Democratic business (your opinion, please)

[H2O Man]

"The business of America is business." – Calvin Collidge

One of the campaign issues that I think is interesting to discuss involves "business ethics." Few would deny that big businesses exert a large degree of influence upon on government. Does this promote the rights of individuals in this country? Does the corporate media serve to promote democracy in the United States?

People can, and should, have different points of view on these topics. I think that corporations tend to be amoral, and while I recognize that big business is going to continue to exercise an unhealthy influence on democracy, it isn’t going to disappear from the scene anytime soon.

A month ago on DU, I quoted from an interview that Bill Moyers did with Joanne Ciulla, a Senior Fellow at the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania. Moyers includes the interview in "A World of Ideas: Part II." He refers to her as a philosopher who challenges her students to consider the ethics of the business world. She describes some shifts that took place around the time of the "Reagan Revolution," including concepts of public and private responsibility. One of the problems she saw was the growing pressure to have private corporations run things ranging from prisons to public schools.

"There are certain areas where we don’t want business taking control. We don’t want business setting the curriculum for schools, for example. They weren’t elected by us, they’re not representative of the people. How can we be sure every company has the common good in mind? The interesting question is what this type of private initiative does to our notion of the common good, which we always depended on government to have," Ciulla told Moyers.

She noted that it becomes more difficult when less-than-ethical behavior becomes common. "That’s just the way we do business. That’s how I get paid," is an attitude that makes business amoral or worse. What is the potential impact on government?

Many of us remember LBJ’s good friend, Bobby Baker. Heck of a job he did! Baker made a fortune with casino operations in the Dominican Republic, and vending machines in the United States. But when Baker’s business became the public’s business in 1963, he resigned as the Secretary to the Majority in the US Senate in disgrace.

A decade later, VP Spiro T. Agnew got caught in some monkey-business. He had been so busy doing business as governor of Maryland, that he forgot to pay taxes. He resigned as vice president in 1973.

Oh, that Reagan Revolution sure was a businessman’s dream! Robert McFarlane’s consultant Michael Ledeen helped arrange some business deals with Manucher Ghorbanifan. The Iranians got weapons; the contras got money and weapons; and some Los Angeles neighborhoods got a lot of high-quality, low-priced cocaine. Everyone was happy or dead, until some anti-business people busted the White House.

Of those implicated and/or convicted in the Iran-Contra crimes, George Bush1 went on to be president; Ollie North was sentenced to hard labor at Fox News; and John Poindexter, Elliot Abrams, Robert Gates and John Negroponte were placed in a purgatory of sorts, and are still working to promote democracy in their unique styles in the Cheney administration.

Of course, not every business association equals a scandal. In 1993, a snake named David Hale lied in an attempt to gain favor by implicating the Clintons and the McDougals in what is known as "Whitewater." The real crime there involved a plot by Hale and his co-conspirator, Kenneth Star.

In the past seven years, we have witnessed the Cheney administration imitating McDonald’s. They have ground up the Constitution, and serve it with some tasteless poisons to an unsuspecting public. They even made a funny commercial, with Ronald McDonald prancing around on an air craft carrier in a flight suit, with a sign reading, "Mission Accomplished!" They were celebrating bringing a new McDonald’s to Iraq. Ah, the spread of democracy.

Sometimes, I’m concerned that some people think that if the republican party is McDonald’s, then the only way the democrats can compete is to become Burger King. I am not trying to point fingers at any one candidate, because my concern is that it is far more widespread of a problem than any one person, or any group within the democratic party.

I am interested in your opinion. What do you think? Are we at a point where we simply need to find better business men and women than the competition? Coupons, perhaps? Or do we need to define what ethics we as a party demand of our government?

Thank you for your consideration of this issue.

[leftist_not_liberal]

1. "business ethics"

Ain't that an oxymoron?

I admire your work. Thanks.

