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3

"NEW" POLITICS, OLD GOVERNANCE:

A REACTION TO "INNOVATIVE POLITICS"

On reading George Porges' interesting rumination on "Innovative Politics",
which appeared /4 Volume 115 Hatter, one may well have the impression that the
“Free Enterprise Movement", which is currently afoot in British Columbia, is
indeed the only real answer to creeping socialism in Canada, and, at any rate,
must be considered a genuine alternative to the exist%ng "Socialist" Government
in British Columbia. Those who are sympathetic to the objectives of the pro-
posed coalition of the Free Enterprise Parties are likely to console themselves
that a future "Free Enterprise Government" will certainly rid the society of

the evils of socialism which it has been the lot of the ruling NDP to foist
upon us.

The theoretical difference between the party in power and those at present
on the outside presumably consists in the antagonistic economic philosophies
they espouse. It is my considered opinion that the intense emotionalism and
confusion dominating the discussion of public affairs - especially as pertains
to the critical issues of politics and economics - are the result of our pre-
occupation with abstract economic doctrines which, in themselves, throw little
light on what is happening around us. The truth is that, in today's conditions,
there is little or no difference between a professedly "Socialist Government"
and a "Free Enterprise Government".

Before indicating the broad areas of similarity between these two forms of
government, I would like to point out the distinguishing features of the
economic philosophies embraced by the Socialist and Free Enterprise Movements
respectively. "Free Enterprise" is a new and perhaps more appropriate name for
what used to be called "laissez faire' economics - a powerful movement which
has dominated the economic horizon of the Western World since the 18th century.
It accepts private ownership of the means of production; rejects governmental
control and regulation of economic life; advocates a market economy in which
perfect competition and other natural economic laws would operate automatically
to regulate the production and consumption of goods. At the free market place,
the individual consumer is presumed to excercise his untrammelled sovereignty
by rationally deciding in favour of those goods whose prices appear lower and
more attractive. The central social doctrine of .this particular system of
economic thinking is that through economic individualism, each person's pursuit

of his own self-interest will ultimately add up to the well-being of the whole
society.

The conditions of the 18th and 19th centuries were undoubtedly conducive
to the wholesale application of these principles, and for the most part they
worked well. But since that time societal conditions have radically altered
as a result both of the conscious application of science and technology and of
the unanticipated consequences of man's restless drive for progress and change.
For one thing, what the 18th century exponents of the laissez faire creed did
not, and could not, foresee was the emergence of monopolistic combines in the
field of private business with the resultant monopoly pricing of their products
calculated to secure excess profits irrespective of their adverse effects on
society as a whole. What they did not expect was the sudden disappearance of

the conditions of "perfect competition", and the total paralysis of "consumer
sovereignty".