The Rise of the Illegitimate Authority of Transnational Corporations

[marmar]

The Rise of the Illegitimate Authority of Transnational Corporations

Thursday, 03 December 2015 00:00
By Susan George, Polity Books | Book Excerpt


The following is an excerpt from the introduction to Shadow Sovereigns: How Global Corporations are Seizing Power:


We're surrounded.

Everywhere you look you find masses, droves, gangs of unelected, unaccountable, profit-oriented indi­viduals, corporations and new institutions surfacing everywhere, making official policy in areas ranging from public health to food and agriculture; from taxes to finance and trade. Some are lob­byists for particular private companies or for entire industries, others executives of the world's largest businesses, often with a turnover much greater than the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of many of the countries where they operate; more and more often, the entities they have created have become quasi-governmental bodies cooperating across national frontiers.

Their role is overtly political and they exercise illegitimate power. They work through lobbies but also directly through governments - not just by convincing elected officials to pass this law or that one, but also through obscure 'expert commit­tees' or ad hoc bodies whose quiet 'mission creep' may gain them official standing. Their activities may be carried out for the benefit of a single company or for an entire industry.

Sometimes they form their own powerful international organizations with large budgets devoted to intervention in world affairs. They have become expert in the careful preparation of strategic trade treaties to be negotiated in secret but under the constant sur­veillance of corporate delegates.

They've got ordinary citizens under their broad thumb, an appendage also used to thumb their noses at the public interest and the common good. Throughout North America and Europe in particular, this corporate spawn is spearheading an important political shift that I call the 'rise of illegitimate authority,' and the constellations of organized interest groups constitute a genuine threat to democracy.

....government in the usual sense, carried out by clearly identifiable, democratically elected officials, is gradually being eroded, sometimes even supplanted by shadow 'governments' to which these officials have made huge conces­sions. This may happen by choice, because officialdom is scared of the giants or admires and wants to pander to them. To be more generous, the bureaucrats and leadership may simply be blind to the long-term implications of their choices. In any case, they have handed over substantial power to these behemoths that now make decisions in innumerable areas that affect our lives. ...........(more)

http://www.truth-out.org/progressivepicks/item/33890-the-rise-of-the-illegitimate-authority-of-transnational-corporations

[fasttense]

1. It is the uber rich like the Koch brothers that are behind these corporations

The uber rich are a danger to a peaceful society.

They know eventually the common man and woman will make them give up their stolen loot. So, they stir up hate and scapegoating. If it really gets bad and the common man and woman actually starts to change the system that oppresses them, the uber rich create monsters like Hitler and Pinochet to abuse the masses. Do you relly believe Hitler was voted in without some help? Do you really think Pinochet wasn't a mass murderer aligned with American millionaires?

[ancianita]

2. And by what authority do transnationals get labeled "legitimate"? By their own.

We outsiders, the 99%, should probably face the reality that while we have believed we are the real source of corporate legitimacy, long ago, corporate leaders ended that relationship without telling us. Corporate wealth, outstripping that of nations, can now run the world without pretense of the people's participation. Technology and robotics are not just augmenting human enterprise, but replacing humans in the most lucrative of human enterprises.

At first, militaries established governments as the source of their own livelihood. Their legitimacy was "the people's" legitimacy. If, now, military legitimacy is established through the power to enforce itself and set order to its own best interests, military's and transnationals' interests are no longer subject to control by "the people," even if the people remain one of a number of sources of wealth for both.

Transnationals, who subcontract out "protection" for their zinc, lithium, diamond and gold wars -- with all manner of pretexts offered to locals about what the "conflicts" are about -- now legitimize both themselves an military might, which primarily creates 'order' for their interests. Order is not "the people's" right unless their order serves transnationals' interests.

So, this essay title should recognize that what is "rising" is actually the legitimacy of transnationals, not their illegitimacy. Our interpretation isn't enforceable, so it won't endure. Transnationals' interpretation of themselves is enforceable, so it will.

[Jefferson23]

3. Have you ever seen the documentary, Harvest of Shame? It goes back to 1960, I believe.

I was able to see it once..in NYC there's a News and TV museum and you can
view numerous old news footage and speeches etc, among other things.

What struck me while watching it was the information that lobbyists were
directly behind the oppression of these migrants..did not matter this was
happening to Americans, lobbying has been a strong force. I had no idea
they were that powerful back then. Now of course their influence is on
an almost surreal level...how anyone imagines we have a thriving
democracy has their head in the sand.

[midnight]

4. ALEC has sure contributed to this movement.