[Jane Austin]

6. Not necessarily - an oxymoron, that is

Many small businesses practice the same morals as their owners.

In the case of owners with high moral standards and a sense of the common good, you will often find a business that mirrors those standards and values.

These are the businesses that send you refunds and an appology when THEY discover they overcharged you.

They support their local schools, Little League teams, animal rescue groups and local arts.

They offer their goods at a fair price and strive to make the shopping experience a good one.

They work for mutually beneficial business transactions and they stand behind their products.

When there is a SNAFU with your order, they might send you a gift certificate for your trouble - in addition to making your order right.

Oh, and they also treat their employees as they'd like to be treated themselves.

It's possible to do and it builds abiding customer loyalty.

Small businesses can do this because there's no crowd of anonymous shareholders and stock gurus demanding ever-growing profits every quarter.

[H2O Man]

9. Valid points.

Thank you.

[liberaldemocrat7]

38. PRESSURE THE REPUBLICAN PARTY WITH MASSIVE BOYCOTTS OF THEIR MAJOR CONTRIBUTORS

Otherwise you might as well bark at the moon.

[leftist_not_liberal]

10. rare as hens teeth in my experience;

lying for profits is just part of the game.

I deal with it every day from my good liberal MBA boss who values her authority and arrogance to the exclusion of her integrity.

The bigger the organization, the more likely it will have people like that infecting it.

Mere reform is not possible where authoritarian, exploitative social relations exist.

[Jane Austin]

12. The small town where I grew up was full of businesses like that

They not only respected their customers, but they seemed to like them, too.

I always got the impression they liked their work.

[leftist_not_liberal]

14. That's the difference between local economies

where many workers own their means of production and the "radically" different and "revolutionary" capitalism wrought by the inevitability of globalization.

[Canuckistanian]

25. So is that the answer?

Are large multinationals the villain here?

It's obvious that corporations, when they get too big, profit from de-regulation. No fear of lawsuits, rules and laws, no fear of amoral behavior?

I think that the documentary "The Corporation" uses the term "externalities" to describe the (unintended) damage that comes from any large profit-making organization.

Are externalities the main problem here? Or are these problems "built in" to any purely capitalistic organization?

[Me.]

31. "externalities"

Love those whitewashed terms. Are they really unintended? Aren't studies done so they know exactly where they stand. Like Disney, when sued for copyright determine which would cost them more, paying the rightful owner what's due, or the lawyers fees. Will it cost more or less to litigate until the clock runs out and the plaintiff can no longer afford lawyers.

[Greyhound]

2. K & R,

It's not about letters, it's about ideals.
:popcorn:

[LWolf]

3. We need to define the ethics we expect from our government,

and from the businesses who operate within our borders.

We need to abolish any sense or type of corporate "personhood," abolish lobbying, pacs, and any kind of funding of any politician from any source but the public coffers. Maybe we even need something to be sure that a politician isn't paid by corporations, pacs, etc., AFTER leaving office, to avoid bribes in the form of future favors.

We need public financing of all elections, with all candidates working from equal dollars and air time.

We need campaign commercials that can't mention the opposition, but only the platform of the candidate advertising. Then we need many vigorous debates, where every candidate gets every question, equal air time, neutral moderators, and honest questions.

We need to ban polling, except for exit polls, and release exit polls only when the last vote in the farthest time zone has been cast.

We need some version of a fairness doctrine, and we need vigorous new anti-trust legislation.

We need to roll back all the privatization, and return public services to the public.

We need to abolish NAFTA/CAFTA, withdraw from the WTO, and engage in fair trade practices based on labor and environmental standards.


Those things would go a long way towards cleaning up the corruption.

[H2O Man]

4. Very good list.

Those are the types of things I want to be in the democratic party platform in 2008. And I want the next president and the congress to take these types of steps, which I agree would go a long way towards cleaning up the corruption.

