Beyond Public and Private: Toward a Political Theory of the Corporation

Ciepley, David

doi:10.1017/s0003055412000536

Cited by 325 publications

(159 citation statements)

References 46 publications

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“…The charter that limited them was an act of the king or Parliament (or today, of a legislature, or secretary of state, or some other sovereign or authorized representative of the sovereign), not an act of the members or shareholders (their supposed "principals"; for critique , Ciepley 2013;Robé 2011;Stout 2012). "Like corporate officers, government officials were merely agents of principals who had prescribed limits on the agents' power in the founding charter" (1434).…”

Section: The Corporate Origins Of Judicial Reviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

Is the U.S. Government a Corporation? The Corporate Origins of Modern Constitutionalism

Ciepley

2017

Am Polit Sci Rev

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T he U.S. Constitution is best understood not as a "social contract," but as a popularly issued corporate charter. The earliest American colonies were literal corporations of the Crown and, like all corporations, were ruled by limited governments established by their charters. From this, Americans derived their understanding of what a constitution is-the written charter of a sovereign that ordains and limits a government. The key Federalist innovation was to substitute the People for the King as the chartering sovereign. This effectively transferred the "governance technology" of the corporation to the civil government-including the practice of delegating authority via a written charter, charter amendment, and judicial review. Federalists used these corporate practices to frame a government that united seeming irreconcilables-a government energetic yet limited, republican yet mixed, popular yet antipopulist-yielding a corporate solution to the problem of arbitrary rule. Leading founders considered this new government a literal chartered corporation of the People.

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Section: The Corporate Origins Of Judicial Reviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

Is the U.S. Government a Corporation? The Corporate Origins of Modern Constitutionalism

Ciepley

2017

Am Polit Sci Rev

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“…52 For example, in the 1950s, American corporations retained sixty percent of their profits for research and development (R&D); today they retain less than ten percent. 53 Rather than reinvesting, American corporations buy back their own stock and reduce "expenses" like payroll and R&D to artificially boost earnings per share. 54 The great American corporate research labs of the mid-to late-20th century are disappearing as employees are cut and the focus is shifted from pure research to modest projects with immediate profit potential.…”

Section: Need For More Innovation and Investment In The Futurementioning

confidence: 99%

Corporate Governance as Privately-Ordered Public Policy: A Proposal

Stout

Ricci²

2017

SSRN Journal

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In this Article, we show how our society can use corporate governance shifts to address, if not entirely resolve, a number of currently pressing social and economic problems. These problems include: rising income inequality; demographic disparities in wealth and equity ownership; increasing poverty and income insecurity; a need for greater innovation and investment in solving problems like disease and climate change; the "externalization" of many costs of corporate activity onto third parties such as customers, employees, creditors, and the broader society; the corrosive influence of corporate money in politics; and discontent and loss of trust in the capitalist system among a large and growing segment of the population.We demonstrate how, to a very significant extent, these problems can be traced to the way shares in business corporations are currently owned, traded, and voted. We also offer a plausible plan for shifting the structure of share ownership, trading, and voting to create a more Griffiths, Struan Scott, Ursula Cheer, and David Ciepley for their comments and suggestions, along with participants at workshops on and presentations of this paper given at Cornell Law School, the Berle Conference held at Georgia State University, the University of Otago in Dunedin, the University of Canterbury in Christchurch, the University of Milan, and Victoria University of Wellington.democratic and sustainable capitalism that allows business corporations to better serve humanity. Our proposal, which envisions developing a new form of institutional shareholder, does not rely either on market forces or government interventions. Rather, it relies on voluntary cooperation and the private ordering of free individuals using modern information technologies. It operates to reduce inequalities not only in wealth and income but also in influence over business corporations. INTRODUCTIONChange begins with imagining something better. In this Article, we imagine a future where our society has ameliorated, if not resolved, a number of currently pressing social and economic problems. These problems include: rising socioeconomic inequality; racial and generational disparities in participation in equity markets; increasing poverty and income insecurity; inadequate innovation and investment in solving problems like disease and climate change; the "externalization" of many costs of corporate activity, such as carbon emissions, systemic risk, and the degradation of human health, onto third parties (customers, employees, creditors, the broader society); the corrosive influence of corporate money in politics; and the disengagement and alienation of large and growing segments of the population, leading to loss of trust in the capitalist system and the possibility of civic unrest.The insight underlying our approach is that governments are not the only institutions that can solve collective social and economic problems. Another type of powerful institution-the business corporation-can be brought to bear. Many of today's corporations ri...

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“…En ce qui concerne l'entreprise, les règles de sa gouvernance, c'est-à-dire les règles déterminant ses principaux modes de fonctionnement, l'allocation du pouvoir en son sein et ses procédures de prises de décisions, ne surgissent pas de nulle part, mais sont justement de « provenance politique », pour reprendre les termes de David Ciepley (2013). L'entreprise est une construction politique complexe.…”

Section: Justice De Genre Et Entrepriseunclassified

Justice, genre et entreprise

Hamrouni

Néron

2016

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Jusqu’ici, ni les égalitaristes ni les philosophes politiques féministes ne se sont sérieusement attardés à l’entreprise à titre d’institution où se produisent et se reproduisent les injustices de genre. Dans la mesure où les inégalités entre les sexes dans la famille, sur le marché et sur le plan de la participation démocratique se renforcent les unes les autres, faire l’examen critique d’institutions comme l’entreprise du point de vue de la justice représente pourtant une des étapes importantes de la marche vers la réalisation de la justice de genre. C’est l’objectif que nous nous donnons dans cet article. Dans la première partie, nous nous intéressons à la place prépondérante qu’occupe l’éthique du care dans la littérature féministe sur l’entreprise. Parce qu’elle s’attache essentiellement à la promotion de dirigeants d’entreprise vertueux, nous concluons que cette éthique du care se trouve en partie démunie lorsque vient le temps de penser la transformation organisationnelle de l’entreprise et des rapports en son sein dans la visée d’atteindre une plus grande justice de genre. Dans une deuxième partie, nous nous attardons à justifier, suivant une perspective normative, l’analyse de l’entreprise du point de vue de la justice de genre. Enfin, ayant déterminé que les approches distributives de la justice de genre sont insuffisantes pour penser la justice dans l’entreprise, nous terminons en esquissant une approche multidimensionnelle de la justice de genre dans et de l’entreprise, alliant justice distributive, participative et égalité relationnelle.

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Beyond Public and Private: Toward a Political Theory of the Corporation

Cited by 325 publications

References 46 publications

Is the U.S. Government a Corporation? The Corporate Origins of Modern Constitutionalism

Is the U.S. Government a Corporation? The Corporate Origins of Modern Constitutionalism

Corporate Governance as Privately-Ordered Public Policy: A Proposal

Justice, genre et entreprise

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