Folks,

Some of the most advanced thinking in the areas of sustainability, social justice, and environmental protection have come to the same conclusions: it’s time we rethink the corporation, and put the power back in the hands of the people.

Corporations are a Frankenstein monster that we created to serve us, but which have turned against us. Without the personal ethics and responsibility of a person, but holding greater liberties and rights than a person, a corporation is free to pursue its own best interest, without regard for the welfare of the people on which it is built.

Corporations have increasingly dominated the economic landscape since they were first created in the 1600s in England. But some say their days are now numbered, and it is time to replace them with structures that enhance the well being of the entire society, rather than just enriching the few who control the corporation.

Here’s an interesting quote on the topic (thank you, Lou Dobbs). Can you guess the source?

“We may congratulate ourselves that this cruel war is nearing its end.
It has cost a vast amount of treasure and blood. . . .
It has indeed been a trying hour for the Republic; but
I see in the near future a crisis approaching that unnerves me and causes
me to tremble for the safety of my country. As a result of the war,
corporations have been enthroned and an era of corruption in high places
will follow, and the money power of the country will endeavor to prolong
its reign by working upon the prejudices of the people until all wealth
is aggregated in a few hands and the Republic is destroyed.
I feel at this moment more anxiety for the safety
of my country than ever before, even in the midst of war.
God grant that my suspicions may prove groundless.”

–Abraham Lincoln, Nov. 21, 1864

[Source: What Lincoln Foresaw:
Corporations Being "Enthroned" After the Civil War
and Re-Writing the Laws Defining Their Existence]

Chilling, isn’t it? And he we are again today. Well, let’s look at some alternatives.

POCLAD, the Program on Corporations, Law and Democracy, is “13 activists working with individuals and existing groups to launch democratic insurgencies that put corporations once again subordinate to ‘We the People.’ We are looking for people experienced in stopping corporate harms who want to rethink organizing strategies, exercise democratic authority at the local level, and strip fundamental powers-such as free speech and due process-from corporations.” They invite your participation in this dialogue.

Taking a legal tack on the problem is the movement to eliminate the legal status of personhood that corporations enjoy. As the corporation is a legal fiction we created in granting corporate charters, then we may also disband the corporate charter. There is much work being done in this area, from grand theory to citizens’ groups opposing the charters of individual corporations, such as this one in Ohio. For a good backgrounder on this topic, see

How Corporate Personhood Threatens Democracy


How Corporations Became ‘Persons’


The amazing true story of a legal fiction that undermines American democracy.

Corporations were not always so out of control. In 1868, the Supreme Court “ruled that corporations were not citizens within the context of Article IV Section 2 of the constitution. Elaborating the court defined a citizen there to apply only to natural persons, members of the body politic, and owing allegiance to the state. Corporations only had the properties that were conferred on it by the legislature.” [Source: Corporate Law: A History]

Unfortunately, their power seems to have grown considerably since then.

Other approaches to reforming the corporation have come from within, from sustainability-minded business executives with an eye on the future. For them, the goals and the ethos are clear enough, the question is how to implement it. And they are finding some success, as is socially responsible investing, in “doing well by doing good.” See the Better World article “Corporations and Sustainable Development”
for more on that.

Shall we undertake to tranform the corporation, or shall we put it out to pasture in favor of a new model? Post your comments below.

–C