Corporatocracy
It’s time we reckoned with what it means to become a corporatocracy. Our governments exist to enact the desires of their corporate masters. Some of these politicians, like Madeleine King, appear to do so with alacrity, while others appear lost in the perceived demands of party and pressure groups. The end result will be an uninhabitable world.
This week, the Albanese government appalled much of its voter base by renaming the Coalition’s “gas-led recovery” out of Covid as the all-new Future Gas Strategy.
In it, Minister King asserts that gas is a transition fuel. This ceased to be true many years ago. As Professor Bill Hare, author of “numerous” UN climate reports explained: “It’s one of the main contributors to global warming and has been the largest source of increases of CO2 [emissions] over the last decade.”
In the policy, the government commits half a billion taxpayer dollars to finding new fossil fuel deposits through Geoscience Australia. Deposits found at our expense will be handed to mainly foreign corporations for their profit. These funds are additional to the roughly $11 billion in subsidies and tax breaks currently granted to the sector annually. Bernard Keane reminds Australians, revisiting Gough Whitlam’s words from 1974, that Australians are still “paying to be exploited” by mining corporations.
The fossil fuel sector has been found to pay “less tax than the typical Australian worker” and many of the corporations “barely pay any tax at all.”
Crikey has also established that the government’s announced raise in the mining rent tax is basically spin with pennies accruing to the commonwealth from ballooning profits.
Labor’s announcement also promotes the farcical climate capture and storage technology as a solution to the rise in carbon emissions they are creating with the policy. It remains, however, an “abject failure” and a “rort.” If the technology becomes viable, it will be one tool in a range of technologies deployed in our race to limit atmospheric carbon rather than this purported offset. This is fossil fuel sector spin, not a policy, least of all a solution.
This surge in gas production was announced on the same day that scientists warned that the world was on the edge of a “climate abyss.” They are expecting the climate to “soar” past the international target of 1.5C, with 80% of the experts surveyed predicting a rise of “at least 2.5C.” Every fraction of a degree means millions of deaths in the Global South. We are approaching crucial tipping points that could worsen the current predictions. Without urgent, substantial effort, a hostile climate will devastate us.
The Australia Institute’s Matthew Ryan warned that, according to “conservative estimates adopted by the US government”, our current exports – which bring us about 2.3. billion from the Petroleum Resource Rent Tax – will ultimately cost $74.9 billion in damages “here and around the world.” Australia also granted approval for Chevron’s “massive expansion” to the Gorgon project on the same day as the gas policy announcement. That 3 billion tonnes of emissions alone could cause $1.9 trillion in damages using an estimate published in Nature.
This is particularly disastrous for our Pacific neighbours who will be displaced by ever-worsening climate impacts. It is not just northern Australia that could become unliveable in the next 50 years. Large tracts of Western Sydney might be abandoned within 30 years.
It is not only the corporations that contribute so little to the Australian economy that are pressuring the government to act. The Saturday Paper’s Mike Seccombe revealed the ugly degree to which the Japanese and Korean governments are pressuring the Labor government to boost gas production to compensate for those nations’ failure to transition to renewables. The disgraceful sea dumping bill was introduced at those nations’ demand. Part of the gas announcement addressed that coercion, declaring Australia is committed to being a “reliable trading partner.”
It is important to note that these trade deals do little for us. Japan’s biggest oil and gas producer, INPEX, for example “employs few people, pays very little company tax, zero petroleum resource rent tax (PRRT) and gets our gas for free.” Between 2013 and 2022, it made $41 billion from Australia’s gas.
The global problem, however, remains centred on the corporations which handcuff the politicians and governments, and muddy the debate.
In America, the fossil fuel-backed Heritage Foundation has set out the fossil fuel-based plan for a second Trump presidency in Project 2025.
One of the main projects that make Biden anathema to the sector is his massive investment in the transition away from carbon-based power to renewable technology under the umbrella of the Inflation Reduction Act. Republicans are determined to destroy these steps and The Washington Post reported that last month at Mar-a-Lago, Trump set out his promises to the sector in return for a demanded one billion dollars committed to his campaign.
