• english
  • italiano

At the base of the theoretical view of the common good economy by Austrian Christian Felber, there is the choice between two economic models: the first sees the competition as the engine that drives the market and the second sees cooperation as the engine mechanism to exit current crisis of the advanced capitalist economies.
According to Felber, the competition that drives the current market economies is based on a logic of "I win, you lose", the typical pattern "zero-sum" game theory, while cooperation is based on a different paradigm: " I win, you win."
Felber's thesis is that cooperation is more efficient than the competition: logical cooperatives encourage greater motivation of individuals engaged in the production processes and, more generally, greater participation in society. Also facilitate the creation of a better quality of life for everyone and a real achievement of the common good.If this is true, why not consider alternatives to an economic model based on competition? The economy of the common good does not want to be a utopian paradigm or a simple theoretical exercise but aims to make the form of a market system, which is able to capitalize on collective and shared dynamics.
Felber says: "The word competition, if watched closely, reveals something amazing. Its etymology is beautiful: from the Latin "com" and "petere", which means "seek together" a solution. What we observe today in the market is a perversion of that original meaning, a kind of "anti-petition": companies against each other. And one against the other, in the long run, we die all and there is no efficiency that takes into. With the word "cooperation" in the sense that we give to the economy of the common good, we could say that we return to the "compete" true and original meaning."