Corporate Hegemony

(Hardback)

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With the continuing consolidation of corporate holdings through mergers and acquisitions, the power of major corporations is of increasing concern from both a practical and a theoretical standpoint. In this study Dugger approaches corporate power as an institutional phenomenon. Through his analysis, he traces the development of US corporate hegemony and explores the impact of the big corporation's social dominance in every aspect of contemporary life. The author begins with an examination of the nature of the corporate behemoth, its values and behaviour, inner contradictions, drive for economic power and its unrestricted control of the global market economy. He looks at the underlying dynamics of the corporation's drive for control and the various processes through which its values, meanings and motives are imposed. These processes include coercion, contamination, subordination, emulation and mystification. Dugger shows how the careerism corporations demand systematically draws energy and commitment away from family, community and other spheres of life, thus corroding their meaning and value. He studies the impact of corporate power on the family, schools and colleges, unions, churches, communities, the state and the media and demonstrates how each of the power mechanisms is used to devalue these institutions. Dugger argues that the social vacuum this creates is being filled by the big corporations. His institutional approach to the rise and spread of corporate power, makes a significant contribution to our understanding of the crisis of pluralism in the West.

Reviews

"This is a very powerfully written, very disturbing book about the subordination of American life to the imperatives of the corporation. I think it exaggerated in parts, and I have no doubt that it is not a balanced presentation.' But I suspect there is enough truth in what William Dugger writes about so that thoughtful people should be very familiar with his argument."-Robert Heilbroner New School for Social Research
"Dugger examines the modern corporation and its impact on such institutions as families, communities, schools, churches, unions, the state, and the media. Dugger's conclusion is that the corporation serves to fill a social vacuum, ' as it hollows out' these institutions. Dugger's analysis of corporations is within an institutional framework that focuses on the source and use of corporate economic power. . . . [T]his volume is thought provoking . . . . . Extensive bibliography; good index. Appropriate for graduate students and faculty."-Choice
Asserts that corporate power is the dynamic factor in capitalist economies rather than market competition operating on the forces of supply and demand. Points to militarization, labor exploitation, the federal deficit, and corporate diversification as the forces driving recent shifts in the U.S. economy--which resulted in the deterioration of the northern, industiral 'rust belt' as well as the growth of the southern, high-tech, service-oriented 'sun belt' and the New Engand financial, service-oriented areas. Views the rise of the corporate institution as a force causing social and political change that supports its power. Contends that institutional change in noncorporate institutions, such as the state, the family, and religion, in the direction of countering rather than tolerating this hegemony is necessary for U.S. prosperity in the future.-Economic Books
Dugger examines the modern corporation and its impact on such institutions as families, communities, schools, churches, unions, the state, and the media. Dugger's conclusion is that the corporation serves to fill a social vacuum, ' as it hollows out' these institutions. Dugger's analysis of corporations is within an institutional framework that focuses on the source and use of corporate economic power. . . . [T]his volume is thought provoking . . . . . Extensive bibliography; good index. Appropriate for graduate students and faculty.-Choice
"Asserts that corporate power is the dynamic factor in capitalist economies rather than market competition operating on the forces of supply and demand. Points to militarization, labor exploitation, the federal deficit, and corporate diversification as the forces driving recent shifts in the U.S. economy--which resulted in the deterioration of the northern, industiral 'rust belt' as well as the growth of the southern, high-tech, service-oriented 'sun belt' and the New Engand financial, service-oriented areas. Views the rise of the corporate institution as a force causing social and political change that supports its power. Contends that institutional change in noncorporate institutions, such as the state, the family, and religion, in the direction of countering rather than tolerating this hegemony is necessary for U.S. prosperity in the future."-Economic Books

Author Bio

WILLIAM M. DUGGER is Professor of Economics at DePaul University, Chicago. His publications include Radical Institutionalism(Greenwood Press, 1989), An Alternative to Economic Retrenchment as well as articles in Journal of Economic Issues, Review of Social Economy, and other scholarly journals.