Sorry to have been outside of the many important
exchanges for the last three weeks. Technology is great, but
unfortunately I've had a frustrating string of equipment problems and server
problems. I think I'm now ready to participate again in discussions of
the system models and their underlying paradigms from a Kelsonian
perspective. I'm beginning to read from the COG archives the many
interesting inputs of this group and will have many comments in the
following days as I get back in the swing of things.
Dan, please advise everyone in this discussion group and in the other
five groups that I have registered with to stop using the OWNCO e-mail
address and in the future contact me through CESJ's address at
thirdway@cesj.org.
To re-introduce myself to those who may know little or nothing about me,
for the last 35 years I have lived and breathed the Kelsonian paradigm for
restructuring economic policy at all levels, from the individual firm and
community to the global marketplace. (See my paper for the Ohio
Employee Ownership Center on my work as Kelso's political strategist that
led to Senator Long's making employee ownership possible in America, by
clicking on http://www.kent.edu/oeoc/Winter1997-8/DinnerWin1997-8.html).
Even before learning of Kelso, I was in the forefront of social change,
totally committed to the democratic ideals of spreading economic and social
power as broadly as possible as the only antidote against monopolies and
power elites in any form. Shaped by the law and economics program at
the University of Chicago, I found in Kelso a synthesis of principles of
economic justice from which any open-minded person can apply in judging all
conventional schools of political economy. Within Kelso's theoretical
framework a society could attack problems of poverty and unemployment that
none of the other schools of political economy could address. Kelso's
vision is the only one I have ever discovered that could move toward the
economically classless society that the revolutionary founders of America
dreamed about but could never fulfill, one that could be achieved without
the bloody class struggle that Marx advocated, one that could bring about
the moral society that Adam Smith hoped for. For those who don't know
me, you can easily learn where I'm coming from by reading my initial
statement to all COG discussion groups on Labor Day by clicking on Homestead
Folks, I have asked several people I consider to be experts in Kelsonian
binary economics to join this discussion group. One is Ron Ludwig, who
many consider to be the dean of America's ESOP lawyers. Another is
Carol Ruth Silver, one of the Freedom Riders in the early sixties who landed
in Mississippi's Parchman Penitentiary soon after she graduated from Chicago
Law School, who later was elected as a member of the San Francisco Board of
Supervisors and still later organized an MBA course in Kelsonian economics
at JFK University in California. The third is the UK's Rodney
Shakespeare, who co-authored the most thorough and scholarly book on
Kelsonian economics with Syracuse professor Robert Ashford, entitled
"Binary Economics: The New Paradigm." For my review of this
important book, please click on Book
Review of Binary Economics
Dan, would you do me a favor and send each of these three binary
economists information on joining the Economics of Ownership discussion
group, plus suggesting that they get up to speed by reading exchanges in
the COG archives by clicking on http:cog.kent.edu/archives/ownership?
Ron can be reached at rludwig@lgklaw.com. Carol Ruth can be reached at
MYERSFLAT@aol.com. And Rodney can be reached at
rshakes@globalnet.co.uk.
Many writings and a bibliography on the Kelso paradigm can be found on
the web site of the Center for Economic and Social Justice. Each of
you are cordially invited to taste our offerings by clicking on the CESJ
Site Map at CESJ Web
Site Map
Again, it's great getting back to what may be the most important idea of
the century. I really look forward to contributing to the multilogue
and working with all of you in bringing a higher level of truth and justice
to the world.
Norm Kurland
Center for Economic and Social Justice
P.O. Box
40711
Washington, D.C. 20016
Telephone: (703) 243-5155
Fax:
(703) 243-5935
E-Mail: thirdway@cesj.org
Web Site: http://www.cesj.org