Chapter 7.1.

👉The table of contents so far is here.

Chapter 7: Economic Planning and Energy Supply

7.1. Transnational Management of Energy Sources

The fact that advanced industrial societies are based on energy as a physical foundation remains the same regardless of the mode of production. However, the ideas and methods of energy supply are closely related to the mode of production.

In capitalist industrial societies, energy is merely a means of material production activity. In other words, "production comes first," and attempts are made to supply energy commensurate with the anticipated material production activity. Moreover, these production activities are not based on an overall plan, but are competing business plans aimed at the pursuit of profits by individual capitalist enterprises, so setting limits on energy supply is avoided.

The idea of ​​a communist sustainable planned economy is the opposite. That is, "energy comes first," and production activities are carried out within the framework of an energy supply plan that takes environmental sustainability into consideration. In other words, the starting point of the economic planning process under a sustainable planned economy is energy planning.

Energy is produced from energy sources (here, this refers to energy sources in the narrow sense, i.e., primary energy sources), so the premise of a sustainable energy plan must be sustainable energy source management, that is, sustainable natural resource management.

In capitalist society, the idea of ​​"energy source management" does not even exist in the first place, and energy sources are permanently subject to development until they reach their limit of depletion, and at best development is only indirectly controlled by the governments and state-run development companies of countries with natural resource deposits.

In recent years, even such indirect control has relaxed, and resources have even become the subject of speculation. The result is economic instability due to fluctuating prices of oil and other energy sources, and the waste and depletion of resources.

A sustainable planned economy is linked to the transnational management of energy resources, which is the polar opposite of this "energy anarchy." Transnational management of energy resources means breaking away from the international common sense of "resource nationalism" that states that energy sources such as oil belong to the country that reserves them, and instead regarding energy sources as ownerless property, placing them under the joint management of all humanity.

Simply put, this means that "natural resources belong to no one." However, in order to make the transnational management of natural resources more than just an idea, but actually possible, it is necessary to build an effective joint management system that is based on the premise of a global planned economy.

👉The papers published on this blog are meant to expand upon my On Communism.

Chapter 6.4.

👉The table of contents so far is here.

Chapter 6: Planned economy and political system

6.4. Constituent units of the World Commonwealth

At the end of this chapter, we will summarize the outline of the planned economy system in the World Commonwealth as a whole. As already mentioned, the World Commonwealth is not a centralized single sovereign entity like a world government, but has a decentralized structure.

The basic constituent unit of the World Commonwealth is the Zone, which is a political unit equivalent to a traditional country, and is also a planned economic entity within the framework of the world economic plan. For example, the Zone of the Germany is both a political unit of Germany and a planned economic entity within the Germany domain.

At the level of these Zones, an Economic Planning Conference is established as a single economic planning organization, and economic plans within each Zone are formulated in line with the economic plan set by the World Economic Planning Organization. There is no complete hierarchical command relationship between the WEPO and the Zonal Economic Planning Conference, but the latter is like a trustee of the former.

A global planned economy not only involves planning of vertical relationships, but also economic cooperation as horizontal connections, and it is rational for such economic cooperation to be carried out on the basis of interrelated regions that bring together neighboring Zones that share geographical and cultural commonalities.

Grand-Zones are interrelated regional cooperation bodies for such neighboring Zones. Grand-Zones themselves are not planned economic entities, but mutual economic cooperation entities that supplement planned economies, and so do not have their own economic planning institutions.

There are various ways to divide Grand-Zones, but I have long proposed dividing the world into five: Pan-African-South Atlantic Zone, Pan-European-Siberian Zone, Pan-American-Caribbean Zone, Pan-Eastern Asia-Oceania Zone, and Pan-Western Asia-Indian Ocean Zone (see my article).

Such economic cooperation bodies among linked regions still exist today, but they often morph into economic competition between the regions and, in the worst cases, turn into exclusive economic blocs that can lead to international war. On the other hand, multinational capital that runs rampant globally across borders is incompatible with this kind of linked regional economic cooperation.

A Grand-Zone in a global planned economy is not a competitive unit, nor is it a sphere ​​of international industrial division like the former Comecon led by the former Soviet Union. Rather, it can be said to be a unit unique to a global planned economy that specializes in mutually complementary economic cooperation.

👉The papers published on this blog are meant to expand upon my On Communism.