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From Financial Crisis to Social Change pp 215–232Cite as

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Unleashing the Emancipatory Power of the ‘Spirit of Free Communal Service’: G.D.H. Cole, Dialogical Coordination and Social Change

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Abstract

Masquelier reappraises G.D.H. Cole’s ‘spirit of free service’ theory, showing how this libertarian socialist vision could serve as inspiration for renewing the socialist imagination beyond the usual dualisms of state and market. The chapter begins with a detailed overview of Cole’s critique of the capitalist mode of production and liberal forms of democratic representation and the merits of his alternative. It then argues that the expansion of the cooperative sector along with developments taking place within the contemporary digital economy may be paving the way for the large-scale institutionalisation of the spirit of free communal service in a dialogically coordinated system of allocation of resources. To help achieve this a strategic vision is offered which could help move these values and practices towards the centre of economic and political discourse.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Cole did indeed admire the fact that central planning could treat ‘the entire available supply of labour and other productive instruments solely as means to the satisfaction of human wants’ (Cole 1937, 252).

  2. 2.

    [Retrieved 13 March 2016] http://wikimediafoundation.org/.

  3. 3.

    [Retrieved 13 March 2016] https://www.mozilla.org/.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Exeter, Exeter, UK

    Charles Masquelier

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  1. Charles Masquelier
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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Sociology, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, United Kingdom

    Torsten Geelan

  2. Department of Sociology, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, United Kingdom

    Marcos González Hernando

  3. Department of Sociology, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, United Kingdom

    Peter William Walsh

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Masquelier, C. (2018). Unleashing the Emancipatory Power of the ‘Spirit of Free Communal Service’: G.D.H. Cole, Dialogical Coordination and Social Change. In: Geelan, T., González Hernando, M., Walsh, P. (eds) From Financial Crisis to Social Change. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-70600-9_12

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-70600-9_12

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  • Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-70599-6

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-70600-9

  • eBook Packages: Social SciencesSocial Sciences (R0)

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