On Mutualism

 Excellent article at Unherd yesterday: How to end anti-capitalism. Excerpt: The mutualist impulse, says Horowitz, is simple: “If neither government nor market forces are solving a problem that you and the people in your community share, why not solve it yourself?”

One of the side effects of the Cold War was that it framed the economic options as a binary choice between free-market capitalism and state socialism, pushing other models of ownership to the margins. One of my biggest frustrations with the Left's economic ideas is (ironically) their conservatism pushing discredited socialist ideas, ignoring other alternatives despite their history within their own movement.

I've long had a fondness for co-ops and partnerships (going back, I think to the Free-market mutual economy described in Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars Trilogy), and think there is a lot of potential uses for the mutual model. Off the top of my head, I'd suggest converting the  BBC, utilities, and train operators to customer-owned Mutuals while service companies such as contract cleaners, carers, supply teachers could also benefit from being employee-owned. 

The book mentioned,  Mutualism by Sara Horowitz sounds interesting too, will add to my wish list. 

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