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Manaén
@mana
I am sorry to be the one to break it to you, but if you do not believe that profit = common good, you are either an arrogant brat, a socialist or, most probably, both.
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Ferran 🐒
@ferran
Hey, before jumping to accusations, you might want to approach this topic with a bit more humility. Because maybe you are also lacking knowledge and are being oversimplistic. By making such a claim you’re doing in your cast, you’re falling into the same trap of oversimplification that you’re accusing others of. I wonder if you studied what common goods is as a political economic theory (see Ostrom), it has really specific characteristics. It’s not socialist (even less State socialism) and is compatible with a free market. I suggest engaging in a more constructive debate without oversimplifying the issue.
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Manaén
@mana
It certainly is an accusation, but evil needs to be named and ousted. Feeling attacked only reveals that there is an identification on the recipient’s side, i.e., guilty by self-identification. Simpllifications are a necessity since all we do is create “oversimplistic” models of the world we need to navigate. Plus, why would I need to study a certain branch of (socio-)economics to be able to form and proclaim my own views? But, yes, I studied sociology, welfare states, and the likes and already disagree with the premise that goods can be common. I would prefer a radical individual ownership/responsibilty approach. The notion of common goods is only in so far compatible with free markets as you see the necessity of the state to regulate them, which is a krass contradiction to the “free” part. What I’m thinking a lot about is how Milei put it while at Stanford earlier this year: Do you know of any example of market failure that was not preceded by government intervention/regulation?
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Manaén
@mana
Another problem I have with the common “goods” approach is the moral a priori. It is out of the bound of science to decide what is a good or a bad. The definition of common goods presupposes an agreement on what everyone must have. I, for myself, studied poverty and am a big fan of Amartya Sen’s capabilities approach and multidimensional poverty measurement since it forces the researcher to make his moral assumptions explicit. Hence, his research is only as valuable as the reader agrees with his terms. Moreover, Sen’s theory on justice offers a better approach to common wealth by trying to minimise injustice while maintaining maximum degrees of individual freedoms. In contrast, Rawl’s approach is to define the good society first, and then build the institutions that take as much control as necessary to be able to realise that ideal. This is the pursuit of Utopia. I count the common goods approach among the latter.
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