Re: Public/Private

[Ian Murray <seamus2001@xxxxxxxxx>]

----- Original Message -----
From: "Forstater, Mathew" <ForstaterM@xxxxxxxx>


The ideas of the Free Trade movement are based on a theoretical error
whose practical origin is not hard to identify; they are based on a
distinction between political society and civil society, which is made
into and presented as an organic one, whereas in fact it is merely
methodological. Thus it is asserted that economic activity belongs to
civil society, and that the State must not intervene to regulate it. But
since in actual reality civil society and State are one and the same, it
must be made clear that laissez-faire too is a form of State
"regulation", introduced and maintained by legislative and coercive
means. It is a deliberate policy, conscious of its own ends, and not the
spontaneous, automatic expression of economic facts. (Gramsci)

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

To borrow from Robert Hale and Charles Tilly, free trade, too, is a form
of protectionism and rent seeking...........


Ian