Lindblom - The Market System - Afghan Journalists' Committee

94 How It Worksmental protection through the market because they requirethe powers of the state to compel cooperation.For some collective projects the argument is correct.Suppose an irrigation project is undertaken. Barring a happyunanimity—an unlikely possibility—there will be thosewho oppose the project or do not want to pay for it. But becausethe project requires compulsion by the state, dissidentswill have to be taxed.Not all collective efforts require compulsion. Consequently,the market is not limited to the accomplishment ofindividualistic objectives. Societies pursue many collectivegoals, such as economic growth or a high rate of literacy,through the market system. They are achieved as a by-productof individual goal-seeking by participants who are notnecessarily even aware of the achievement. In recent yearsan upgrading of occupational competencies—for sheetmetal workers and translators no less than for computer programmers—hasoften been declared an urgent national goalfor a country seeking to compete internationally. Yet oftenmore is done to achieve upgrading through the marketsystem, specifically through on-the-job training, thanthrough governmental programs. Some of the greatest collectiveachievements of Western societies have been of thiskind—high standards of living among them. Perhaps evenfreedom, a great collective goal, is more an inadvertent outcomeof market interchanges than of its deliberate pursuit.Market systems also coordinate many collective projectsthat are less than societywide, projects that proceedthrough an agreeing group. Colombian coffee growers haveestablished the National Coffee Fund to build schools.Groups of householders sometimes buy land, buy a fence tocontrol access, and hire a private police force to guard theentrances. They have by their purchases shifted some of the