The Impact of Corporations on the Commons......an oldie but goodie.

[marmar]

I ran across this, and corporate personhood has become my new issue du jour, so I thought I'd share it:


THE IMPACT OF CORPORATIONS ON THE COMMONS
Address at the Harvard Divinity School’s Theological Opportunities Program, October 21, 2004
by Mary Zepernick
Program on Corporations, Law & Democracy
Women's International League for Peace & Freedom

A California-based group called Friends of the Commons defines the commons as "the vast realms of nature and society that we inherit together and must pass on, undiminished, to our children." And as many Native Americans put it, to the seventh generation.

The "commons" is as old as the Earth itself but the term has come into use again today as a helpful way to think about various aspects of nature and society that are increasingly under assault by giant corporations.

Vast realms of nature and society -- Jane Anne Morris, a writer with the Program on Corporations, Law & Democracy, points out that the commons is everything except what we the people choose not to include.

Think about this: everything except what we the people choose not to include. In other words, the commons properly derives from decisions made by us, collectively -- which presumes democratic self-governance.

It certainly wasn't a collective decision in the Enclosures of the 15th, 16th & 17th centuries, when the English commons -- lands worked "in common" by peasants for centuries -- were fenced so that the landed gentry could pursue single crops for profit, like grain or sheep for wool -- my 1956 college textbook, A History of Civilization, described them as enterprising and ruthless capitalists!

You may have heard this 17th century protest doggerel: "The law locks up the man or woman who steals the goose from the common. But the greater villain the law lets loose, who steals the common from the goose."

The Enclosures, which someone pointed out is an old-fashioned word for privatization, helped spark the Cromwellian revolution that deposed and beheaded King Charles I in 1642.

Today, privatization refers to turning over to corporations -- now considered the "private sector" -- aspects of nature and society previously under the jurisdiction of government -- the "public sector," with its authority ostensibly rooted in us, the public. The vast realms of nature and society are being increasingly privatized for the primary benefit of the few. However, it's not about good or bad people, good or bad corporations. It's about who governs.

So my thesis, the organizing principle for these remarks, is that the fundamental commons today is We the People's promised authority to govern, the power to make decisions about matters affecting nature and society. There are two historical streams in U.S. history in this regard: one is about the decentralization of power, public decision-making, self-governance -- about democracy; the other is about the concentration of power, private decision-making, governance by the few and the corporation as their governing institution. ......... (more)

The complete article is at: http://www.poclad.org/articles/zepernick02.html

[Union Thug]

1. Thanks for posting this... I love this line...

"The law locks up the man or woman who steals the goose from the common. But the greater villain the law lets loose, who steals the common from the goose."

:-)

[marmar]

2. You bet...

and that is a great line. :thumbsup:

[DaveJ]

3. Fancy language

Simple point... corporations are bad for us economically and socially because they do not care about the economics or social well-being of the communities they serve.

And I would extend the idea so far as to say the ethics of the stock market should be evaluated. It is possible to make money based on one's abilities, but these days people are expected to invest in the stock market to use other peoples' abilities to make them money. Of course the people doing the actual work are not expected to be compensated for the money they make the company -- only the shareholders. Really I think investing like this is incredibly lazy... it's as though they are saying "Well I'm too inept to make money myself, so I'll have someone else do it and reap their profit." That's just my own opinion that I'm sure most will not 100% agree.

[Union Thug]

4. good points. n/t

[marmar]

5. Agreed.

n/t