ABSTRACT
It is perhaps unnecessary again to stress the enormous and growing complexities of planning. Yet these underlie the problems we are considering here. The job must be divided between many offices, some concerned with the common problems of an industry, some with the common problems of an area, others with questions common to many industries and many areas. Production, supply, regional specialization, assessment of consumer demand, current planning, long-term planning, new technique, labour and wages, prices and public finance, all these interrelated and intermingled subjects are necessarily dealt with by different organizations. It is an illusion to suppose that the fact that all these organizations are part of the same 'state' machine makes it any easier for them to march in step. Certainly British experience of nationalized industries should teach us this. We are concerned here not with 'capitalist' characteristics, but with general rules of government and bureaucracy, and with the general tendency of human beings to seek personal gain, moral approbation or promotion, and to take responsibility for the sector or area with which they may be entrusted, rather than to concern themselves with a 'general good' which they can only obscurely apprehend.