[leftist_not_liberal]

5. We need to undo the 120 years of law that make corporations 'persons'

There is, to my mind, no single, practical political action we could rally around more effectively than amending the constitution to say only natural persons enjoy personhood and the protected speech it gives.

[Jane Austin]

7. Amen to that!

Nothing could have a more far-reaching effect.

[LWolf]

11. Let's do it.

I don't hold out much hope for whoever wins the presidency this time around, or for most of the current congress.

I think this effort has to start at the local and state levels, and then springboard to the federal. The only way I see of achieving that agenda is to replace the washington establishment with fresh, clean, blood.

[Me.]

18. Bottom Up

Instead of the top down business they've been handing us. Whoever came up with the term collateral damage did a huge harm when they figured out how to refer to death in such antiseptic terms. At the local level, people still know how to feel when a soldier comes come in a box.

[Canuckistanian]

29. It would literally require a revolution to achieve that

Eliminating corporate personhood and all that entails, would require a MAJOR re-tooling of laws, especially the TAX laws.

Ain't gonna happen any time soon.

[nam78_two]

8. I can think of one really important thing that is needed

A much much much higher degree of real environmental consciousness from business. I don't mean green washing but truly eco-friendly business approaches and that would mean a cut in profits, but business as usual is largely responsible for the extreme destruction of the environment that we are seeing.

We really need to take environmental issues off the back-burner.

[H2O Man]

13. I agree 100%

About a decade ago, I was involved in helping locate witnesses and track down evidence to help the EPA and DoJ in the first "test case" of the federal municipal solid waste policy. (US v AlliedSignal Inc ND, NY No. 97-0436) The question was what amount a community should pay to help clean up two Superfund sites used by large industries as toxic waste dump sites?

Environmental attorney Robert Kennedy, who advocated for residents near the two sites (really, it was one 130-acre site), has noted that the republican policies create a socialism for the corporations, which are able to reap huge profits, yet pass the clean-up bill on to the small towns that are also dealing with the health problems caused by the toxic dumps.

In his second book, "Crimes Against Nature: How George W. Bush and His Corporate Pals Are Plundering the Country and Hijacking Our Democracy," Robert notes that republican citizens are usually as concerned about the damage to the environment as the democrats he speaks to. It is the corporations that create a false sense that folks like Robert and his good friend Al Gore are "tree-huggers," and that the corporate government is acting responsibly.

The result is, sadly, something I believe you have mentioned elsewhere on DU today: the grass-roots contributions to environmental groups are shrinking.

[nam78_two]

22. Exactly

That is an excellent book btw isn't it? Nice catalogue of the Bush environmental crimes. Robert Kennedy is a really good guy. He would have my enthusiastic support were he to ever decide to run for office.

[H2O Man]

23. If Senator Clinton

becomes President Clinton, then Robert will become the second NYS Senator Kennedy.

[nam78_two]

28. Really?

Interesting. I haven't been following RFK's career lately. I didn't know he had any political ambitions yet! He would make an excellent senator.

[Me.]

30. Now That

is a lovely thought

[me b zola]

15. k&r

[Me.]

16. A Dark Vision Here

The nightmare of someone else's making. Many of the ideas already presented on this thread are good ones. Taking away citizenship from corporations would be a good start. The immorality we are talking about really kicks in with big corporations, where we're talking millions upon millions and billions. That amount of money seems to grab people by the throat. It seems to take on more meaning and become as important, if not more so, than life itself.

Conscience is what is needed. I was so struck by Marion Jones yesterday. When was the last time we've heard such an honest apology, any apology at all, from a public figure?

I am heartened that the progressives in the House banded together and told the leadership no to Hoyer's FISA bill. More of that please.

Truth. Spread far and wide, repeated often enough so that even those who confine themselves to Faux, hear it and are faced with it. Truth is so strong it eventually wears lies out.

