We live in a time when corporations are totally self-serving entities (or should I say self-serving individual people?). In the mid to late 60’s and early 70’s we began to think that corporations should be more responsible. Eventually cultivating the idea of what was often termed “Corporate Social Responsibility”. The idea of “Corporate Social Responsibility” is now gone. Should or can society have expectations of corporations where morality and ethics come into play? Government deregulation has helped obliterate the idea of Corporate Social Responsibility. To corporations Corporate Social Responsibility does not exist, greed rules the day.
This is nothing new, in the 50's, 60's and first half of the 70's the extremism of AT&T's monopoly from the prior 50 years was nothing short of corporatism. There was nothing that could touch the AT&T telephone system that they might not claim they owned. When our government lacks the courage and fortitude to stand against corporate domination such as this the result is a system that is void of competition and creates an environment that is stacked in favor of the corporation in control and against the pubic as well as any potential competition.
Corporatism: (noun) the organization of a society into industrial and professional corporations serving as organs of political representation and exercising control over persons and activities within their jurisdiction.
- Definition quoted from Merriam-Webster.com dictionary
Additional background:
Theory and practice of organizing the whole of society into corporate entities subordinate to the state. According to the theory, employers and employees would be organized into industrial and professional corporations serving as organs of political representation and largely controlling the people and activities within their jurisdiction. Its chief spokesman was Adam Müller (b. 1779—d. 1829), court philosopher to the Fürst (prince) von Metternich, who conceived of a “class state” in which the classes operated as guilds, or corporations, each controlling a specific function of social life. This idea found favour in central Europe after the French Revolution, but it was not put into practice until Benito Mussolini came to power in Italy; its implementation there had barely begun by the start of World War II, which resulted in his fall. After World War II, the governments of many democratic western European countries (e.g., Austria, Norway, and Sweden) developed strong corporatist elements in an attempt to mediate and reduce conflict between businesses and trade unions and to enhance economic growth. - Definition quoted from Merriam-Webster.com dictionary