Despite the loathed restrictions imposed by the Biden administration, American oil companies are producing a record number of barrels and boasting “bumper” profits. This will not suffice, and they are also reported to be drafting “executive orders and other policy paperwork” for Trump to sign immediately on regaining office. They fear his Super Tuesday commitment to “drill baby drill” might be lost in the chaos of his plans for vengeance and his other prioritised commitment to deport 11 million non-White people.
Right wing forces in America are working to crush protest rights. In Australia, Labor state governments are imposing similar restrictions. In fact, in 2023 South Australia’s Labor government rushed through laws to silence protest outside the Australian Petroleum Production & Exploration Association (APPEA) conference. The resources minister told the gathering that his government was “at your disposal.”
We will not be allowed to inconvenience the corporations for which our politicians work, even at their conferences.
Renewables are quickly becoming cheap and gaining market share on that basis. Without corporate distortion of the market, using their politicians to funnel taxpayer money away from the community’s needs into subsidies to boost their profits, we would be moving in the right direction.
With government money deployed not to subsidise our own destruction but towards renewables, we can boost our chances of success.
Madeleine King’s resources ministry and this announcement are probably partly sops to West Australian Labor voters who believe their prosperity is dependent on gas. Albanese’s team is gambling that the rest of Australia is as susceptible to the long-outdated argument that gas is a transition fuel. Australia’s regions, served by Sky News propaganda free-to-air, may be filled with manufactured doubt about the prospects for renewables to ramp up relatively quickly and reliably to meet energy needs.
In the better-informed cities, however, Labor might just have been forced to kill its own government by corporations that would prefer the Coalition was back in power.
We must hope that quality independents and small parties can free us from the golden-handcuffed party hacks, pushing Labor into minority government.
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Steve Davis
Return to home pageIf one had severe constipation, a gas led recovery might sound (hah) promising, but, if gas is to replace other excess carbon usages and techniques, surely we doom ourselves with a worse than booby prize of no value? Incidentally, all T V chefs seem to use gas without alternatives or variations, and they do set an example. This Australia is difficult, a land of floods, fires, droughts, extremes, and we should be aware that the future is dangerously threatened, now, right now. Trouble is, all world finance is intertwined with investment derived through gas and oil and coal, and profiteering owners and controllers who hold the past dearly will not embrace a different future they cannot round up and capture. Politics disappoints now, as always to most, and will fester.
A very worthwhile article, and Lucy’s instincts are very good, as usual.
Corporatocracy is a development of which we must be aware, and must oppose. But Lucy has not offered an opinion on how we got here, or how we advance.
So how did we get here?
Corporate sector domination of public policy is a natural progression from the corporatism of Benito Mussolini. Did we go straight from liberalism to corporatocracy? Did we by-pass fascism?
Mussolini — “Fascism is more appropriately named corporatism because it is a merger of state and corporate power”
It’s worth taking a look at definitions of fascism from “respectable” sources.
Wikipedia has a lengthy, detailed, and very good article on fascism. It even devotes an entire section to different definitions of fascism from about twenty scholars, but with no mention of Mussolini’s definition. There is a passing reference to corporatism, but not as a definition in itself. Incredibly, Wikipedia has an entirely separate article on definitions of fascism in which it devotes four paragraphs to Mussolini’s views, but with no reference to his definition.
Let’s look at Britannica.
As with Wikipedia, Britannica has a lengthy and detailed article, and also tried to claim that there is no clear definition — “For these and other reasons, there is no universally accepted definition of fascism.’’ They at least acknowledged the influence of corporatism, but could not bring themselves to accept the definition that came straight from the horse’s mouth. Or even mention it. Instead, they weaseled their way around that little dilemma by referring to “fascist corporatism”. The examples they gave of fascist corporatism have an eerie likeness to corporate sector activities we see today. E.g., “In practice, fascist corporatism was used to destroy labour movements and suppress political dissent.” Where have we seen that before?
In the Oxford Reference article on fascism, no mention of Mussolini’s definition.
In a Time article on the history of fascism, also no mention of Mussolini’s definition.
How do we explain this reluctance to touch the actual definition?