Hi Jim :hi:

[H2O Man]

46. I respectfully

disagree about Ms. Jones. She had lied about something rather important, and did so in a forceful way. It wasn't until prosecutors had enough evidence that her attorneys and her recognized that making a plea was her only option for getting a reduced sentence, that she found it in her heart to admit that she had violated the policy on steroids, and lied about it for years.

"Ethics" and "honesty" do not seem to fit when a person tells the truth only after being caught, and when they are the last ditch effort to save one's self from the consequences of criminal acts.

Of course, that's just my opinion. But I remember back in the good old days, when our forensic team would evaluate the sincerity of liars who suddenly found the light when they knew they were caught. From listening to her various statements, I think she has a massive sense of entitlement, and is primarily sorry that she got caught.

A great example of conscience in an athlete, in my humble and not entirely objective opinion, would be when Muhammad Ali gave up his heavyweight championship, the prime years of his career, and millions of dollars, and when he risked 5 years in prison, because his conscience would not allow him to be drafted during the Vietnam war years. Looking back, we now know that many of the people around him, including Elijah Muhammad, had advised him to compromise his beliefs, and accept a non-combatant role. But his conversations with Martin Luther King, Jr., illegally taped by the FBI, convinced him to stick to his beliefs.

Telling the truth to avoid jail is very different than living the truth at risk of incarceration.

[Me.]

47. I Get Your Point

If one wanted to be cynical about it one could describe it as a rehearsal for the elocution she will likely have to make before the court. That being said, I was surprised and glad to hear words like shame, I lied, sorry. How many have been found guilty and still can't step up too those words? Scooter Libby and Isiah Thomas come immediately to mind.

[Flabbergasted]

17. I believe there is a slow but sure corporate management change occurring

based on the realization that the current system is unsustainable on several levels: Economically, Environmentally, and socially. There may need to be some major breaks in the system and a new generation of business executive taking the reigns but I believe it is inevitable.

[Annces]

19. I sometimes think of the McDonalds and Burger Kings

as the basic oasis that people can use to get by, along with the TV sitcoms and the various entertainments. But that if you want to enjoy real life, you need to go beyond those. And the most important growth is on an individual level, and that person brings that to the society (Joseph Campbell- the hero journey).

I think there will eventually be a time when we take away the power from the corporations because they are death dealing oftentimes, with the only sites on instant money. However we are not near that crisis point yet, and so just hope for the best in terms of who we elect President. I still wish Howard Dean would have gotten the last nomination, because he was bold.

[autorank]

20. Business needs to be regulated to protect the public. "Ethics" is a false flag.

This is a great piece, truly. I enjoyed every word.

Business is the aggregation of labor and capital to achieve an end. Given the inherrent falibility
of the human character and the fact that one of those ends is excessive wealth, it's mandatory that
regulation be inplace to assure we don't get our lunch eaten by the lust for ready cash.

The idea that Harvard's MBA program or any other is responsible for the problems with business is a
false flag in the extreme. It's not the ethics teaching, it's the nature of business. When you've
got come, you want more, when you get more, you're ready to cut some serious corners to get a whole
lot more.

What you end up with is The Money Party running everything, into the ground.

It's a racket. The racket is perpetuated by the bull shit terms which dominate the debate.

"Free market capitalism" and "global free trade" are just proxies for "take all you can without care
for the consequences." For the fraudsters who put forth these terms, here's a message: your day is
done because nobody believes your lies anymore.

It's time to reign in rapacious greed - which is not really capitalism but, rather,

"welfare for the rich and survival of the fittest for the rest of us."

You nailed it H2O Man with this line because that's what we've got (and I'll tell you why below):


"Sometimes, I�m concerned that some people think that if the republican party is McDonald�s, then the
only way the democrats can compete is to become Burger King."

Why is it this way. Because:

The Money Party is a small group of enterprises and individuals who have most of the money in this
country. They use that money to make more money. Controlling who gets elected to public office is the
key to more money for them and less for us. As 2008 approaches, The Money Party is working hard to
maintain its perfect record.

