Home      Contents

 

GEPRODIS

W. J. Sidis

1929 - 1930

[MS, 2 p., presumably unpublished, found in Helena Sidis's files.]

 

GENERAL OUTLINE OF THE PLAN

          We have already explained how the projected Geprodis Association has nothing in common with any form existing at present, except insofar as it may have a few general resemblances in some particular to each existing form.

        In GENERAL FORM it is to be a non-profit membership corporation, to be incorporated in some State that allows activities to be conducted anywhere, and with a minimum of supervisory regulation (such as Maine or Delaware). It is to be organised on the basis of a pyramided federation of groups, details of which will be taken up in later lessons of this series. (The general form may possibly turn out to be familiar to a few of those who may receive these lessons.)

        MEMBERSHIP is to be practically inseparable from employment under the organisation, so that the Geprodis Association is to be substantially a society of its own employees. Application for membership and for employment by Geprodis are one and the same, and can only be accepted together. Such application is to be open to everyone without exception (unless charges are pending against the applicant, in which case permission to apply is delayed), and employment with its accompanying membership must be granted on the basis of merit alone, without favoritism, and independently of applicant's adherence to any opinions whatever. Applicants for whom no vacancy exists are kept on to the waiting list, and are formed into an auxiliary organisation called NOVITIATE, which gives them a sort of probationary standing in Geprodis, with no vote but with certain recognised rights regarding preference on employment vacancies and aid given by the association towards employment elsewhere.

         NO DUES, contributions, or purchases of capital are required or expected of members, as one of the objects of this form of organisation is to have industry conducted under management of labor exclusively and completely divorced from all control by capital. Whatever means of raising capital is adopted (by loans, contributions, pledges etc.), it is to be independent of the membership, whose contribution is their labor for which they are to be paid in such terms as the form of organisation may require.

        ACTIVITIES of the Geprodis Association, and any subsidiaries that come within its rules, are primarily to be the ownership and operation of as many lines of production, distribution, and general services as the organisation at any given stage of development can handle. The chief limitation to the extent of lines Geprodis will undertake to handle is that all lines of such activity (which may be mainly for members, but would generally be for the general public) must be of such nature as to be useful to individuals in their private capacity and not in a business capacity, and must also be of such nature as not to discourage members from continuing to work for Geprodis. For instance, Geprodis could not run an advertising agency, as that is useful to a customer only in a purely business capacity. Again, some activities common to business can only be taken up a special form adapted to the particular plan; thus, Geprodis cannot become a professional employment agency, as that planned "admissions department" provides peculiarly Geprodis variation of that type of public service; nor could banking be taken up, as there is to be in the fully-developed Geprodis a "membership credit" system providing a partial substitute for banking facilities.

        Also, certain BENEFIT services are to be provided for members and/or novices among the additional activities of Geprodis. These are to be paid by the industrial activity rather than by the membership.

        Geprodis is NOT FOR PROFIT, and no distributions of dividend are allowed. Outside of a sinking fund for times of loss, prices and salaries are to be adjusted so that expenses will be covered with no more surplus than necessary.

 

Home   Table of Contents