It goes back to a point made earlier. The examples Britannica gave of fascist corporatism are misnamed. They are better termed “corporationism”. Corporationism in action as we see it constantly today. In other words, something too close to home. It is a corporatism, but in the sense of corporation sector activities and priorities, not the more general sense of formally established interest group activities which is the corporatism Mussolini referred to. For Mussolini, unions were “corporate”. Chambers of Commerce were “corporate”. In his system individuals gained legitimacy, a voice, through corporatism.
And that’s the background that the “respectable” sources do not want us to be aware of. It’s all too close to home. Interestingly, Mussolini’s version of fascism was the definition in Webster’s dictionary up until 1987, when a corporation bought Webster’s and changed it to exclude any mention of corporations.
For what we see today with corporations acting as a group to influence public policy in the interests of the corporate sector is corporatocracy, a virulent exercise of corporatism that has taken control. Because corporatism in action, as we see it today, is what we get when a particular interest group enjoys such wealth and power that it totally dominates all other interest groups. It’s gone beyond Mussolini’s fascism where even unions had a place.
We’ve moved into a near-totalitarian dystopia where those who expose criminal activity are jailed. Where those who protest genocide are terrorists. Where perpetual war is peace.
So how did we miss out on fascism?
James Waterman Wise — When fascism comes to America it will be “wrapped in the flag and carrying a cross.” (also attr. to Sinclair Lewis)
George Carlin — “When fascism comes to America, it will not be in brown and black shirts. It will not be with jack-boots. It will be in Nike sneakers and Smiley shirts…”
From a New York Times report in 1938 — When fascism comes to America it will not be labelled ‘made in Germany’; it will not be marked with a swastika; it will not even be called fascism; it will be called, of course, ‘Americanism’.
So our starting point for the progression to fascism is of course the previously dominant ideology we know as liberalism, which, because of its foundation principles, descends inevitably into authoritarianism. This does not necessarily have a fascist streak to it, but here in Australia our unbreakable attachment to militarism means that even we cannot escape that label. It’s worth noting that myths of military glory were a popular aspect of 1930s fascism.
Yep. We did not miss out on fascism, we just didn’t notice it. We were told to look away by “respectable” voices, and so, while we were oh-so-easily taken in by the worthless promises of a narcissistic liberalism, we missed it.
Now we live with the consequences.
Corporatocracy. A fascism in which the corporate sector does not merge with the State, because for all practical purposes, it becomes the State.
S Davis has offered us a cool and academic survey , so we might consider that Australia, like similar others, must be somewhat of a corporate state to accommodate management of policies on pay, public services, investment, prices, etc.; the more vulnerable of society, usually badly represented, will be hostile and unhappy, as with attitudes to points in this current budget, where someone feels personally aggrieved. Corporatism is usually seen as a revival of the theory of the corporate state, and old figures like Mussolini are disregarded. Generally central and northern Europe regard this area of political thought as being relevant, necessary, fruitful if done with consensus. I’ll be thinking of some more reading and revision here…
Phil, it’s a huge subject, so I apologize for such a lengthy comment, but it was necessary to get around all the background.
You refer to “more reading and revision here…”
Sounds like me. Every time Lucy presents an article I groan. I know I’ve got days of study ahead of me. 🙂
All food for last drinks, thank y’all.
Corporatism is not corporatocracy. Look up the definitions, Steve.
Steve. This is the way we got here. As this legal expert said on an interview about her new book, its as if putting “neo” in front of “liberalism” made it the opposite. Happy to re-enter discussion of liberalism and neoliberalism with you after you’ve read it. https://wwnorton.com/books/9781324091165
I like the fact that Lucy keeps the focus on climate change issues, and our survival as a species as pretty darned important.
The necessity to spend valuable time contemplating which monstrous old man will use his influence to dispense weapons, and war, to nations easily conned, should be well down our list of priorities, but the greed factor simply will not go away.
I have always thought of corporations as nucleus to attract persons who are criminally inclined to do business that they could not do alone.
“Corporatism is not corporatocracy.”
Lucy, I explained that in my comment. Obviously, not very well.
Will check out your link.
Lucy, your linked article gives an interesting account of how we got here. None of which I disagree with.