It is not about Republicans versus Democrats. Right now, the Republicans do a better job taking money
than the Democrats. But The Money Party is an equal opportunity employer. They have no permanent
friends or enemies, just permanent interests. Democrats are as welcome as Republicans to this party.
It’s all good when you’re on the take and the take is legal.

[Me.]

21. Don't You Love The Term Supply-Side

What the heck is that supposed to con notate in the real world. It makes as much sense as trickle down, cause there isn't even a trickle any more.

Good post Autorank.

[autorank]

34. How about this;)

"The :rofl:Laugher:rofl:Curve" - lower taxes means increased revenues. Economist Arthur Laugher said
that he wrote it out on the back of a bar napkin.

So these tax cuts during Bush should have raised more revenues than the taxes that were in place over time.

Of course, they always want lower takes, so the theory is meaningless since it never has an opposing
condition.

[H2O Man]

32. One of the sources

that I sometimes quote in discussions of the business ethics of the corporate interests in the upper economic class is Colonel L. Fletcher Prouty. He wrote a book, "JFK," which was used by Oliver Stone in creating the movie by the same name. Prouty is the person that Man X, played by Donald Sutherland, was based upon. (I saw it early this morning on Cinemax.)

In his book, Prouty lists four of the beliefs of the power elite: (1) A concept of "real property" as described by John Locke; (2) The population theory of Malthus; (3) Social Darwinism; and (4) Heisenberg's theory of indeterminacy. (see pages 2 through 5)

Thus, they recognize that there is a limited supply of certain natural resources. One example that is worthy of our consideration is oil. Just as there is a limited supply of oil, there is a growing demand for "energy." This includes in large countries such as China and India.

The businesses in the USA demand a significant share of the world's energy supply. Access to the oil reserves in the Middle East is a very obvious reason for the Bush-Cheney "policy" in Iraq. It would be difficult, as you note, to consider these types of investments -- American and Iraqi lives for cheap oil -- as ethical. The issues involving groups such as Blackwater highlight the unethical nature of the business interests deciding our national policies.

[autorank]

35. Prouty's book is really something.

Those four theories are beyond the dismal science.

The opposing forces you talk about are illustrated by Boxers climate change bill, which will work, and
the substitute offered by Lieberman.

One wonders where the monsters of greed think they'll live when they've ruined the planet?

Who will they sell premium goods to, those with the highest profit margins, when there's no consumer
class?

They're too busy counting their money like some ersatz Scrooge McDuck.

[brer cat]

24. This is probably too simplistic,

but I think the answers to all of your questions come down to one word: accountability. From big business, corporate media, to the Cheney Administration, and Ronald McDonald pronouncing "Mission Accomplished", there has been NO PUBLIC ACCOUNTABILITY. Can we legislate, regulate good business ethics? Never without accountability. Can we safely hand off to private concerns our education, prison systems, or security of officials in Iraq? Never without accountability. Can we expect our elected officials to operate above-board and for our best interests? Never without accountability.

As long as corporations and elected officials are allowed to be above the law; as long as we rape our regulatory agencies by putting foxes in the chicken houses; as long our three "separate" branches of the government are beholden to the same golden gods holding the almighty dollar purse strings, and the supposedly independent media are within the same fold, we are lost.

Voting for Burger King accomplishes nothing. We need to demand that our elected officials get OFF the corporate trough, and represent the people. That is the first necessary step to get back to accountability. Start with Congress, and if we are very, very lucky, our next Dem President.

[H2O Man]

26. Accountability

is an on-target answer.

[bleever]

27. Billions and billions sold

down the river.

I have a really good friend who is a strict libertarian in the Ayn Rand mold, who leans very Republican. We used to argue about regulation of business, with her opposing it on the ground that the free market could be counted on to hold corporations responsible for being good citizens. Her belief is that with a little more consumer education, people's buying habits are sufficient to enforce good corporate behavior.

