I was listening to Radio 4 business news at 8.45 this morning on my way to the station. Because of poor reception I could not hear whowas being interviewed. What I do know is that they argued that we will, over the next 25 years, have to accept that parochial national governments will have to give up trying to regulate or govern large multinational companies to whom the power in the world is passing.
With the very greatest of respect to whoever spoke, this is a description of the path to fascism - to the corporate state.
It is an argument that democracy is dead.
It is an argument that the 1% must rule.
And let's be candid: we do not have to accept this. Not in the slightest.
My own contribution to the fight against this form of fascism is country-by-country reporting. That would make global capitalism accountable locally. That is its most important goal. It is part of a fight against the rule of global capital.
But note that Ernst & Young, PWC, the CBI and others fight country-by-country reporting. It's safe to say that they are on the side of global capital defeating democracy. And I defy them to say otherwise.
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As apensioner my contribution amounts to less than the widows mite but I try not to buy products from ‘international’ companies and haven’t bought Nestle products for nearly thirty years. Not much but about the best I can manage.
Fair enough
This does not relly surprise does it? These people meet and discuss issues and take lines based on the interests of their companies or themselves. When governments start to take people oriented policy positions international capital looks for ways of recovering autonomy or control. If you have oil under your land and you decide to exploit it for the good of the people the seven sisters will call on the government they influence to get the policy changed even if that means war etc. Iran, Venezuela, Libya, Iraq: the list is there to see. We have the position you fear now it is just hidden by failure of the media to expose what lies behind policies: you don’t get promotion for exposing corporate or government wrong-doing.
it was the head of waitrose richard….i also heard that i thought it was someone from a think tank until the end when he was identified…..and no one on the today show challenged him…but then well, our political class is wrapped up with our media class and we are locked out from it all…..
I didn’t hear this piece, Richard, but coincidentally, having caught up with your blogs from yesterday and earlier today, I was going to add a comment along similar lines, not least because the latest PAC experience illustrates very clearly how corporate interest now takes precedence over all else. Indeed, it demonstrates beyond doubt something you regularly point out here, that institutions and agents of the state (e.g. HMRC) no longer see their purpose as the pursuit of aims and goals that are in the broader public interest but as synonymous with those of big business, multi-nationals, and the 1%.
Where I perhaps differ from the person on Radio 4 is that my argument would NOT be that the enslavement of democracy (and thus democracies) by big business is desirable, but that it is what has been and is happening, not just here in the UK but pretty much globally. In short, it’s a statement of reality.
The very worrying thing about this situation is that so few people, a. realise that it has – and is – happening; and b. appreciate the full extent of the descent into the corporate state. That is. how far we are already down that road (and this applies even in academia where too many of my fellow political scientists have spent too many years focusing on the democractic potential of new technologies and lost sight of the ongoing capture of the fundamental levers of power – though that is not to dismiss the significance of bloggers such as yourself).
Even more worrying is that politicians have a vested interest in either ignoring or talking down the significance of this turn to corporate democracy/dictatorship. They like to pretend they still exercise power and influence. And with some persuasions of government it could be claimed that there is at least some effort made to face down, or militate against the forces of corporate capture and control.
But as we are seeing here in the UK, and as was evident in the US under Bush (though not much improved under Obama), and as we have also seen with the EC, a perfect storm is created when those in power are ideologically predisposed not only allow, but encourage, support and fund the extension of the corporate state.
You say the person on Radio 4 put a 25 year timescale on this trend. Personally I’d say that is optimistic. In the US it’s already debatable whether democracy functions other than at election time. Here, I’d say that with one or two more governments of similar leaning to the current one, or of New Labour, then ten years will see us hit a point at corporatisation of democracy is pretty much complete.
So, democracy is not dead. But no one should be in any doubt that the creeping and largely hidden sickness that is the emasculation of representative democracy by big business and the 1% is well and truly established. And it will require major surgery to remove it now.
Agreed
Sadly, the BBC is now a propaganda offshoot of the government. I’m guessing that the then DG made a Faustian pact with them to avoid having the Beeb given to Murdoch.
Rule by corporation? As you say Richard, that is not democracy, as Pinochet’s Chile so clearly showed. I would say that right wingers need to understand that free markets do not equal democracy, but on relection, I don’t think a lot of modern day right wingers like democracy anyway.
It’s the market fundamentalism of the right that is a threat to democracy and society now.
I would say that right wingers need to understand that free markets do not equal democracy’
Glabraith points out in his essay ‘The Renaming of the System’ that it is not by chance that ‘capitalism’ morphed into the ‘free market.’:
‘Reference to a market system is…without meaning, erroneous, bland, benign. It emerged from the desire for protection from the unsavoury experience of capitalist power….No individual form,. no individual capitalist, is now thought to have power; that the market is subject to skilled and comprehensive management is unmentioned even in most economic teaching. here is the fraud.’
