 B.6 But won't decisions made by individuals with their own money be the best?

   This question refers to an argument commonly used by capitalists to
   justify the fact that investment decisions are removed from public
   control under capitalism, with private investors making all the
   decisions. Clearly the assumption behind this argument is that
   individuals suddenly lose their intelligence when they get together and
   discuss their common interests. But surely, through debate, we can
   enrich our ideas by social interaction. In the marketplace we do not
   discuss but instead act as atomised individuals.

   This issue involves the "Isolation Paradox," according to which the
   very logic of individual decision-making is different from that of
   collective decision-making. An example is the "tyranny of small
   decisions." Let us assume that in the soft drink industry some
   companies start to produce (cheaper) non-returnable bottles. The end
   result of this is that most, if not all, the companies making
   returnable bottles lose business and switch to non-returnables. Result?
   Increased waste and environmental destruction.

   This is because market price fails to take into account social costs
   and benefits, indeed it mis-estimates them for both buyer/seller and to
   others not involved in the transaction. This is because, as Schumacher
   points out, the "strength of the idea of private enterprise lies in its
   terrifying simplicity. It suggests that the totality of life can be
   reduced to one aspect - profits..." [Small is Beautiful, p. 215] But
   life cannot be reduced to one aspect without impoverishing it and so
   capitalism "knows the price of everything but the value of nothing."

   Therefore the market promotes "the tyranny of small decisions" and this
   can have negative outcomes for those involved. The capitalist
   "solution" to this problem is no solution, namely to act after the
   event. Only after the decisions have been made and their effects felt
   can action be taken. But by then the damage has been done. Can suing a
   company really replace a fragile eco-system? In addition, the economic
   context has been significantly altered, because investment decisions
   are often difficult to unmake.

   In other words, the operations of the market provide an unending source
   of examples for the argument that the aggregate results of the pursuit
   of private interest may well be collectively damaging. And as
   collectives are made up of individuals, that means damaging to the
   individuals involved. The remarkable ideological success of "free
   market" capitalism is to identify the anti-social choice with
   self-interest, so that any choice in the favour of the interests which
   we share collectively is treated as a piece of self-sacrifice. However,
   by atomising decision making, the market often actively works against
   the self-interest of the individuals that make it up.

   Game theory is aware that the sum of rational choices do not
   automatically yield a rational group outcome. Indeed, it terms such
   situations as "collective action" problems. By not agreeing common
   standards, a "race to the bottom" can ensue in which a given society
   reaps choices that we as individuals really don't want. The rational
   pursuit of individual self-interest leaves the group, and so most
   individuals, worse off. The problem is not bad individual judgement
   (far from it, the individual is the only person able to know what is
   best for them in a given situation). It is the absence of social
   discussion and remedies that compels people to make unbearable choices
   because the available menu presents no good options.

   By not discussing the impact of their decisions with everyone who will
   be affected, the individuals in question have not made a better
   decision. Of course, under our present highly centralised statist and
   capitalist system, such a discussion would be impossible to implement,
   and its closest approximation -- the election process -- is too vast,
   bureaucratic and dominated by wealth to do much beyond passing a few
   toothless laws which are generally ignored when they hinder profits.

   However, let's consider what the situation would be like under
   libertarian socialism, where the local community assemblies discuss the
   question of returnable bottles along with the workforce. Here the
   function of specific interest groups (such as consumer co-operatives,
   ecology groups, workplace Research and Development action committees
   and so on) would play a critical role in producing information.
   Knowledge, as Bakunin, Kropotkin, etc. knew, is widely dispersed
   throughout society and the role of interested parties is essential in
   making it available to others. Based upon this information and the
   debate it provokes, the collective decision reached would most probably
   favour returnables over waste. This would be a better decision from a
   social and ecological point of view, and one that would benefit the
   individuals who discussed and agreed upon its effects on themselves and
   their society.

   In other words, anarchists think we have to take an active part in
   creating the menu as well as picking options from it which reflect our
   individual tastes and interests.

   It needs to be emphasised that such a system does not involve
   discussing and voting on everything under the sun, which would paralyse
   all activity. To the contrary, most decisions would be left to those
   interested (e.g. workers decide on administration and day-to-day
   decisions within the factory), the community decides upon policy (e.g.
   returnables over waste). Neither is it a case of electing people to
   decide for us, as the decentralised nature of the confederation of
   communities ensures that power lies in the hands of local people.

   This process in no way implies that "society" decides what an
   individual is to consume. That, like all decisions affecting the
   individual only, is left entirely up to the person involved. Communal
   decision-making is for decisions that impact both the individual and
   society, allowing those affected by it to discuss it among themselves
   as equals, thus creating a rich social context within which individuals
   can act. This is an obvious improvement over the current system, where
   decisions that often profoundly alter people's lives are left to the
   discretion of an elite class of managers and owners, who are supposed
   to "know best."

   There is, of course, the danger of "tyranny of the majority" in any
   democratic system, but in a direct libertarian democracy, this danger
   would be greatly reduced, for reasons discussed in section I.5.6 (
   [1]Won't there be a danger of a "tyranny of the majority" under
   libertarian socialism?).

References

   1. file://localhost/home/mauro/baku/debianize/maint/anarchy/secI5.html#seci56