I think, frankly, that's absurd. And I agree with autorank's point above that "ethics" is a strawman. Appealing to a corporation's ethical sensibility, and eschewing regulation, would be like doing the same for human citizens by instituting an "honor system" to replace all criminal and civil laws. And while an individual human can have a conscience, a corporation's prime directive of maximizing stock price can only very rarely, and slightly, be impinged upon by the higher ethical standards some of the humans running it might happen to have.

That being said, what we need is a recognition that some things are in fact our Commons, and that the role of government is to protect and nurture the Commons for the good of all, and against the selfish actions of all, especially corporations. Regulation of business is critical to a prosperous and healthy country, just as the rules of any sport are essential for it to even exist.

We need leaders who understand this. As long as being elected is primarily a matter of raising money, this will remain out of reach for the most part, with rare exceptions.

Thanks for the great topic!

[KoKo]

33. K&R...read a little...gotta get back...

Thanks!

[tomp]

36. business has been merged with the state...

...since at least the turn of the century, i.e., we have been living in at least a quasi-fascist state all that time. crime after crime has been committed by the government of corporations in "our" name. the most important work that needs to be done to restore a semblance of democracy in the u.s. is to expose the crimes of the government perpetrated at the behest of corporations. nothing less will set us right. i do not expect this from the democratic party.

[Gregorian]

37. I love your candid cynicism.

That's a side of H2Oman I haven't seen before.

In a sense I feel your post is rhetorical. But you are asking for input. I don't have any thoughts on this. But as I read the post I kept seeing a vision of Dennis Kucinich in my mind. And that might be one answer to the problem. That is we rely on the goodness of people. Part of your comments are directed toward a ratcheting down syndrome. We've become accustomed to this administration breaking the law. And so much so that we really cannot even contain the scandals in our psyche. As I once posted, to a lot of dischord, I wish there were a law against lying. But that might be impossible to enforce. Again, we may be at the mercy of the goodness of people. You cannot deny that goodness exists. I posted a reply to someone last night. In it I mentioned my great uncle Harry Kuljian. I googled for a book he had written, and found a 1961 Time article on him. He was a wealthy engineer who built our earliest nuclear power plants. And he also contributed to poor nations of the world to try and ensure that people all lived above a minimum standard. But I suppose you are asking for specific thoughts regarding how to regulate business activity during campaigns. You know, it's about money. And public campaign financing would go a long way in eliminating that evil potential to engage in money grabbing, and resulting partnering.

I think my best thought is to work toward eliminating the need for money from these campaigns. An even playing field. That wouldn't forbid the Roves of the nation from participating in their own evil ways. But that is a separate issue.

For now, that's all my head has to offer.

[Swamp Rat]

39. "Does the corporate media serve to promote democracy in the United States?" - Absolutely not.

Private corporations should NOT be allowed to run prisons, public schools, the military, public utilities, and healthcare.

[antigop]

40. Thank you for this post, H2OMan! I have been quite vocal about the corporate hostile takeover

One of the biggest problems I see is the corporate takeover of the court system.

I have mentioned this many times on DU.

Business Week had an article about the Supreme Court being "Open for Business"
http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/07_28/b4042040.htm

>>
With controversial rulings on abortion and campaign finance, the current U.S. Supreme Court has waded into some of the most explosive issues in American politics. Under the leadership of new Chief Justice John G. Roberts, the high court appears to be on the verge of rewriting vast tracts of settled Constitutional law. But there's another important emerging feature of the Roberts Court that has not drawn nearly as much attention: its sympathy to business.
>>


Here is another article
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/11/05/politics/politicsspecial1/05legal.html
>>
Judge Samuel A. Alito Jr. has reliably favored big-business litigants as he has pushed the federal appeals court in Philadelphia in a conservative direction.