The lawyer naturally approached the subject from a lawyer’s perspective and that’s fine. It’s such a huge subject that a comprehensive account would fill volumes.
Some of her points about neo-liberalism however, support my view that it was derived from liberalism.
But I’m a little puzzled. Her account of how we got here is a story of neo-liberalism while your article is about corporatocracy. Are you equating or linking the two? Not that I would find that a problem, but I’d be interested in your take on it.
Douglas P., “I have always thought of corporations as nucleus to attract persons who are criminally inclined to do business that they could not do alone.”
Reminds me of the definition of a criminal — a person of predatory instincts who has insufficient capital to start a business.
Like most people in the Far North of Qld we cook on a gas stove-top with an electric oven for roasts, baking etc. – it’s a risk management strategy.
In cyclone Jasper December 2023 we lost power almost instantly and were without electricity for five days – many were out for much longer. In the aftermath of cyclone Larry we were without power for ten days – we were lucky many were much longer – gas picks up the slack.
Until we can find a viable, consistent clean energy alternative to gas, it will remain a backup source of energy for many and that’s a fact. Batteries have yet to prove their staying power when grid power is not available for extended periods
I agree, we have not been receiving proper royalty or corporate taxation returns for our gas resources but that is another argument. I’ve said many times before, the global transition to renewable energy has got to be seamless. If it isn’t we will have global conflict the likes of which we cannot even contemplate.
Whether we like it or not, gas is a staple for industrial use as well as for heating and cooking in many parts of the world and will remain so until we find a viable alternative :
https://www.worldometers.info/gas/gas-consumption-by-country/
Her legal viewpoint is the crucial one, Steve. Neoliberalism was a legal beast initially established at the Chicago Law School. It was about co-opting government for those who wanted to create monopolies, duopolies and oligopolies. So yes, I think that corporatocracy is what neoliberalism was established to create. The Chicago School and ultimately the Atlas Network were shaped to change the hegemonic beliefs away from Keynesian economics and liberalism towards an authoritarian/anti-democratic corporate-run world. The scope of the project over decades is mind-bogglingly determined and consistent.
Baradaran also argues that neoliberalism emerged out of international and domestic racism.
The legal viewpoint is certainly important Lucy, but the process of granting more and more rights to corporations (which then become powers) began long before the Chicago School and Atlas became active.
It was 1886 when the case Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Rail Road appeared to grant a corporation the same rights as an individual under the 14th Amendment.
The case is remembered for a headnote added to it by the court reporter at the time, which quoted Chief Justice Morrison Waite as saying: “The Court does not wish to hear argument on the question whether the provision in the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution which forbids a state to deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws applies to these corporations. We are all of opinion that it does.”
In later cases, this headnote would be treated as an official part of the verdict, and Waite’s conclusion reaffirmed in subsequent decisions by the Court. Recent court decisions regarding free speech for corporations have ignited a debate in the US as to whether corporations are now regarded as persons.
You included Chicago Law School in this, but it was opened in 1892. The Chicago Economics School did not begin its activism until the 1940s or 50s.
This (and other factors) supports my view that neo-liberalism is a development of liberalism. The Chicago mob seized on a process of granting ever greater power to the corporate sector that had begun with liberals. I do not know if the economic influencers of the 1860s referred to themselves as liberals, but history records that in the lengthy debates that produced the US Constitution, the ideas of John Locke were frequently cited. Liberal economics was built into the US system from the start.
We can certainly agree on one thing. Neo-liberalism has been so successful in its aims that it has become a de facto corporatocracy.
Withstanding technical definitions one prefers to follow actual history and deeds of this broader ecosystem e.g. lines in the sand pre and post WWII.
Fast forward from Malthus/Galton population control/social Darwinism, then post WWI in US ‘conservative ecologist’ Madison Grant, Henry Ford’s promoting anti-semitic hoax ‘Protocols of the Elders of Zion’, AES American Eugenics Society and start of Sanger & Rockefeller (Standard Oil/Exxon) Planned Parenthood (inc. sterilisation) and funding some research projects at KWI Kaiser Wilhelm Institutes, in pre WWII Germany….many US oligarchs continued to do business with Nazi Germany & Italy via subsidiaries and proxies.
