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The Transformation of Business, Democracy, and Everyday Life
Knopf
September 2007
On Sale: September 4, 2007
288 pages
ISBN: 0307265617
EAN: 9780307265616
Hardcover
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Non-Fiction
From the greatly admired author of The Work of Nations
and The Future of Success, one of
America's greatest economic and political thinkers as well
as a distinguished public servant in three national
administrations, a breakthrough book on the clash between
capitalism and democracy.
Mid-twentieth-century
capitalism has turned into global capitalism, and global
capitalism—turbocharged, Web-based, and able to find and
make almost anything just about anywhere—has turned into
supercapitalism. But as Robert B. Reich makes clear in this
eye-opening book, while supercapitalism is working
wonderfully well to enlarge the economic pie,
democracy—charged with caring for all citizens—is
becoming less and less effective under its
influence.
Reich explains how widening inequalities
of income and wealth, heightened job insecurity, and the
spreading effects of global warming are the logical outcomes
of supercapitalism. He shows us why companies, fighting
harder than ever to maintain their competitive positions,
have become even more deeply involved in politics; and how
average citizens, seeking great deals and invested in the
stock market to an unprecedented degree, are increasingly
loath to stand by their values if it means biting the hands
that feed them. He makes clear how the tools traditionally
used to temper America's societal problems—fair taxation,
well-funded public education, trade unions—have withered as
supercapitalism has burgeoned.
Reich sets out a
clear course to a vibrant capitalism and a concurrent,
equally vibrant democracy. He argues forcefully that the
spheres of business and politics must be kept distinct. He
calls for an end to the legal fiction that corporations are
citizens, as well as the illusion that corporations can be
"socially responsible" until laws define social needs. Reich
explains why we must stop treating companies as if they were
people—and must therefore abolish the corporate income tax
and levy it on shareholders instead, hold individuals rather
than corporations guilty of criminal conduct, and not expect
companies to be "patriotic." For, as Reich says, only people
can be citizens, and only citizens should be allowed to
participate in democratic decision making.
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