His extensive paper trail of 15 years of opinions reveals a jurist deeply skeptical of claims against large corporations. A review of dozens of business cases in which Judge Alito has written majority or dissenting opinions or cast the decisive vote shows that, with few exceptions, he has sided with employers over employees in discrimination lawsuits and in favor of corporations over investors in securities fraud cases.

Judge Alito, President Bush's choice to replace Sandra Day O'Connor on the Supreme Court, cast the decisive vote in a case involving a major steel company, and in another involving a large chemical maker, over environmentalists in pollution cases.
>>

During the Roberts' confirmation hearing, Feinstein asked:
http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/05259/572427.stm
>>
FEINSTEIN:
Now, Duke Law School Professor Catherine Fisk examined nine cases
heard by you while you were on the Court of Appeals. Her review
concluded that you ruled in favor of a corporation each time.

Consequently, she made this prediction, quote: You're going to be a
fairly reliable vote against workers' rights across the board, end
quote.

Would you respond to that, please?
>>

Feinstein voted against Roberts.


The corporations have "taken over" the judicial system, imo. It's one reason why I am extremely leery of Dem candidates' corporate ties. We don't need any more corporatist, anti-worker judges.

<edit to add> Workers and consumers need a fair judicial system to obtain redress when corporations engage in harmful,unethical behavior. And the laws need to be there to protect consumers and workers from egregious corporate behavior.

The Dems should have put up a fight over the confirmations of Alito and Roberts.

[defendandprotect]

41. No -- government has been "downsized" so that it can't stand up to corporations . . ..

nor tobacco companies --
It's not the government who has the strongest set of lawyers now, it's corporations ---
And, as we've seen, we have criminals running the departments that are supposed to protect the people - i.e., FEC, FDA, DOJ --

We don't need "better business men and women" -- capitalism is a fake --
Capitalism isn't about competition, it's about killing the competition.
Look at what happens as "regulation" disappears, corporations fold until we have monopoly --
media now owned by 5 major companies!!!

If we want to try to save humanity and our planet -- the world has to begin to make sense again --
That means we must end all violence --

Patriachy, patriarchal religions and capitalism must be collapsed ---

[TahitiNut]

42. In 1977, Congress passed (and Carter signed) the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act

As Wikipedia says ...

The Foreign Corrupt Practices Act of 1977 (15 U.S.C. §§ 78dd-1, et seq.) is a United States federal law requiring any company that has publicly traded stock to maintain records that accurately and fairly represent the company's transactions; additionally, requires any publicly traded company to have an adequate system of internal accounting controls. The act does not only apply to public companies, it applies to all companies in the U.S. and all of those associated with it.

Note carefully where it says it"requires any publicly traded company to have an adequate system of internal accounting controls." That's not quite as strongly stated as it should be. As originally passed, the FCPA require publicly traded companies to have a set of internal management controls adequate to ensure that all transactions on behalf of the company are undertaken consistent with management's intent.

This was a key provision of the FCPA and, being an internal audit principal at the time in a Fortune 10 (yes, 10) company, I knew this was regarded as the "Internal Auditor's Job Security" provision. The key impact of this provision of the FCPA was to eliminate (hopefully forever) the practice of "plausible deniability" by which corporate executives escaped liability for acts of employees or agents of the company that were found to be criminal.

Since 1977, the FCPA has been under repeated and constant attack by the "business lobby" which, with the cooperation of 'understanding' members of Congress, has succeeded in removing approximately 90% ore more of the "teeth" in this law.

In particular, extensive tooth extractions were performed in 1988 (at the end of the Alzheimer Administration) and 1998 (when America was getting a blow job).

Today, the FCPA may as well not exist, especially with regards to subsidiaries and companies with an agency relationship. (Think "Enron" ... a spider's web of over 500 corporations specifically designed to create liability firewalls and accounting concealment.)

Read http://www.fas.org/irp/crs/Crsfcpa.htm ... between the lines as much as possible.

A study of the FCPA and its amendments could probably offer a basis for tracking the degree to which corporate ownership of our political processes has increased in the last 30 years ... and the corresponding decline of "business ethics" in multinational corporations.



