Foundations: contours of sustainable socialist societies

Anyone striving for a better, sustainable socialist society in the 21st century must put their cards on the table. The elementary building blocks of such an order are: transformative law; collective self-ownership of and in large economic organisations; a cooperative market economy in the small and medium-sized enterprise sector; comprehensive economic democracy; social planning with the help of participatory budgeting; climate and sustainability councils that operate beyond the core state; the transition to a circular economy with the production of durable, recyclable high-quality products; and a social infrastructure that satisfies basic needs by providing public goods. Sustainable socialist societies break with the economy of “cheap things”, instead valorising care work and other reproductive activities in both material and non-material terms. Without democratic redistribution from top to bottom, from the centre to the periphery and from the privileged to the most vulnerable states, such a programme is not practicable.