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From: sykora@csd2.UUCP (Michael Sykora)
Newsgroups: net.politics.theory
Subject: Re: Newsflash! [JoSH on Socialis
Message-ID: <4340024@csd2.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 23-Dec-85 19:21:00 EST
Article-I.D.: csd2.4340024
Posted: Mon Dec 23 19:21:00 1985
Date-Received: Sun, 29-Dec-85 01:01:27 EST
References: <266@meccts.UUCP>
Organization: New York University
Lines: 39

>/* franka@mmintl.UUCP (Frank Adams) /  6:59 pm  Dec 16, 1985 */

>Yes, but the result of the political process is not to produce *a* solution.
>It is to produce solutions to each case as it comes up.  So in a real sense,
>the process *is* the solution.

I don't believe anyone here advocates substituting another form of rule
fo democracy.  I thought what we were considering what would be the best
general policies to come out of the system.  The task for any system,
democratic or otherwise, is to find the optimal solution, not merely
to consider alternatives.

>As for "notable success," how do you measure such success?  Do you take
>into account the cost effectiveness of the means that have been chosen,
>as well as the oportunity cost of these measures?  How do you know
>other means would not have been more successful?

>What other means?  So far, the only other means even suggested is the
>exercize of the autocratic political process.  This has been notably
>less successful.  (Although this may be an artifact caused by their less
>developed economies.)  One can only measure opportunity costs and cost
>effectiveness when there are alternatives.

Again, I am talking about that set of policies that have been and are
currently in place, not the method by which these policies were decided
upon.

>The success is measured by the fact that we have (1) kept pollution under
>control, while (2) retaining a strong and vital economy.  This is crude,
>but it is the level of feedback available for most social policy questions.

Without quantification, the above phrase seems virtually meaningless.  
Of course, it may be extremely difficult if not impossible to measure
the costs and benefits of pollution policy accurately enough to yield
useful information.

>Frank Adams                           ihpn4!philabs!pwa-b!mmintl!franka

Michael Sykora