Functional socialism

140 FUNCTIONAL SOCIALISM

decision—that finance must cease to be the master and become the servant of industry. The logic of events points definitely to functional control, particularly if we adopt the new conception of value here adumbrated.

Finally, before we can move into a new era of credit, we must understand what credit is. During recent years, when credit has been discussed from every point of view except of function, I have not yet found any common understanding or definition of credit. It is, apparently, as closed a book to the financial guidnuncs as value is to the economists. Many meanings are attached to it. For example, | may gain or lose credit by writing these lines and Heaven knows how my credit would suffer if I did not treat the publishers with ceremonial humility. Credit is good reputation and, coming to the bones of it, trust in ability to pay. It may consist of property or other instrument whereby we obtain money or services, particularly from the bank. But, functionally considered, credit is a contract of which time is the essence. Functional groups, controlling the means of production and distribution—they are not two but one economic process—will, of course, control their own finance and create their own credit. That credit must and can only be a contract in time, the period specifically stated. That is to say, credit supersedes capital. For if, over a given time, any functional group can secure the credit necessary to the efficient conduct of the business, there is obviously no need for capital, which, unlike credit, is