The developing teaching of the Catholic Church on economic justice in recent years has increasingly emphasized the rights of people to active participation in the economy. Although the exact term is not to be found in official documents, some observers find in the Church’s teachings not only the advocacy of increased participation but also a case for some form of “economic democracy”. This paper examines the Church’s teaching on participation in the economic realm and the possibilities of developing a more democratically controlled economy. Specifically it examines the feasibility of and prospects for implementation of economic democracy, with eastern Europe as a special focus of attention.

Over the last one hundred years the hierarchy of the Catholic Church has produced a variety of official documents which reflect upon a range of social, economic and political issues. Collectively these documents have come to be known as the tradition of Catholic Social Thought. Increasingly there has been an emphasis in these documents on both the rights and obligations of all people to active participation in the various realms of human life. These rights and obligations are conceptualized around a three-faceted concept of justice which encompasses procedure, distribution and participation. Procedural justice refers to what is commonly called the “rule of law”. Concerns which fall under procedural justice include the establishment of laws for regulating fair competition in the economic, political and sociocultural realms, as well as laws which guarantee fair and equal protection of civil rights and fair and equal procedure in the courts.