The Swedish Theory of Love

This episode of the BBC Radio4's Analysis, Cameron's Swede Dreams, describes comparisons between various economic systems and political cultures and provides an analysis of the successful Swedish Model. Apart from covering individualism, society, capitalism, unionism, homogeneity, immigration and eugenics, it also mentions the Swedish theory of Love: that you can only be sure that personal relationships are loving when the individuals are economically independent and free. The programme also briefly delves into history to explain the idea that the Swedish state is seen as a protector of individuals, not a tyrant: in ancient times the King supported the land owning peasants against the demands of the Lords. It provides an interesting view of political culture and change.

The Bicomponent Free Market

Ha-Joon Chang has pointed out many fallacies of free market capitalism in his book "23 Things They Don't Tell You About Capitalism". You can watch his summary lecture here.
He paraphrases Winston Churchill's comment about democracy, "capitalism is the worst economic system except for all the others" and he points out that no markets are entirely free: they are all limited by politics, laws and social norms.
Yet we feel free to choose how to spend or invest our money. The market alocates resources and makes choices by a process of individual choice and approval, punishing bad choices with loss and supporting good choices with gain. It's survival of the fittest. The best products and best investments win.
I suggest that the second layer of free market capitalism is how we 'spend' our votes. And I suggest that if we can choose policies freely, from a wide range of 'suppliers', then the best ideas will emerge. These ideas may define the boundaries of capitalism, moulding it in ways that best suit the common good. Furthermore, if the ideas are only produced by a small political oligopoly, the major parties, it is unlikely that society will evolve and adapt as quickly and as effectively as the entrepreneaurial politics that Interactive Democracy fosters. Oligopolies may be as retarding to politics as they are to markets!

The Sham of Democracy

"The Sham of Democracy" is an article by Bill Bonner in MoneyWeek (24/02/2012). In it he writes
"The Italian city states practised real democracy too. In 15th-century Florence, for example, citizens voted on whether or not to build a cathedral. Then, they voted on what shape it should take. A scale model was built, Citizens knew what it would look like. They understood how it was built and how much it would cost them. They cast their ballots and took responsibility for the outcome. American democracy, circa 2012, has no more in common with real democracy than American capitalism has in common with real capitalism. Both are degenerate, corrupt and geriatric."

Milton Friedman

"The problem of social organization is how to set up an arrangement under which greed will do the least harm, capitalism is that kind of a system."

Milton Friedman

Sales, marketing and public relations, disciplines that evolved in the capitalist system, are crucial to winning elections in our party political representative democratic system. They require capital and thus rich people and organisations have more political power than individuals. Their capital, greed and raw self interest skew the political system. Can democracy be developed so that greed does the least harm? Interactive Democracy switches a good deal of power away from cash and converts it into individual votes, spent frequently. Sure, cash will be spent to persuade us of an issue, but the deal will be far more transparent than is the case today.

"The only way that has ever been discovered to have a lot of people cooperate together voluntarily is through the free market. And that's why it's so
essential to preserving individual freedom."

Milton Friedman

Interactive Democracy, a free market of ideas, purchased with votes which are equitably distributed amongst the electorate, adds to our individual freedom of expression and self determination.