EDITORIAL

Much has changed since our last newsletter, both inside and outside Corporate Watch. Recession, increasing unemployment, massive government bail-outs; epochal developments have been dominating the headlines. While the economic world seems to be changing around us and the G20 clash attempting to restructure capitalism in their own interests, might we see an equivalent, or a more radical, collapse or reconfiguration of the political order? Few seem to be considering this. Yet, for some at least, the looming recession represents enforced freedom from work. It raises the spectre that the powerful fear: people with time to spare and motivation for dissent.

Across the pond, eight years of brazen and violent imperial adventures, manifest in the rule of the US Neocons, are coming to an end - in name, at least. In reality, a few hard edges of the Bush era are being smoothed away and replaced by seductive, velvetine ‘soft power’. We’ve seen this before, have we not? When nominally grassroots activism is put into the service of the most expensive election campaign in history (over $1 billion spent by the Obama and McCain campaigns combined), even in an effort to unseat a despotic regime, should we not be asking some hard questions about the politics and practice of this supposed socio-political change?

In the midst of this tumult, it transpires that many things remain constant, albeit obscured. Behind the surface of change and the ostensible restructuring of capitalism, a dogmatic philosophy still runs deep through the core of business practice; the same business practice, norms and ideals that have driven the planet to the ecological and economic brink. This issue of the Corporate Watch newsletter takes a timely look at the theoretical heart of corporate practice: management and business ideology; what made and, crucially, what still makes businessmen and women tick.

It may seem strange to talk about ideology with regard to the business practices of corporations. After all, the modern corporate executive likes to think of him or herself as a ‘practical person’: only interested in hard results, not airy-fairy theory. Corporations and pro-corporate politicians like to tell us that they are pragmatic, interested purely in ‘what works’. But whether they admit it or not, the Western-style multinational corporate rulers, just like the ruling elite of the former Soviet Union, are bound by a common belief system, with certain tenets that are held with a near-religious level of faith. Business theory provides a language that corporate managers can use with each other; that expresses their specific aims (that is, seeking profit, exploiting people and natural resources, and beating competitors). Expressing these anti-social aims in a tailor-made, business-friendly language also provides justification for managers’ work. Business education is also arguably a filter. Partly due to the high cost of this kind of education, business school graduates tend to be from the richer end of society and thus have limited experience of the world the majority inhabit.

Back at Corporate Watch, this summer has seen some of the biggest changes at Corporate Watch since its founding in 1996: we have moved from the dreaming spires of Oxford to the heart of corporate power in the UK, London. Moreover, as some long-standing and much missed members of the Co-op have left , three new researchers have joined the Watch. Equipped with experience and passion, they bring with them a broad spectrum of new research areas: from migration, the Israeli occupation of Palestine and the arms trade, to nanotechnology and gentrification. So, look out for new Corporate Watch research focusing on these issues and exposing the abuses of the corporations and companies involved.

Another new, exciting development at Corporate Watch has been the revamping of our News project; writing and editing collectively and making it even more relevant to the needs of the campaigners and activists confronting corporate power. Those readers who are subscribed to our fortnightly electronic News Update (those who aren’t, should!) have certainly noticed how these have been restructured and extended to include timely and in-depth articles that cover a wide range of issues related to both corporations and campaigns against them.

Finally, we do apologise to our readers for the delay in producing this issue. We hope that the reasons above suffice as explanation. If there is anything you would like to see more of, or less of, or totally changed, now is the time to tell us by filling in our Reader Survey at www.corporatewatch.org/?lid=3114.