When I studied economics (as a mature, i.e. not naive, student) I had most problems with the international trade modules. That was back in the early 80s when we were suffering another Tory engineered recession. One of the things that bothered me was that the kind of specialisation free trade pushed meant that no country could present a full range of employment opportunities to its young citizens. I had forgotten that but it suddenly popped into my head on reading this discussion. I don’t suppose for one minute that this hasn’t been considered before, but it was my original thought and I think it is very important from the point of view of democracy.
Mark Price Waitrose
Today Programme 8:43
“we just have to accept the world will function in a different way”
It won’t, he said, be down to individual governments but governments working together how they deal with the corporations.
I actually agree and that’s why it’s important to work with other countries in the EU
AND to resist the corporations trying to impose their views on the political process.
This may mean giving up some -probably illusionary – freedom of action to secure a wide freedom. But not easy to work out which is which.
I felt it more sinister as a tacit acceptance – indeed he said it – that corporations will be much more powerful than governments
In the light of his other comments – particularly that government can only do what business permits with its wealth generation – it revealed the attitude I suggest, I think
Democracy is a nuisance for most of the “1%” (there are a few notable exceptions), it prevents them corrupting capitalism to suit their looting.
Fascism 1.0, involved “eccentric characters”, with curious hand gestures, making rousing speeches hoodwinking the masses. At least the populous knew who to hold to account when things went wrong.
With the new improved version, Fascism 2.0, the “eccentric characters” are replaced by huge corporations behind which the elite can hide, out of harms way.
In the developed world, “capital” and in particular within the Anglo American Axis, has in the last 30 years been taking an ever bigger share of wealth creation, while turning “labour” into pliant debt slaves.
The vital “bread and circuses” to keep the masses fed and entertained takes the form of supermarkets selling cheap food or food banks/stamps and television and the Internet to beam the celebrity cult into every household.
All was going so well until the economic crisis of 2008, now in the ongoing aftermath the propaganda has redoubled to convince ordinary people that everything is in order. Distraction techniques have been used to shift blame on to scroungers/smokers and the overweight/obese making too mant demands on the infrastructure of society.
Sorry to be so cynical, but at the momentm, I can only see things ending badly, unless those in control come to their senses and realise that ultimately they have the most to lose…
Richard, your valuable contribution, country-by-country reporting is important and achievable, but it is not sufficient to stop the onslaught on democracy. Are there any other ideas out there.
No, it’s just one tool
Carol
One way would be to put in place various systems and mechanisms that would make the policy process (i.e. formulation, implementation, evalution/oversight)across government and within government departments and agencies more open and plural. For example, by stipulating that all advisory groups and regulatory bodies must adequately represent the views of all of the primary stakeholders in a particular policy area. So, the Board of HMRC would not simply consist of the represeantives of big business, but SMEs and individual taxpayers (and yes, I know we could argue about how the latter would be represented, but it isn’t difficult to resolve).
Another that George Monbiot promotes, is that all think tanks (e.g. Policy Exchange, Adam Smith Institute, IPPR, etc) should be forced to publish where their funding comes from so that the public can see what/who might be driving/influencing their work.
A comprehensive register of lobbying companies – not the deeply compromised version the government are supporting – would be another.
The extension of FoI law to all organisations delivering any form of publicly funded service.
Public funding of political parties and strict limits set on the amount (in cash or in kind) that any individual or organisation can donate/provide to a politician or political party.
The City of London turned into a normal local authority.
None of these are original suggestions. All have been promoted before – some for many years – and all routinely blocked by those who would see their power and influence weaken as a result.
“Public funding of political parties and strict limits set on the amount (in cash or in kind) that any individual or organisation can donate/provide to a politician or political party.”
Which would hand a huge, eyewatering bonus to those already in power. They wouldn’t even need to ask for donations if the taxpayer had to pay. It would simply freeze out other parties without access to cash.
I have to say I find it difficult to equate Waitrose and World Domination. Not least given that it is owned by its employees. Hardly a bastion of right wing capitalism! I wonder perhaps if your poor reception caused you to inadvertantly take a comment out of context? I don’t know as I did not hear the piece.
I do not equate the man and Waitrose
I equate the man and the view
Richard, is that in the same way you separate Bill Dodwell, for example, from Deloitte or even the Big 4?
No
He clearly was not speaking for Waitrose on that issue – which is only a national company
No
He clearly was not speaking for Waitrose on that issue – which is only a national company
Corporatism = Fascism and Fascism = Corporatism? Maybe, maybe not, but Mussolini did say “Fascism should more properly be called corporatism, for it is a merger of corporate and government power.”
What we are certainly seeing, as noted by several people on this blog, is the growth and strengthening of the neo-feudal state, and so the enserfment of the many, right up to the whole 99%.
“A comprehensive register of lobbying companies — not the deeply compromised version the government are supporting — would be another”
http://www.powerbase.info/index.php/Main_Page
Just click on the words on the right hand side.
It is really amazing, given the wide spread of the various names, how the same private organisation keep cropping-up.
The adam smith institute seems to be in a lot of places.