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marisbest2 's review for:
The People's Republic of Walmart: How the World's Biggest Corporations are Laying the Foundation for Socialism
by Michal Rozworski, Leigh Phillips
Reading well developed unabashedly Leftist thought is a pleasure. This book articulates clearly how capitalism (exemplified by Walmart and Amazon, but also the USDOD and Federal Reserve) already employ centralized planning and as such are proving that central planned economies already do work. This part of the argument is well argued, giving the lie to the libertarian belief in an absolute free market. Next the authors debunk the idea that markets work as well as planning given the failure of firms to succeed when they adopt internal markets (shown in the case of Sears and also the UK NHS). The book then goes on to a claim that the USSR wasn't actually felled by central planning because it didn't really have plans. It thus concludes that in theory as well as fact a centrally planned economy can work.
The main flaw is that somewhere in there is a claim that the central planning can work for and by the people, a vaguely "democratic" notion about who will be empowered by the rise of big data socialism. I find this to be the most torturous part of the book. A simpler conclusion would be that Amazon and Walmart are bad, not because they are capitalists but because they exemplify the failures of a command and control economy!: Bad external side effects; destabilization of markets; totalitarian impulses towards control of workers etc.
Overall a good listen and an important perspective.
The main flaw is that somewhere in there is a claim that the central planning can work for and by the people, a vaguely "democratic" notion about who will be empowered by the rise of big data socialism. I find this to be the most torturous part of the book. A simpler conclusion would be that Amazon and Walmart are bad, not because they are capitalists but because they exemplify the failures of a command and control economy!: Bad external side effects; destabilization of markets; totalitarian impulses towards control of workers etc.
Overall a good listen and an important perspective.