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More than ever, large corporations wield
an unjustifiably excessive influence over our lives. The consequences
are indeed frightening—environmental destruction, political
corruption, erosion of democracy, increased polarization between
rich and poor, declining wages and benefits, increased stress
and overwork. As corporations become more powerful, these
problems will only get worse.
The People’s Business offers
a comprehensive series of proposals for reforming and restructuring
corporations so that they become the people’s servants,
not their masters. Writing in a lively populist style, the
authors pull together recommendations from the prestigious
members of the Citizen Works Commission on Corporate Reform
to present a clear-headed plan of action.
Drutman and Cray discuss how corporations
managed to achieve their current privileged position and offer
a comprehensive approach for reconceiving corporations as
engines of public prosperity, not private plunder. They outline
specific reforms that could be enacted to get corporations
out of politics, establish truly public-minded regulation
of corporate behavior, safeguard our natural resources, combat
unfair market domination by corporations, crack down on corporate
crime, and challenge the corporate claim to constitutional
rights.
Bolstered with relevant history and recent
examples, The People’s Business is a lively book that
will appeal both to deeply-committed (and often frustrated)
long-time activists looking for a coherent approach in the
struggle for corporate accountability, as well as relative
newcomers looking for immediate measures that could serve
as effective means of corporate reform.
- The official report of a commission
of 50 prominent leaders of the corporate reform movement
that includes such notable members as Ralph Nader, David
Korten, Herman Daly, Medea Benjamin, and many others
- Includes specific, detailed prescriptions
for how we can take our country back from corporate rule
and integrates them into a coherent strategy
- Written in an engaging, hard-hitting
style with lots of concrete examples
Lee Drutman is the former Communications
Director at Citizen Works (www.citizenworks.org), a nonprofit,
nonpartisan organization founded by Ralph Nader to advance
justice by strengthening citizen participation in power. His
commentaries have been published in many outlets, including
the Los Angeles Times, New York Newsday, and the Providence
Journal and online at TomPaine.com, Alternet.org and CommonDreams.org.
Charlie Cray is a policy analyst
and the director of the Center for Corporate Policy in Washington,
D.C. (www.corporatepolicy.org). He is the former director
of the Campaign for Corporate Reform at Citizen Works and
a former associate editor of Multinational Monitor
magazine.
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