Welcome!

[Richard Stutsman <rstutsman@worldworks.org>]

Gentlepeople:

Welcome to the Economics of Empowerment discussion group!

As moderator I will work overtly and covertly to try and keep discussions on 
topic and civil. We are all gentlemen and scholars, and I therefore anticipate 
that this task will incur little effort on my part. :-)

Our main goal herein is to discuss ideas for plans of action. This is not to be 
primarily a debate regarding economic theory. Naturally, ideas of how best to 
bring about (1. the elevation of full participation in future productive asset 
ownership as a universal and fundamental human right; (2. the democratization 
of credit to widely spread the ownership of self-financing productive assets 
and other basic economic reforms as appropriate means for closing the wealth 
gap between the rich and the non-rich; and (3. new policies and laws that lift 
the non-rich without depriving the rich of fundamental human rights - these 
ideas will no doubt be informed by each of our respective models, theories, and 
assumptions about macro- and micro-economics, and some discussion of these 
assumptions is inevitable and acceptable.

Let us please treat each other - and each other's ideas - with respect. If you 
disagree, "beg to disagree" and then patiently explain why you disagree while 
attempting to understand and acknowledge the viewpoint of your colleague. The 
most unproductive discussions and debates are those where each side of an 
argument refuse to see what the opponent is saying or meaning to say, or 
implying that the opponent is ignorant, stupid, or crazy.

One of the first things I want hope to accomplish with the help of the founding 
members of this discussion group is a bibliography of articles and books which 
best address the issues raised by our "Statement of Shared Vision: Toward a New 
Economic Order for the Third Millennium" 
<http://www.cesj.org/about/programs/declarations/sharedvision.htm>.

I have received several recommendations already, and hope to have Dan Bell (our 
liason to the COG working groups) provide a link to the final list soon.

I will follow up with additional comments and/or guidelines as time permits. In 
the meantime,

LET THE DISCUSSION BEGIN!

-- 
Richard A. Stutsman, Director
WorldWorks Symposium: An inquiry into how the world works
URL <http://www.worldworks.org>