The situation is past dire, imho. One of the impacts of deregualtion has been the decline in Antitrust enforcement. This has allowed one of the more 'persuasive' arguments in favor of corruption and "turning a back on crime" to gain power in the Hollowed Halls of Congress: that would be the "more harm than good" claim. After all, what politician want's to support a law enforcement action that results in people losing their jobs and a key blue ship stock to lose market value to the degree that little old ladies lose their retirement money?

You see, as corporate conglomerates are permitted to grow to gargantuan sizes and interbreed to the point where we become codependent on them, we might as well join the Mafia in a suicide pact.

They're. Too. Big.

"Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely." Multinational corporations (or, more properly, their owners and executives) wield a political and economic power greater than most of the 200 or so nations on the planet.

[bleever]

43. Kicking for some of the thoughtful responses on this thread.

Good conversation.

[Me.]

44. Sunday Kick n/t

[rosesaylavee]

45. I think it is a question of honest leadership

from the top down. I do think that business leaders and owners, if they are not directed by inner motivation to be above board and honest in their dealings, are simply guided by what they see going on around them. And when bad behavior is rewarded and not prosecuted, why change?

I have been thinking about this all week - funny to find this thread here this am!

I have about 25 years experience in various types of businesses - both large and small. The most honest people I have worked with have NOT been the most wealthy or on the 'fast' track to the top. Ethics seems to a recurring thread for me ... will I or won't I do such and such a thing though it will hurt a colleague or the company's rep if found out, etc. I have had a pretty clear idea all along who I am and choose to be straight and narrow each time. Not making a lot of money but I can sleep at night and think in the long run, I it's important to me to just feel better about myself. Not too concerned (ok, maybe a little) about what other people think of me, but bottom line - I have to live with me and my conscience.

Now, what I am talking about here is not - will you steal money or lie outright to get ahead. One huge situation in the past was - would I engage some of my outside consultants in a venture that I knew would hurt their reputation down the road. They trusted me and were not probably going to find out what it did until after the fact. I declined as it was promoting another company that my supervisor represented and it would have been directly competitive with our shared company. Odd. But true. I left shortly thereafter as he was not pleased I wasn't going along. This was an international firm.

Decided then to work with local firms - ha. Recently started a position in a firm that I hope will tide me over until I can start my own business. This new position requires me to gather facts over the phone. I have been in training and the choices presented to me are: you can present yourself as who you and be up front about what info you are collecting and hopefully building relationships with these businesses over time OR pretending you are someone you are not and acting as if you will be working with these businesses and that you are initiating something you have no intention to following up on - just to get the information.

To me, the choice is a simple one. I don't like liars and even if I did, I have never learned to lie well. I am going to me on the phone and develop relationships where allowed. This is a leadership issue - the owners somehow don't see a problem with the HOW the work gets done but just that it gets done. They see it as a 'personal style' issue rather than an ethical issue.

If business leaders had a role model or if this was part of an ongoing National Dialogue, they may take a closer look at this practice. But, as the news is full of crappy behavior getting hugely rewarded, what would give them the impetus to change their business practice.

Sorry for the long post - but have been thinking about this all week.

[antigop]

48. Post #24 above mentioned "accountability": I'd like to add "transparency"

I don't think we can have real accountability without transparency.

Examples:
If capitalism is to work, if investors invest in capital markets, there needs to be transparency of the those financial markets. That transparency was not there in the Enron fiasco, and consequently, investors, Enron employees (who lost their retirement savings), and lenders lost.

It was only recently that full disclosure of CEO compensation was required in corporate proxy statements (salary, stock options, perks,etc.)

A democracy requires an informed citizenry. Transparency is necessary so people can become informed.
Transparency provides sunlight, which can be a great disinfectant.

(Hope this makes sense. I'm posting in a hurry while just checking in this afternoon.)