In the book, A New Scotland, leading activists and academics lay out the blueprints for radical reform, showing how society can be transformed by embedding values of democracy, social justice and environmental sustainability into a coherent set of policy ideas.
This is not a conventional book on economic policy. The first theme that struck me is the breadth of the factors that make up the nation's wealth. When I first studied economics, we were taught a range of formulas that calculated everything from a nation's output to the money supply. In this book, the contributors demonstrate that the wealth of a nation depends on much more than mathematical calculations.
More than anything else, it is inequality that holds back our economy. Equal societies do better on almost every measurement. Then we have arguably the most significant challenge facing our society, environmental and climate justice. This also reminds us that we live in an interconnected world, which involves action beyond our borders. Some chapters cover subjects that are not traditional economic concerns yet are essential to a functioning economy. These include housing, education, transport, land, health and decent work. Land ownership is a particularly Scottish concern, with a disproportionate share held in the hands of very few individuals and bodies.
Then there are chapters on the structural factors that undermine our economy. These include the need for economic democracy that challenges the elite domination of wealth and economic decision-making. As well as addressing the weak forms of political governance. Several contributors highlight the development of a highly educated, socially unrepresentative professional-managerial class, which has banished all talk of ʻcapitalismʼ, ʻclassʼ and ‘exploitation’ as obsolete - leaving little appetite amongst the political elites for change. Chapters on culture, human rights, race and gender also point to complacency in what we like to think of as Radical Scotland.
The second big theme for me is that a better Scotland is possible. If the analysis might depress us, the possibilities are also there in buckets, from a new approach to bottom-up public ownership and investment in worker-owned business to individual economic rights, public participation and deliberation of the economy itself. This wouldn't be a book about Scotland without referencing our national obsession, constitutional change, and the authors hold a range of views on this issue. Whatever constitutional path is taken, Scotland will remain embedded in a complex web of economic relationships across these islands, Europe and the world.
My chapter moves away from traditional macroeconomics to focus on the local economy. Scotland has one of the democratic world's most centralised forms of government and one of the least 'local' local democracies. Economic development in Scotland has focused on attracting inward investment. This has resulted in the wealth generated by workers, local people, and businesses being extracted by often distant shareholders as profits and dividends in our communities of place. These firms are often the first to flee when the economic cycle shifts. Community Wealth Building seeks to address this by encouraging plural ownership of the local economy, increasing investment using fair employment, progressive procurement and the socially just use of land and property.
I also argue that outsourcing of public services has fragmented delivery and extracted wealth from communities. I make a case for the collective provision of a wide range of local services based on plural forms of democratised and decentralised common ownership. The cooperative movement and other forms of community ownership could also play a much larger role in regenerating the local economy. The problems facing our high streets and town centres will not go away after the pandemic. Consequently, we need to rethink our town centres as places where people live and work, not just shop. This should include a level playing field on taxation. I listened to an interesting IFS debate last night about an Online Sales Tax to offset the business rates for high street retailers. There are always challenges in implementing a new tax, but this issue needs to be tackled now.
This book highlights some challenges for traditional thinking on the left in Scotland. We should be proud of our radical history while applying the lessons to a Scotland in thrall to a neo-liberal economic orthodoxy with weak governance systems. The solutions cannot be dictated from the top; they must be developed and organised from communities of interest and place. This book offers a different vision for Scotland and signposts new approaches to our enduring challenges.