Re: [OPE] socialist planning in capitalist firms

My reading of Marx suggests that we study capitalist firms for
insights into the future of socialist planning whatever form it will
take - centralized and decentralized

Paul Adler
USC

On Mar 14, 2010, at 2:53 PM, Alejandro Agafonow <alejandro_agafonow@yahoo.es
> wrote:

> The point is not so much the pre-figuration of socialist planning by
> the increase in the dimension of economic agents in the corporate
> sector, as the limits of central planning as it is shown by the
> structure of capitalist corporate sector. Why doesn’t it have evolve
> d to a centrally planned capitalism? The answer lies in the diminish
> ing returns to management that these agents face when certain organi
> zational dimension is attained. So, the point is what lessons can be
> derived for a feasible socialism, i.e. a decentralized one.
>
> A. Agafonow
>
> De: Adler Paul <padler@usc.edu>
> Para: Outline on Political Economy mailing list <ope@lists.csuchico.edu
> >
> Enviado: jue,11 marzo, 2010 22:48
> Asunto: Re: [OPE] socialist planning in capitalist firms
>
> I'm not sure what aspects of business planning are worth considering
> -- I am just trying to scope out the issues...
>
> * I assume that stuff like CAD/CAM and OR applied to inventory
> planning are so straightforwardly technical that their value for
> socialist planning is obvious. (I recall reading something about
> cellular mfg and CAD/'CAM from the USSR in the 1980s).
>
> * The case of scientific management and its new incarnation as lean
> production is obviously more complex historically, but as I read
> that dossier, it seems pretty clear how to use these techniques
> under socialism (like Sydney Hillman demanded: make it a joint mgt-
> labor investigation)
>
> * transfer pricing between units: an old study by R. Eccles showed
> that many "related diversified" corporations used "rational trust"
> rather than cost-based prices or market-prices -- that seems
> interesting
>
> * strategic planning: the research on how corporations formulate
> their annual (and longer-term) plans and budgets has (as best I can
> tell) dried up in recent decades. My understanding is that most big
> companies engage an iterative cycle where higher levels propose
> targets, lower levels come back with plans that aim to meet those
> targets or challenge the targets as infeasible, and the results
> cascade progressively down through the layers of authority
> (corporate -- sector/group -- business unit). Recently, this area of
> management practice has gotten more interesting with the
> introduction of the concept of "balanced scorecard" -- this makes
> explicits the business goals in several distinct dimensions -- not
> only for finances, but also for customer quality, internal process
> efficiencies, and employee "growth and learning".
> ...
>
> So my query is about whether folks on this list are aware of any
> recent work that explicitly aims to assess progress in the emergent
> pre-figuration of socialist planning in the corporate sector.
> ... Or if they think I've posed the problem wrongly.
> Paul
>
>
> On Mar 11, 2010, at 1:13 PM, GERALD LEVY wrote:
>
> >
> >> Large capitalist firms have sometimes been characterized as
> islands of
> >> planning in a sea of competition. I think Marx can be read as
> making
> >> this point when he celebrates the socialization (albeit limited,
> >> partial) that flows from concentration and centralization. I
> wonder if
> >> anyone has studied corporate planning practices through these
> lenses.
> >> In what senses do these practices pre-figure socialist planning?
> What
> >> lessons for socialist planning might we learn from them?
> >
> > Hi Paul A:
> >
> > Well, I don't think Marx anticipated industrial pricing schemes by
> large
> > firms in oligopolistic markets. And, I'm not sure what aspect of
> "planning" by these corporations you are referring to? "Scientific
> management" (Taylorism)? (Lenin and Trotsky referred to this under
> the NEP.) Operations research and linear programming? Well, that was
> > also developed in a different context by planners in the USSR.
> Automated production systems which incorporate (no pun intended)
> planning functions (e.g. computer-aided manufacturing - CAM - and
> CAD/CAM)? Systems of inventory management and control (e.g. those
> associated with "lean production" systems? Etc? Etc?
> >
> > In solidarity, Jerry
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Received on Sun Mar 14 21:49:24 2010