Socialists@XL: Prof. Madhukar Shukla's take on Socialism

1. yes, socialism/capitalism is a pretty obsolete - and far too simplstic binary - classification... somehow 'socialism' get equated with only the erstwhile Soviet Russia... and the fact that it fell sort of vindicates that socialism is bad for economy. Also economics and politics being intertwined in out own heads (not just 'out there'), the left/socialism gets equated with dictatorship and opression, and right/capitalism with freedom and democracy (such is the power of media!!;0)... worth having a look (and do take the test!!) at:

http://www.politicalcompass.org/

2. in the process, one tend to overlook other self-proclaimed socialist countries (my favourites are the scandinavian ones) which have been performing pretty well... in one of my blog postings I had mentioned this link - am enclosing the document describing there 'socialistic" framework

3. agree too, that each country has to design its own macroeconomic policy framework depending on its specific requirements - there is no single medicine/tonic to perk up all economies. Joseph Stiglitz, who used to be the Chief Economist for IMF (was fired/ resigned for his views) had once written an interesting article on this (am enclosing that too)

4. the terms like "reforms" "liberalisation", "Globalisation" etc. have sort of acquired a brand equity, which influences us subliminally, and stops us from looking underneath for the ground-level reality (the kind which the hindu article describes) - I mean, when you say that this is 'reform' (or democracy, freedom etc. for that matter) who can dispute you... in politics, it is called "setting terms of debate" - whoever is able to do that, wins.... the only empirical study, to my knowledge, which has comprehensively looked at the impact of these (reforms, globalisation, privatisation, etc.) on countries world-wide was done by Center for Economic and Policy Research. The verdict is far from positive:

http://www.cepr.net/globalization/scorecard_on_globalization.htm

(and noone talks about countries like Ghana, Bolivia, etc., who liberalised their economies and then went bankrupt)

5. "economic progress" is a function of what one measures - the current benchmark is GDP... calculating GDP is actually an art (like the CTC in CRP;0), and different countires calculate their GDP in different ways... in any case, how much people consume on average (that is what roughly GDP measures) does nothing to reflect the income disparities, unemployment, environmental damage, divorce/suicide rates, etc... we need to look at more comprehensive measures to assess the well-being of a society... one can call it socialism or capitalism or whatever, but no point having a high GDP growth, high FDIs, if crime rates or suicide rates are going up, or more and more people are unemployed/ starving...

my two paise worth

ciao

madhukar

=====================

Dr Madhukar Shukla

Professor (OB & Strategic Management)

XLRI

Jamshedpur (India) 831001

ph: 91-657-2225506 x 300(O) / 603(R)

mail: madhukar@xlri.ac.in; madhukar.shukla@gmail.com

webpage: http://www.madhukarshukla.com

weblogs: http://madhukarshukla.blogspot.com/; http://alternativeperspective.blogspot.com/