Grünen Kapitalismus - Rosa-Luxemburg-Stiftung

Simply put, true free-market capitalism, in which businesses pay all the
costs of bringing their products to market, is the most efficient and democratic
way of distributing the goods of the land – and the surest way
to eliminate pollution. Free markets, when allowed to function, properly
value raw materials and encourage producers to eliminate waste – pollution
– by reducing, reusing, and recycling. (Kennedy 2005, 190)
A similar perspective is put forward by the influential alternative-energy
advocate David C. Korten. The persistent theme of his Agenda for a New
Economy (2009, esp. 31 ff.), framed by an explicit opposition to socialism,
is a dichotomy between “the capitalist model” – which he identifies with
Wall Street or “phantom wealth” – and “a true market system,” which he
identifies with “Main Street” or “real wealth.” He further explains:
The basic difference between a market system and a capitalist system is
rules. A market system has an appropriate set of rules enforced by government
to maintain the conditions essential to efficient market function.
(120)
The classical theoretician invoked by Korten for his conception of the
market system is, ironically, Adam Smith (Korten 2009, 29), whose work
is more commonly cited by conservative opponents of government intervention.
Korten draws, however, on a rich US tradition – dating back to
the anti-trust campaigns of the early 20th century – of diverting a potentially
anti-capitalist understanding into a perspective which limits itself
to questioning the scale on which private companies operate. The one peculiarity,
in his case, is that he views capitalism as such in an entirely negative
light, identifying it with its corporate [monopoly] incarnation (including
Wall Street), and hence categorizing his free-market advocacy as
a species of anti-capitalism. In this respect, Korten joins forces with another
present-day theorist, James Gustave Speth, a Yale University professor
who calls for “a new nonsocialist operating system that can transform
capitalism as we know it” (2008, 190; Speth’s italics), its central operating
principle being a market in which the “polluter pays” (100). 189
189 Application of this principle to the reduction of atmospheric CO2 has so far been confined
to signatories of the 1997 Kyoto agreement, which the US did not join. For analyses
of the initial stages of this process, see various chapters in State of the World 2008.
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