We Never Voted for Corporate Rule

Labour and capital have rarely been comfortable bedfellows.



David Korten.

The manifestations of that discomfit have been many, but the “granddaddy” of all those differences, climate change, is poised to become the great leveller.

However, there is the implication that capital, rather than labour will be better placed to deal with the emerging social and practical complexities settling on the world community because of a disrupted climate system.

Author, co-founder of Yes! Magazine and member of the Club of Rome, David Korten has long been aware of the disruptive damage capital has brought to the world’s life-giving infrastructure and has watched in amazement as capital has operated without sovereign limits, while labour, frequently denounced, has been restricted in its movements and in what is best for those who constitute this social stratum.

The “corporate rule” Korten laments has enriched much for humanity, but the human and social cost, and now what is clearly obvious is the damage to the Earth’s atmosphere, brought on by a way of life, a generalized behaviour, that has brought on an indebtedness we cannot afford.

Capital, or neo-capitalism, has become so powerful that is threatening the most cherished form of government, democracy, which appears to be the only bulwark protecting the world from catastrophic climate change.

Read the second part of a series in Yes! Magazine by David Korten - “We Never Voted for Corporate Rule.”