Post WWII, after respectful number of years when eugenics had a suboptimal reputation, AES in US invited German scientist Verschuer to a conference in US, no problem; coincidentally he was Mengele’s supervisor via KWI. By 1950s UN moved to NY on real estate gifted by Rockefellers and then 1960s much noise around Rockefeller Population Commissions etc., still strong links with the Population and ‘Sustainable’ Development Divisions.
A significant line in the sand was the meeting of ‘thinkers’ at the Club of Rome 1968, held on Rockefeller Estate, sponsored by Fiat (Agnelli family/BM) and VW (Porsche/AH), where pseudo or junk science was discussed with whiff of pre WWII, also the launch of ‘science like’ PR and ‘greenwashing’ of fossil fuels i.e. the Meadows’ ‘limits to growth’, Lovelock’s Gaia theory, Tanton Network’s conservative ecologist Herman Daly’s ‘steady state economy’ (‘degrowth’ to avoid ‘overshoot’ ) and Paul Ehrlich’s ‘Population Bomb’; untestable talking points while limits to growth was debunked by University of Sussex research team, published as ‘Models of Doom’.
Both Tanton and Ehrlich went on to found ZPG Zero Population Growth, supported by Rockefeller Bros. Fund which ‘owned’ the other supporters, Ford and Carnegie Foundations, which was also the roots of SPA locally; both have visited while the dec. white nationalist Tanton admired white Australia policy, visited and was hosted by SPA.
The ‘nativist fossil fuel trap’, back to corporates, and nowadays with Koch Network (born of John Birch Society, US CoC, KKK etc. & fossil fuels) who share donors with Tanton’s mob, under the guise of sustainability promoting ‘degrowth’ via Daly’s ‘steady state economy’ model for greenwashing and actual planned unfriendly and authoritarian outcomes…..
It requires nations to adopt a ‘sustainability’ to protect ecosystems, economy viewed as having fixed resources (Malthus), strong borders, no immigration, withdrawal from trade blocs, reduce consumption, Malthusian population control inc. fertility etc.
Outcome? There are no clear examples if any, but see Brexit of UK from the EU to avoid regulation of fossil fuels and finance, plus ‘immigrants’ (won the ref), for ‘sovereignty’, but global fossil fuel, finance and oligarch structures remain in place offshore (not subject to rule of law), to play individual nations off against each other.
Objective? See 1930-40s autarky of Italy and Germany, and now Koch, GOP and Trump for Project 2025, to make fossil fueled corrupt white Christian nationalist autocracy, permanent for the <1%; faux free market or libertarian trap.
Yes, LUCY, just what we need independents and loonies to return the LNP. NOT
PS
wow Our survival, Mr Pritchard?
in what climate can we not survive.
Mars, Antarctica, the desert?
Anyone else starting to feel like they never want to hear the words “liberalism” or “neoliberalism” again?
Thanks Lucy, for the article keeping an eye on the fundamental target.
What an awful dilemma.
And for the info in the commentary, very informative, and accords with my recent swat-ups, albeit some comments lean much more into academic review.
So, it appears we a trapped, hoist by modern history’s petards. The success of the collective bomb tossers from behind the network of international and domestic racism.
I entered the workforce as a kid trying to be useful and make a buck. It didn’t take long for me to realize there were networks, and an escape route from those individuals who sought to intimidate and coerce. I had to face fears of reputational damage, so in the alternative, relied upon nous and learning via getting around and experiencing the knocks and bumps. A more natural path for me round the rugged rocks, with no aim for wealth.
As time went by, to utilize my accumulated wit to the max, it was inevitable that I became more involved with corporations, and exposed to those that would seek access to my pockets – not ever was it granted.
As a numbers man on big jobs, I saw plenty of jiggery-pokery. When I did a big job for Qantas / Boeing, I was welcomed by Boeing with open arms. Later they asked me if I’d be interested in doing jobs for them in East Asia. Still somewhat naive, I started a business and pursued the East Asian business. Very soon my eyes were opened to the entanglements of business and politics. I sold my business to a big brother, and worked for them through East Asia and Middle East. The cold war ended, and soon the entanglements turned to duress, including from Uncle Sam (in disguise). I got out.
