This paper represents current elements of my strategic thinking that are a product of more than 30 years of social activism, mostly in the context of industrial companies and industrial/post-industrial communities. I have seen victories as well as defeats in my own work and in that of my peers and colleagues. Over the last 15 or 20 years, the defeats have been far more frequent than the victories. And they have occurred in an environment that is increasingly unsettling.

Around me, and in most accounts I read, I see developments that are deeply disturbing and reflect a deterioration in society and the human condition that would have been inconceivable 30 years ago. The economic poverty and poverty of spirit that we see all around us were not described in Michael Harrington's The Other America. Yet in part in response to conditions described in that book, a War on Poverty was launched by a president, reflecting an official policy of concern and a commitment of resources to the eradication of poverty. During that time, the intelligentsia and people of good will made enormous personal sacrifices to come to know and to be of assistance to those who had less. Social activists held each other to very high standards of accountability, particularly in demanding that we address core and causal issues.

Now, in the face of evidence to the contrary, we have official pronouncements that we live in a "dream economy" paraded in all the media outlets. Allegedly our system has achieved a world-wide victory. With amazing ease, the intelligentsia find comfort in studying and lauding the positive qualities, actions, and conditions of a smaller and smaller percentage of our domestic and international population. These statements inevitably serve to justify the decision to back away from intellectual or material discomfort and risk. From my perspective, it really is a story of the Emperor's New Clothes, and I am surprised and saddened by the faces I see in the cheering crowd.

That's what I feel on my bad days. On good days, and when I have analyzed what I have seen in my daily work, this is clearly a time of deep transition. Though the numbers are frightfully smaller than I would wish, an emerging core of people from a variety of disciplines have come to a similar conclusion, and are doing the intellectual and practical work that should pay off big time in about 30 years, while making more and more positive changes at the margins in the meantime.

Over the last two years, my organizational network has encouraged me to set forth in one place the perspectives that have emerged from my experience, so that those who are interested might have access to them. Fortunately, this pressure coincided with the generosity of the Cooperative Charitable Trust Forum.¹ Members of the Forum have not only given me the encouragement I needed, but bought the space and set the deadlines I needed to break from the demands of daily work and get it done. The comments and suggestions I received from Forum members as well as friends, staff, colleagues, and family on the earlier drafts were essential for the quality of this final paper.

What is the value of this paper for the Forum? As you will see, it is not exclusively on employee ownership. I advance a strategic vision that provides a framework for practical as well as intellectual work. Forum participants have all been active leaders in the kind of work that has given rise to this vision. For that, I am indebted. You have acted with absolute creativity and courage in the arena where efforts, by definition, are often the most complex. You are where the rubber hits the road. None of the ideas in this paper are worth anything if they aren't effective in showing the immediate power of a strategic vision at the place where work is done--at individual companies and workplaces.

One goal of the paper is to bring those we respect in the social movement closer to our side--to win them away from their agnosticism in relation to our core commitment to apply our strategic vision at the company level of the economy. On the other hand, the demand of attention to detail and daily tough decisions gives rise to a narrowness in vision and thought, even on the part of the practitioner/leaders. This paper is dedicated to giving you some determination and insight in guarding against that narrowness. It is also meant to be an antidote to the Valium of our movement--the mobility and financial and professional rewards that go to those with real skill, but that one way or another tend to discourage critical thinking and political organizing.