There are tectonic stresses building beneath the surface of our society that threaten a global earthquake
unlike any we’ve seen in recent history. Global warming is accelerating; fossil fuels are being rapidly exhausted; critical eco-systems have been severely damaged; and the income gap between rich and poor is increasing rapidly. The root cause of most of these problems can be found in the excessive power of global corporations. To solve these problems, we must bring corporations back under our control. This will be one of the greatest challenges our society faces this century.
It is alarming that, despite a long history of successful efforts to change individual corporations, their power has grown so large that the corporate state is now poised to supplant the nation state. Corporations have managed to obtain rights that in essence supersede those of individuals, communities, and even governments. This imbalance of power is a grave threat to democracy and the health of our planet. The main components of a movement to bring corporations back under citizen control already exist in the U.S. and around the world — including organized labor, environmentalists, religious activists, shareholder activists, students, farmers, consumer advocates, health activists, indigenous and community-based organizations. We have seen these activists in action on the streets of Seattle in 1999, challenging the World Trade Organization. We have seen them achieve impressive results curbing sweatshop abuses, stigmatizing tobacco, guiding bank lending practices, and protecting millions of acres of forests, to name just a few successes. We have seen the building of new institutions like worker-owned enterprises, cooperatives, and land trusts.
All these movements are advocating for healthy communities, for a moral economy, for the common good. Added together, these various movements possess enormous collective power. Yet the whole is less than the sum of the parts. Despite our many achievements, the gap in power between corporations and democratic forces grows wider each year.
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