Is 'Corporate Citizen' an Oxymoron?

theodp writes "Citing expert testimony from a recent House Science Subcommittee hearing on Globalizing Jobs and Technology, The Economic Populist challenges the conventional wisdom that maximizing profits should be a corporation's only responsibility, suggesting it's time for the US to align its corporations to the interests of the nation instead of vice versa. Harvard's Bruce Scott warns that today's global economy is much like the US in the later 19th century, when states competed for funds generated by corporations and thus raced to the bottom as they granted generous terms to unregulated firms. Sound familiar, Pennsylvania? How about you, Michigan?"

Comments

Re:So, basically

[Adambomb]

Fascism is a government, faction, movement, or political philosophy that raises nationalism, and frequently race, above the individual and is characterized by a centralized autocratic state governed by a dictatorial head, stringent organization of the economy and society, and aggressive repression of opposition. In addition to placing the interests of the individual as subordinate to that of the nation or race, fascism seeks to achieve a national rebirth by promoting cults of unity, energy and purity [1]

Yep. Partly.

This is what happens without communism

[Animats]

From 1917 to about 1980, fear of communism helped keep capitalism in line. During that period, capitalism had ideological competition, and there was a very real fear on the part of business owners that their companies might be nationalized. During that period, most telcos were state-owned. Britain nationalized the steel and coal industries during the 1950s, and most of the rental housing units in the country were state-owned. During the Great Depression, the U.S. Government ran many programs that employed people and built things, a form of socialism.

For over a century, communism was taken seriously as an alternative to capitalism. (Yes, it never worked all that well in Russia. Neither did monarchy, democracy, capitalism, or oligarchy. Russia did better in its communist period than before or since.) During that period, when it faced competition, capitalism had to deliver an ever-higher standard of living. Which it did. There was more talk of "corporate responsibility" during that period than there is now.

Companies used to fear public opinion. That ended during the Reagan administration. (This is why Reagan was such a darling of business.)

The triumph of unbridled capitalism may be temporary. Something similar happened in 1900-1929, when railroad and power companies ruled the world. That ended in the Depression, and for the next fifty years, businesses were strongly regulated and kept in line.

Re:So, basically

[boneglorious]

Why should a corporation be treated as an individual?

I will treat a corporation as an individual the day a corporation is sent to jail for stealing pension funds!

Or maybe it should be treated like the individuals who run corporations (and make decisions) but who never seem to be punished for their egregious misdeeds, because, "oh, it was the corporation that did it"?

Re:So, basically

[Ray]

I'll call bullshit on that one. There is one guy who knew EXACTLY what Fascism is because he invented it.

"Fascism should more properly be called corporatism because it is the merger of state and corporate power." -- Benito Mussolini