Just Finished Reading: The Corporation – The Pathological Pursuit of Profit and Power by Joel Bakan (FP: 2004)

It’s hard to believe, living at a time when the Corporation is everywhere, that not only was there a time when they did not exist but a time when they were actually outlawed. But times change and money talks and whispers in all the necessary ears. As businesses grew and opportunities grew with them financing such ventures became increasingly difficult. Corporations – especially with limited liability – were the answer and so they were permitted once more. Before limited liability anyone investing in a business could lose everything if the business collapsed owing debts that needed to be recovered. When liability was limited only the investment was lost – not everything the investor owned. Naturally investment opportunities increased and with them profits as well as the power that corporations wielded. One of the most famous corporation in the 17^th century, which lasted long into the 19^th before being ‘wound up’ by the British government, was the East India Company which had its own armed forces! But the modern corporation we know so well today came of age in the USA – so much so that today’s ventures have all of the rights (though few of the responsibilities it seems – of citizenship itself. They also – under law indeed – are charged to focus purely on earning dividends for their shareholders. They are legally obliged to maximise profits and only engage in activities that are primarily aimed at this outcome. Any other task – such as setting up schools or crèche’s for their employees or food banks or anything else for the community must, at least in some way, profit the company. What is more, with the profit motive front and centre, anything that increases profits it naturally held to be of the highest value – anything. So ‘lobbying’ politicians to downgrade environmental protection laws that cost companies to comply with is a good thing. Saving money on adequate protection on vehicles to prevent deaths in collisions – knowing that the average fine is less than the cost of fixing the problem and saving lives – is a good thing. Using friendly media outlets and scientists to question the link between smoking and lung cancer or CO2 and Climate Change (AKA Global Warming) is a good thing as it delays the day when companies will need to do anything that might reduce their profits regardless of the damage and death they cause in the meantime. Anything like this are essentially someone else’s problem – or someone else’s opportunity to make money from the misery caused by someone else – rather than a problem that needs to be addressed and, ultimately, solved. Welcome to the world of the Corporation.

Told mainly from an American PoV – especially for the legal bits – this is an unashamed polemic against the unbridled greed and actual danger of unrestricted corporations. The answer, the author says (and I agree) are enforceable and enforced regulations overseen by agencies with the will and the legal teeth to do so. Corporations in their present guise are wild animals that need either to be tamed or at the very least caged within acceptable ranges. Letting them roan free and comparatively unencumbered is a recipe for disaster – as we will, no doubt, find out. Companies are presently very powerful institutions but they exist at the will of the State. Powerful companies have been wound up before when they got above their station – just ask the East India Company, and they had an army behind them. An interesting read if a very partisan one. Unfortunately this is one of those books that end up either preaching to the already converted or wasting their time trying to convince the ‘opposition’ of their case. But at a mere 167 pages it’s still worth a read though – by either side.