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The Corporation

hulu.com

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Re: The Corporation

#11

Post by meatsock »

it's a well reasoned look at framing the observable results of corporate behavior in the context of allowable human behavior; this is an important issue in light of the the law's assertion that corporations are legal entities in as much as humans are.

watching the corporation is an excellent way to better understand the way our world works, whether or not you agree with the sentiment that corps have a moral obligation to anything.

it's a bit of an intro-level look at the issue. for more of the same i can't recommend adam curtis's series of bbc documentaries.

Re: The Corporation

#12

Post by kiba »

joelmichael wrote: post #6

An old, overlong bit of socialist propaganda that has little place on a site dedicated to entrepreneurialism.

As a supporter of capitalism, I was taken in by the socialist propaganda.

My interpretation is rather different. I thought the corporations are creature of politics and political institutions, rather than a product of free markets. The state make a bunch of laws that influence the size and nature of corporations, determine what they cannot do and often what they can do, and so on. The state would then give favors and listen to what corporations wanted the law to be, and so on.

Politics is the partitioning of a cake without expanding the cake. Indeed, in some case, the cake probably become smaller. Interests are easily given into thinking short term, not the general long term prosperity. They rather not work so hard amongst their competitors to get what they want.

Ease of life with no competitors to contend with on the market lead to less innovation, laziness, and blindness.

We see that the record labels are lazy and blind, and less keen on innovations. This of course make them vulnerable to adversaries and emerging competitors.

No matter how intensive their lobbying is, they are targeting consumers, not competitors. Unless their behaviors change, it will only be a matter of time before they are out-competed.

Re: The Corporation

#13

Post by kiba »

dsspence wrote: post #8
chasingsparks wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The movie is very popular in some circles, enough so that I can understand why the OP did not add more of a description. (I assume he wanted to just tell people that it now exists for viewing on hulu.) The movie is an indictment of the corporation as a "legal person." In my opinion, it conflated a lot of general adverse phenomenon associated with collective action and the consequences of corporate personhood.

Yes, I didn't want to editorialize and I've never seen this available online before. Everyone is free to think what they want. The privatization of the Bolivian water supply was the most poignant moment for me.

The Killing Buddhas[1] rule has lead me to dig up information.

Initial investigation:

Bolivia seem to be a country that got into a lot of debt. Following the advice of the World Banks, they privatized everything in rapid order.

Wikipedia article on the privatization of Bolvia states that the public utility is having water shortage, high tariff, accounting errors, and such. The citation was from a Spanish source, but the link was expired. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water_privatization_in_Bolivia#...

I have to say that the Water War is a lot more complicated than it look. First, there is the issue of privatization and how it is conducted. Second, we need to know the economic consequences of privatization. The possible bias of the World Banks that argued for privatization of water will have to be investigated, and so on.

Note this is only a cursory look into the issue of water privatization. It is also unlikely that I will go much into the issue as water use is not that interesting to me.

----

1. Killing Buddhas is taken from the Zen maxim If you meet the Buddha on the road, kill him. ESR generalize it as a rationalist maxim that said that our strongest belief should not be immune to and should be subjected to attempted refutation. This help avoided fixed beliefs that are totally wrong and help make sure that we do not mistake beliefs for reality.

Re: The Corporation

#14

Post by kiba »

kiba wrote: post #12
joelmichael wrote: post #6

An old, overlong bit of socialist propaganda that has little place on a site dedicated to entrepreneurialism.

As a supporter of capitalism, I was taken in by the socialist propaganda . My interpretation is rather different. I thought the corporations are creature of politics and political institutions, rather than a product of free markets. The state make a bunch of laws that influence the size and nature of corporations, determine what they cannot do and often what they can do, and so on. The state would then give favors an…

Wait, why am I being downvoted? I was only offering my interpretation of the film means.

Re: The Corporation

#15

Post by hugh3 »

Y'know, I don't think film is a good medium for making a political argument.

I do think it's a powerful medium for making a political argument, since you can capture a viewer's whole attention for two hours, tug at their heartstrings with music and pictures of crying children, overwhelm your audience's critical faculties and gloss over the main flaws in your argument without anyone noticing. And that's exactly the reason why I won't watch political films... not even if they're saying something I agree with.

For a complicated issue like corporate personhood (if indeed that's what this is about), I'm willing to entertain arguments either way, but I want them written down in black text on white paper and limited to a few pages, so I know I'm not being manipulated. And then I'd like to seek out an opposing viewpoint in a similar format, and make up my own mind. I don't see why anyone would want to subject themselves to a political film at all.

