.

 

This is only a thumbnail sketch of a participatory economy. Further in depth reading and introductory material can be found at:

 

Life After Capitalism:

http://www.zmag.org/books/pareconv/parefinal.htm

Looking Forward: Participatory Economics for the 21^st Century: http://www.parecon.org/lookingforward/toc.htm

The Political Economy of Participatory Economics: http://www.zmag.org/books/polpar.htm

Rise of a New Economy

From: Fall of the American Empire and the Rise of a New Economy

 

Once the economic collapse of America has occurred, what then? We need to study what our economic options are. Esteemed economist Shrii Prabhat Ranjan Sarkar has provided to the world a glorious vision of a new economic model called PROUT (Progressive Utilization Theory), which contains guidelines for the creation of a new economy. He says that regional, self-sufficient socio-economic units must be formed on the basis of common cultural, geographic, social and economic factors. These socio-economic units may be affiliated in a federated system, but they must possess sufficient self-determination in their own local economic regions to create and control developmental policy.

Every region's economy should be organized into three types of enterprises: cooperatives, key industries, and small private enterprises. Cooperatives would form the core of the economy. Except for a few large-scale, key industries and small private enterprises producing nonessentials, all production is to be organized under worker-owned and controlled enterprises. Cooperatives increase worker motivation and job satisfaction because they give workers control of the business as well as a stake in its profits. When cooperatives have access to the requisite inputs of production—capital, entrepreneurship, skilled labor, and competent management—they invariably out-perform private, free-market enterprises. Cooperatives are controlled by their worker members on the basis of one member, one vote. All members must purchase a membership share in the cooperative. This initial capital contribution gives each worker member a financial stake in the business. Thus workers' ownership rights are based on their functional role as workers, and not on the basis of their capital contribution.

Very complex, capital-intensive industries, such as utilities or industries producing raw materials or goods which are strategic to the regional economy, should be designated as key industries. As they play a crucial role in stimulating production and development for the region, they must come under community control, not worker control. Key industries should be controlled either by the local or regional government, or by an autonomous board. That board or local government operations would hire a plant management team. Participatory team management techniques should be used to insure maximum worker involvement. An effective incentive system should be used to motivate productivity. Key industries should operate on a no profit, no loss basis. The state should not subsidize their operation, nor should the industry reap profits.

Small businesses—those having a maximum of about 5-8 employees—can be privately owned. Private enterprises should not be involved with producing or distributing staple commodities. Salaries of workers and income of owners should be subject to minimum and maximum standards established for the region. (In fact, today in Germany the people are on the streets demanding a minimum wage as well as a maximum wage for all workers!)

Economic planning should take place at the central, regional, and district levels. But, for the most part, planning authority should reside at the local level. The most basic unit of planning is the district. District boundaries should not be determined on the basis of political considerations, but on the basis of geographic factors, socio-economic requirements, common economic problems, and common aspirations of the people.

Course outline: Genocide: What Role for International Law?

Genocide is not only a dark legacy of the past but a threat to the present and future of many societies. How best to respond to genocide, prevent its (re-)occurrence, provide redress for the victims and deal with the legacy of atrocities, and what is the role of international law in all this? This is the central question the course sets out to answer. Indeed, today's responses to genocide seem manifold. After forty years of lying dormant, the Genocide Convention is resuming its role as a tool for combating impunity for acts of genocide. The ad hoc tribunals for the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda have paved the way for holding perpetrators accountable, and truth and reconciliation commissions have been set up to deal with the aftermath of genocides. The International Court of Justice speaks out on genocide, and the International Criminal Court has jurisdiction over this crime. But are these laws, institutions and measures adequate for preventing genocide, for intervening and for providing redress - and if not, why? This thematic course provides an introduction into the phenomenon of genocide and explores the ways and means for responding to genocide which are available under the present international legal order. It examines the potential and limits of law as a tool for confronting the "crime of crimes" and its perpetrators, accomplices and bystanders.

 

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