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Whatever Happened to Capitalism? Minor Details |
Not surprisingly, Dobbs' book hasn't received much press in a media dominated by the corporations Dobbs critiques. Corporate America, as he points out, controls virtually every avenue of access to information for the U.S. citizen by virtue of its media ownership and the dollars it spends in Washington. In an interview that same month with Bill Moyers, Dobbs admitted that he might be embracing a contradiction in such a scathing analysis of the corporate America he invests in, though he distinguished good companies to invest in from companies who were good corporate citizens. But his diagnosis was, and is, clear -- because the ordinary citizen has so little political influence, corporate America runs our government and our culture. Dobbs' own words open with: "The power of big business over our national life has never been greater. Never have there been fewer business leaders willing to commit to the national interest over selfish interest, to the good of the country over that of the companies they head." Those who are paying the price for what Dobbs calls corporate America's "absolute indifference to the national interest" are the middle class. They are the only ones forced to compete unfairly in the global marketplace - multinational corporations can merely move their workforce overseas. "Do we want to destroy the middle class?" Dobbs told Moyers. "Because if we do let's continue outsourcing jobs." Dobbs' own list of U.S. companies confirmed to be outsourcing runs almost 30 pages. Other conservatives blame high taxation, government regulations, health care costs, and legal representation cost for these problems. Dobbs admits that these add about 22 percent to the cost of goods. But then he says: "So what." That's all a part of the cost of a better life and a better society. "Are we to absolutely turn back the clock on every achievement that we've made to improve the lives of our citizens in order for a U.S. multinational to get cheaper labor in Romania or the Philippines or India or China?" he told Moyers. "I don't think so." Dobbs focuses on corporate outsourcing, though the daily headlines tell us there's more to the widespread failure of corporations to act as patriotic citizens. In the midst of a multi-year corporate crime wave with one corporate executive after another facing investigation, security and justice charges, and even jail time for the few who've failed to successfully manipulate our business-biased legal system, what we're seeing is the underbelly of uncontrolled capitalism. Ethicists know that no one has been able to argue successfully that the free market, freewheeling corporate activities, or even capitalism per se, are moral. There must always be some other value to control profit-oriented institutions. In fact, if the major purpose a business has to justify its existence is to make money ("increase capital," "pay a decent rate of return to investors," "make a profit"), that's a pretty weak moral argument for its existence. After all a conservative's own hero, Jesus of Nazareth, pointed out: "You can't serve God and money." But who takes that literally, right? Dobbs and other critics from right to left label these moves by large business against democracy greed. I'm inclined instead to see greed as a symptom of fear. Multimillionaires who don't feel secure with the millions they already pocket want more, as if more millions will protect them. But protect them from what? Protect them from their fears that our economic system is really quite fragile, and may quickly implode upon itself. These men at the top feel something none of us wants to face. They're afraid that a bust is always on the horizon, always imminent, always threatening. And they fear that what capitalism has become in the form the U.S. trumpets and spreads to others may fall like a house of cards. Of course, real men -- and these "captains of industry" are supposed to be role models of real manhood for us - can't talk about their fears, particularly fears that reflect upon their careers and moneymaking competence. They'd not only scare the rest of us (if we could face the fact that we're scared), but they'd prove that they're incompetent at manhood. So that's not the kind of language that will frame the problem that keeps us stuck in all that Dobbs and other critics decry. The language of criminality and sin is as deep as we can get - they must be criminals motivated by greed. Preaching to people to "stop being greedy" has never worked. The long-term solution is to uncover and face fears, not deny them. To respond to what we're really afraid of but don't otherwise want to face. To see how fear has dominated our society. To see that those fears have targeted others based on skin color, religion, class, ethnicity, and sexual orientation. To see that our fears are not only personal, but have been institutionalized in our system. To seek out other ways to live economically, value the work we do, and relate to fellow human beings. Fear work is the toughest work we can engage in. It's scary. It's more easily diverted into other issues. It's counter a culture that is fear-based. It's digging down to the roots of things. It's life-renewing, and it will save us. Robert N. Minor, Ph.D. is Professor of Religious Studies at the University of Kansas. His most recent book, Gay & Healthy in a Sick Society was a finalist for the Independent Publisher Book Award and named one of the "Best Gay Books of 2003." He may be reached at www.fairnessproject.org . |
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CNN commentator Lou Dobbs warns about the exporting of jobs from America