[Campaignforrealdemocracy] Fwd: From Putney to functional democracy

[Mark Barrett]

This kindly sent from Greg Wilkinson, Spirit Level Richard Wilkinson's
brother. Maybe Julie you could include his comments in the master document
(along with Dave Dewhurst's, sent to you a short while ago):

  Thanks for yours. I may be able to make it to Sunday St Pauls session, on
my way back from family in Brighton to home in Swansea.

I'm intrigued by Agile but cant quite remember what my three sentences
were, probably about finding ways of meeting and acting more locally (to
avoid such expensive carbonising journeys).

Nice, Mark, to see my bro Richard on poison of inequality. He
takes pay-differentials as reference point and homes in on in personal
humiliation and stress of inequality. How do we bridge those polls, in the
working lives and institutions where the money is made and
differentials set, where our collective efforts are ordered and
constrained.

I find too much emphasis on consumerist bling and folkloric community, not
enough on the actual, functional organisation of economic and social life.
When peers first met at Westminster, they were both local and effective
powers in the land - warlords, landlords, executives and executioners. When
the guilds held power in cities, it was on the strength of their practice
in essential trades. When modernising landowners, lawyers and merchants in
the 'lower house' opened markets and enclosed the common lands, they were
in a position to exploit those lands and those displaced. Weren't the
Putney Debaters also soldiers, in the army of their choice?

When we talk about democratising from the bottom, that must also, and most
importantly, be from the bases of industrial, professional and working
life, so we reclaim the power of self-determination in the use of our
effective (and personal) time, energy and resources - direct democracy at
the point of production and representative democracy in the boards and
councils that distribute the proceeds in wages and investment.

Not just in private enterprise, but public services etc. The more democracy
within, the less need for  regulation from without. Unions, like some other
professional bodies, must go beyond wages, conditions and passive
membership to enable all sorts of workers to combine and grasp the levers
of management, direction and investment.

This 'functional democracy' could find its national expression in a new
revising chamber of parliament, bringing together the real interests and
expertise of the a wole social economy (or the bits that fall within
national boundaries)

Questions: how far to adapt existing notions of share-holding with worker
shares, buy-outs etc, how far to bypass that sort of ownership and and
assert labour power and representation more directly?
This may relate to Putney Debates then and now. Can Agile also serve
democracy AT work? Where are the commons of the City and Canary Wharf? And
the flowers and snows of yesteryear?

Greg
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