I returned to big infrastructure jobs in Oz, doing capex analysis, and later as a forensic specialist, making and / or settling claims. Sticking to my commissions I’ve been successful. Nevertheless, I have seen many hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of frauds along the way, not only, but mainly by govts. I’ve seen the ‘Chinese walls’. I’ve seen the affects of alignments of major law firms. I’ve seen countless probity breaches. And I’ve seen the critical mass and endurance needed to get to settlement, at times on the steps of the Supreme Court, not one soul prosecuted (funny about that).
So my career went from counting nuts and bolts to dealing with nuts, dodging the spanners in the works, seeing the taxpayer being screwed, to today’s blue sky where everything is continuously ‘negotiated’ with a very fat risk encompassing marker, with the taxpayer still being screwed due to mismanagement – deliberate or not.
So much for networks. I’m glad to be out, and not any more being coerced by lawyers and others in dark or braided suits. Ironically, there is little that can be done from the outside, even from at arms length. And there can be a huge price to pay trying to set things straight from the inside, just ask David McBride and Richard Boyle.
Given we are inextricably reliant (for the time being) upon the global economic network, and the ubiquity in the ‘west’ of corporatocracy, how best can we manage the liquidity needed to obtain our climate change objectives? From the inside? With clever contracting, at least the govt can maintain its sovereign rights as long as it does not succumb to wonky provisions like Investor-State Dispute Settlements, etc.. There could be for example, staged developments with pull-out provisions or performance based profit share alliances with sunsets typical of PPPs.
There’s certainly plenty of money in global corporate hands looking for somewhere to go among a mess of broken and stranded assets, and the race for change (and protectionism) is on. Oz must show determined intent and stability to leverage itself for the best deals to facilitate a renewables future. To say the least there must be some stealth amongst the apparent mixed messages.
It certainly is precarious, but what else to do when facing the likes of Dutton and Trump and Russia/China?
It must be emphasised that the usurping of power that is behind Lucy’s examples of corporate undermining of society, did not suddenly appear with the rise of neo-liberalism, or even as a consequence of Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railway. This has been an ongoing process of theft from the working class by manipulating legal provisions, for almost a thousand years. You could say it’s a time-honoured tradition.
In 1215 when the English nobles secured their rights and protections from Royal encroachment, they were forced to include in the Magna Carta protections and rights for the common people as well, no doubt because they needed the commoners onside if the dispute with the king resulted in civil war.
But the document was revised and re-issued in 1217, with a significant change.
The commoners’ rights no longer appeared in the revised version, instead appearing in a separate document, the Charter of the Forest.
This was hugely significant.
It signified that the English elites saw a gap, a difference, a distinction, between their needs and those of the commoners. It was a move that effectively cut English society in two. It reinstated the Norman tiered sytem established by William. And it signalled that the elites were in future going to look after their interests only. Which they did. They began a process of encroaching on the rights to common land that were outlined in the Charter. Enclosures. Stealing the Commons. Hundreds of years of theft.
So the contempt shown by the nobles for the Charter of the Forest became a pattern of behaviour. A lack of respect for legal provisions and for society as a whole, that has continued through British history and was embraced by the landowners who drafted the US Constitution.
A lack of respect for due process as we saw in Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad, that resulted in corporations being granted the rights and privileges of persons with the matter not being tested by legal argument, but with the decision instead being based on a court reporter’s interpretation of the Justices’ opinions. A court reporter who was a former president of a railway company and whose interpretation altered the course of global financial governance.
From Merriam-Webster — “The case is viewed historically as marking a Court shift away from issues predominantly involving civil rights and toward those predominantly involving property rights and the doctrines of laissez-faire economics.” Well, blow me down. Liberalism in a nutshell.
Fair dinkum, you couldn’t make this stuff up.
So the Chicago School or Atlas or Mt Pelerin Society did not begin steering us towards an “authoritarian/anti-democratic corporate-run world”, although they all were certainly influential in that regard. We’ve been heading in that direction since 1217.
@Steve Davis: most informative and thought-provoking, thank you.
frances, thanks for your interest.