SwampFox

Thoughts from TEDxGreenville on the value of a community infrastructure. Comment about what you think.

TEDxGreenville was a cool, inspiring event. Much of the politics of the presenters, and probably of many people in the room, was left of center. Heck, there were a couple people so far out they may not be able to find there way back to the center.

So I was relieved and overjoyed when close to the end of the day Dr. Eric Daniels of Clemson University's Institute for the Study of Capitalism provided a vigorous and unapologetic defense of the free enterprise system that has made us all successful and which we all take for granted. Thank you Eric.

Eric talked about our need to proactively defend individual rights as the best guarantee of a vibrant and prosperous society. No disagreement here.

As Eric was talking, the watercolor above of Liberty Bridge over the Reedy River waterfall at Falls Park was in the background. I confess as Eric was talking, I was thinking about the value of a community infrastructure to enhance an individual's ability to soar.

I graduated from Clemson in 1981 and left very libertarian. I have my personally annotated copy of Atlas Shrugged. As I have gotten older though, especially in recent years, I have come to have a greater appreciation that none of us is an island. None of us is successful purely because of our individual efforts. We have all built on the shoulders of generations of people.

I believe we all have an obligation to leave this legacy better than we found it. I also have come to understand that educated, affluent people thrive in communities of other educated, affluent people. It is in our collective interest to work together to enhance our community.

One example I use all the time is from Plato in the Republic. We need food, shelter and clothing to survive. We could all meet our needs every day on our own. But if some will be the farmers, they will develop special skills (they will become educated) and special tools, which makes theme more productive. And if some will be the builders and others the tailors, they will become specialized and more productive as well. If we trade, we will have our daily needs met, and there will be an abundance left over. The farmers can't specialize and be more productive, unless they can depend on the builders and the tailors to be specialized too. Everyone has a vested interested in everyone else being specialized, that is in being educated.

One example of a public asset we all benefit from is public education. When I hear people ask why they have to pay taxes to pay for other children's public education, even though they have no children in school themselves, I tell them this story. Each of us benefits from living in a more educated, affluent community. We're all paying for an educated society because we all benefit from living in an educated society.

We ought to maximize the freedom of people have within the public education system to deliver diverse education options that match the needs of diverse students. We need to transform our publicly funded education system, and that starts with the fundamental reform of money following the child. The school choice movement focuses on maximizing the choice of the parents. We ought to begin to discuss how school choice empowers teachers as entrepreneurs to create diverse education options that match the diverse needs of students. Teachers can't be creative, unless they can attract the resources from students for providing creating education alternatives. That how the market excels by empowering entrepreneurs to create the future.

So how do we decide what public assets we will collectively invest in? We do that through the democratic process. Once we vote, individuals no longer have the right to opt ought. The free market and democracy are both messy, imperfect system. Both involve flawed humans, so as Eric paraphrased Churchill, they are the worst systems, except for all the rest.

Ayn Rand and many at the Institute for the Study of Capitalism argue that capitalism is the only moral system because it promotes individual freedom. I am a huge supporter of the free market, but I don't buy that. Capitalism is amoral. So is democracy. Society can get bad results from either.

What struck me as Eric was talking with the watercolor in the background is that the textile industry used to dye the Reedy River a different color every day. We all benefit from putting restraints on that. Now the river is a public asset we have water colors of.

Clemson is the home of John C Calhoun, who ironically is one of the world's great thinkers on protecting minority rights in a democracy. What he was driven by, though, was protecting the right to maintain the institution of slavery. We all benefit from putting restraints on our right to democratically impose things like slavery or segregation, which we did in this country for a few centuries. Just because people vote for it doesn't make it good.

I believe, as Plato observed, that humans thrive in communities. Communities work best where there are strong, commonly shared values. People in different places, times and religions have discovered some similar principals, such as the golden rule, because they promote communities. If individuals honor commonly shared values, like trust and integrity, then market and democratic based cultures thrive because they empower the innate human potential of everyone in the communtiy. But without high, commonly shared values, both markets and democracies can be brutal systems. Neither capitalism nor democracy are moral. Moral people thrive in capitalistic, democratic cultures. High, commonly held values emerge from a collective understanding that we all benefit from a community where we trust one another.

In InnoVenture, I talk all the time about people participating in their enlightened, self-interest. We all have to get enough out of participating to sustain our involvement over time. But, there is an enlightened part too, where we all have to understand that we are growing a community that will benefit us all.

Chris DeSoiza, VP of the Milliken Research Corporation, put his finger on something powerful one day. He said that if, in considering a transaction with you, I think we will do business in the future, then I am concerned about whether you are getting what you need today because I want you to come back tomorrow. So it is in my interest to look after your interest too. And as you begin to trust me to have your best interest in mind, it is possible for both of us to excel to a place that neither of us could get to alone. I'm not polly anna about this. Ronald Reagan taught me to trust by verify. But trust is a fundamental value that must be broadly shared for a creative society to exist.

Everyone is innately creative, and people thrive where the have the freedom to pursue their dreams. But some people will abuse that freedom, so we limit individual freedom where it impinges on someone else. We also all benefit from community assets, like education, so we collectively agree that everyone will contribute towards creating that asset. We use a democratic process to determine what those limits on personal freedom are.

I know this is out of fashion today, but I believe America is the greatest country on the planet. We have a unique blend of a market and a democratic based culture that has allowed our society to grow and prosper over the last 400 years. Though we've made our share of mistakes over the centuries, America is the last, best hope for freedom throughout the world.

That was Eric's point, and I enthusiastically agree.