Red spectre

Communism, yikes. I'm sorry, but what's the attraction? I agree with Steve's sentiments below. It's hard enough for a married couple, of 2 people who love each other, to get along and share goods, let alone a nation of strangers. I think the historical record shows one thing very clearly, and that is the failure of communism as a realistic social program (along with showing the success of, well, capitalism).

Regardless, I agree with Godfrey that maybe not everything should be opened up to laissez-faire trade. Utilities for example. I still think all roads should be government property and tolled by usage, like most bridges.

Mark, agreed, we do have large scale economies, massive states, etc, so it's not impossible for humans to participate in large-scale social networks. It's just very difficult, and in my opinion, the problems that come up- war, terrorism, racism, and economic exploitation- aren't going to be solved by progressive social programs. They're going to be solved by hegemony or intensive neuropsychological reprogramming. Option 1 has been used with equivocal success in the past- hell, that's what 'history' is all about.

Chris, the economist you're thinking of... Joseph Tainter? He's an archaeologist who wrote a book called "The Collapse of Complex Societies" that I just read. Pretty neat stuff... one of the most interesting aspects was the realization that a lot of New World civilizations collapsed around 1000 A.D. (plus or minus a couple centuries), the common trend being the change in weather that occurred around then. Strictly, Tainter's idea is that it's not necessarily global catastrophe (e.g., global warming) that ends civilizations, as many civilizations are able to withstand and adapt to such prior forms of adversity. Rather, civilizations become too complex and are unable to adapt after a certain point, as all their resources are being spent to just keep the complexities intact, i.e., it's fundamentally an economic problem... you run out of fingers to stick in the dyke.