Re: The Corporation

#16

Post by yummyfajitas »

meatsock wrote: post #11

it's a well reasoned look at framing the observable results of corporate behavior in the context of allowable human behavior; this is an important issue in light of the the law's assertion that corporations are legal entities in as much as humans are. watching the corporation is an excellent way to better understand the way our world works, whether or not you agree with the sentiment that corps have a moral obligatio…

...the law's assertion that corporations are legal entities in as much as humans are.

No they aren't. In coding terms, this is a LegalPerson:

    interface LegalPerson {
        public void signContract(Contract c);
        public void enforceContract(Contract c);
        public void sue(Lawsuit s); // Plus a few more
    }

    class Human implements LegalPerson, HumanRightsHolder, etc { ... }
    class Corporation implements LegalPerson, Property { ... }
LegalPerson is just an interface. Whenever you deal with a LegalPerson, you can use the enforceContract method, etc.

Since Netflix implements LegalPerson, I don't care about their implementation details. We have a contract - they owe me 3 DVDs and I owe them $14.00/month. Because of legal personhood, I need not worry about Netflix corporate structure or other implementation details.

Re: The Corporation

#17

Post by mgunes »

hugh3 wrote: post #15

Y'know, I don't think film is a good medium for making a political argument. I do think it's a powerful medium for making a political argument, since you can capture a viewer's whole attention for two hours, tug at their heartstrings with music and pictures of crying children, overwhelm your audience's critical faculties and gloss over the main flaws in your argument without anyone noticing. And that's exactly the re…

Film is a perfect medium for delivering a political punch to your face, after which you can wash off the gloss that was deemed necessary for the film to be seen my millions, evaluate the facts you were offered in the light of new or existing ones, and make up your own mind. That's the whole point of good, biased political documentary, as summed up by Michael Moore at the very end of this one.

There are enough millions of people who are completely oblivious to critical issues that a well prepared, biased, flawed, powerful punch can wake them up to, who do not otherwise stand a chance of forming a stance for or against and getting involved in those issues. Delivering punches and sitting down calmly and evaluating sophisticated issues thoroughly in an impartial manner should not be mutually exclusive; there's room for both.

Re: The Corporation

#18

Post by meatsock »

yummyfajitas wrote: post #16
meatsock wrote: post #11

it's a well reasoned look at framing the observable results of corporate behavior in the context of allowable human behavior; this is an important issue in light of the the law's assertion that corporations are legal entities in as much as humans are. watching the corporation is an excellent way to better understand the way our world works, whether or not you agree with the sentiment that corps have a moral obligatio…

...the law's assertion that corporations are legal entities in as much as humans are. No they aren't. In coding terms, this is a LegalPerson: interface LegalPerson { public void signContract(Contract c); public void enforceContract(Contract c); public void sue(Lawsuit s); // Plus a few more } class Human implements LegalPerson, HumanRightsHolder, etc { ... } class Corporation implements LegalPerson, Property { ... }…

well that's a clever way of framing the issue in code, but i think the point of the movie is that your comment '//plus a few more' is a grey area wide enough to drive a feature film through. law deals mostly with edge cases (in that the easily decided issues aren't interesting in terms of new law)

your other point, that you don't have to worry about implementation details is true until someone tries to bill you for your tap water or shut your factory down without regard to the human consequences. if you have an abstraction for dealing with those situations i look forward to it.

Re: The Corporation

#19

Post by kiba »

kiba wrote: post #13
dsspence wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, I didn't want to editorialize and I've never seen this available online before. Everyone is free to think what they want. The privatization of the Bolivian water supply was the most poignant moment for me.

The Killing Buddhas [1] rule has lead me to dig up information. Initial investigation: Bolivia seem to be a country that got into a lot of debt. Following the advice of the World Banks, they privatized everything in rapid order. Wikipedia article on the privatization of Bolvia states that the public utility is having water shortage, high tariff, accounting errors, and such. The citation was from a Spanish source, but…

Any reason why this post was downvoted?

Re: The Corporation

#20

Post by j_baker »

yummyfajitas wrote: post #16
meatsock wrote: post #11

it's a well reasoned look at framing the observable results of corporate behavior in the context of allowable human behavior; this is an important issue in light of the the law's assertion that corporations are legal entities in as much as humans are. watching the corporation is an excellent way to better understand the way our world works, whether or not you agree with the sentiment that corps have a moral obligatio…

...the law's assertion that corporations are legal entities in as much as humans are. No they aren't. In coding terms, this is a LegalPerson: interface LegalPerson { public void signContract(Contract c); public void enforceContract(Contract c); public void sue(Lawsuit s); // Plus a few more } class Human implements LegalPerson, HumanRightsHolder, etc { ... } class Corporation implements LegalPerson, Property { ... }…

Corporations have a lot of the same rights as people though. That was one of the big deals about the supreme court striking down campaign finance reform: the idea that corporations have the freedom of speech to influence elections.

The case is here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizens_United_v._Federal_Elec...

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