Here is today's ZNet Commentary Delivery from Stephen Shalom. To pass this comment along to friends, relatives, etc. please note that the Commentaries are a premium sent to Sustainer Donors of Z/ZNet and that to learn more about the project folks can consult ZNet (http://www.zmag.org) and specifically the Sustainer Pages (http://www.zmag.org/Commentaries/donorform.htm) which include lists of writers, writer biographies, and other features of the Z Sustainer Program. Please do not send the pages repeatedly to the same people -- people need to become Sustainers themselves. Here then is today's ZNet Commentary... ---------------------------- The State of the World Stephen R. Shalom This summer, the United Nations Development Programme issued its annual Human Development Report. The document is a stinging indictment of globalization and its horrific impact on the well-being of so many of the world's people. According to the Report, in developing countries nearly 1.3 billion people do not have access to clean water, one in seven children of primary school age is out of school, 840 million people are malnourished, and an estimated 1.3 billion people live on incomes of less than $1 a day. Even in the industrial countries, globalization has taken a grim toll. One person in eight suffers from either long-term unemployment, illiteracy, a life-expectancy of less than 60 years, or an income below the national poverty line. This human misery is not a consequence of globalization's insufficient advance. "More than 80 countries still have per capita incomes lower than they were a decade or more ago," comments the Report. In sub-Saharan African and some other least developed countries, per capita incomes are lower than they were in 1970. And some of the countries that are worst off are those that are most integrated into the global economy. Exports account for close to 30% of the gross domestic product of impoverished sub-Saharan Africa, for example, compared to less than 20% for the industrial nations. In Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union, where privatization and the market have expanded most rapidly, "the dismantling and weakening of the welfare state have meant cuts and deterioration in services in health and education -- across the board -- contributing to the deteriorating human outcomes. Life expectancy was lower in 1995 than in 1989 in 7 of 18 countries -- falling as much as five years since 1987. Enrolment in kindergarten declined dramatically." The gap between rich and poor has, in the words of the report, today "reached grotesque proportions." In 1960, the countries with the wealthiest fifth of the world's people had per capita incomes 30 times that of the poorest fifth. By 1990, the ratio had doubled to 60 to one, and by 1995 it stood at 74 to one. And the Asian economic crisis of the past few years has exacerbated the marginalization of the poorest countries. Within nations, the income gap has been growing as well. Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union have experienced "the fastest rise in inequality ever." Russia now has the world's greatest inequality, with the richest 20% having 11 times the income of the bottom 20%. Income inequalities have also grown dramatically in China, Indonesia, Thailand, other East and South-East Asian countries, and in the industrialized countries, especially Sweden, Britain, and the United States. A recent study by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities (reported in the New York Times of Sept. 5, 1999) found that the richest 1 percent of Americans earned as much after taxes as the poorest 100 million; in 1977 the top 1 percent only (!) had as much as the bottom 49 million. The poorest 20 percent are making less today in real terms (adjusting for inflation) than they were in 1977. The assets of the world's three richest people, notes the Human Development Report, are more than the combined GNP of all least developed countries on the planet. (This piece of information is already out of date: the statement was based on a report in Forbes magazine for Oct. 12, 1998, when Bill Gates, Warren Buffett, and Paul Allen had combined assets of $110 billion; on July 17, 1999, the NYT reported that the first two of these individuals alone were worth more than $140 billion.) The assets of the 200 richest people in 1998 were more than the total income of 41% of the world's people. The Report observes that a measly 1% tax on the wealth of these 200 people could fund primary education for all the world's children who lack access to schooling. One major source for the growing inequality and the global suffering is the spread of markets. For example, as the Report points out, for much of human history care-giving -- attending to the young, the old, the sick, and the rest of us -- was performed by women outside the market, based on a gender division of labor and female subordination. As women have entered the market -- partly by choice and partly by economic pressures -- they are still largely responsible for care-giving activities, which has forced a reduction in the time devoted to care, just as state services are being cut back as well. The "expansion of markets tends to penalize altruism and care." Markets also undermine the environment. "Despite widespread public support for environmental action, the driving forces of globalization still put profit before environmental protection, preservation and sustainability." The World Trade Organization, the international body responsible for aligning environmental and trade policy, has instead acted to protect the trading system from government policies designed to protect the environment. The WTO, like the other main international institutions, reflects the interests of the rich nations, "often those of the G-7 [the seven largest industrial economies], or sometimes just the G-1 [the United States]." But it should not be thought that the rich countries and the multinational corporations are consistent defenders of markets. They favor markets except when it advances their interests to favor state action on their behalf. And so a major aspect of the current globalization is extending the reach of patents to enhance corporate profits. As the Human Development Report notes, "most developing countries previously exempted agriculture, medicines and other products from national patent laws, but with the passage of the agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS), almost all knowledge-based production is now subject to tight intellectual property protection, unified internationally." Products developed with public funds are increasingly being monopolized by private firms. The 1999 Human Development Report is unusual for an official document in being so critical of the powerful and the wealthy. In fact, the new UNDP Administrator Michael Malloch Brown, perhaps worried about his funding, felt obliged to remind us in his foreword to the Report that its authors enjoy "robust editorial independence" and to assure us that the Report "comes down clearly in favour of the power of globalization to bring economic and social benefits to societies." Brown gently admonished the Report's authors: "In listing the negative impacts of markets on people, it is important not to appear to be rejecting markets as the central organizing principle of global economic life. Markets need institutions and rules -- and too frequently in the global setting they are not yet adequately subjected to the control of either. But the unleashing of competition within countries and between countries has ushered in for many an era of prosperity and liberty." Brown goes on to note that where he "fully agree[s] with the authors is that this empowerment has been uneven." His conclusion is that we need to "keep markets free but fair." Brown's formulation, however, begs the question. What if "free markets" are inherently unfair? Markets produce and allocate goods based on the number of dollars that demand them, not on the basis of need. A million dollars from a wealthy individual creates more market demand than ten dollars from a thousand needy individuals. Moreover, even if everyone started out with equal incomes, markets work by creating winners and losers, thus generating inequality and leading to domination by the rich. In addition, markets are fundamentally incompatible with building community: they depend on ruthless competition and penalize those who regard others as human beings. Thus, the necessary consequence of markets is self-centeredness, inequality, and a lack of democratic control over the economy. Fortunately, however, there is nothing inevitable about globalization. It is the result of political decisions and as such can be contested. Grassroots political action managed to stop the Multilateral Agreement on Investment, and September 15 has been declared an International Day of Action against the World Trade Organization. All who can ought to add their voices to the protest. -------------------------------------- The full text of the 1999 Human Development Report is on-line at: http://www.undp.org/hdro/index2.html. For many useful resources on the anti-World Trade Organization campaign, go to Public Citizen's Trade Watch site: http://www.tradewatch.org/publications/gtwpubs.htm. For information on how you can participate in the September 15 International Day of Action against the World Trade Organization, go to http://www.citizen.org/pctrade/activism/activist.htm. ------------------------------------- Stephen R. Shalom teaches political science at William Paterson University in NJ. He is the author of Imperial Alibis (South End, 1993) and is currently working on Which Side Are You On? An Introduction to Politics. ****************************** The Criminal Element By Russell Mokhiber and Robert Weissman The criminal element has seeped deep into every nook and cranny of American society. Forget about the underworld -- these crooks dominate every aspect of our market, culture, and politics. They cast a deep dark shadow over life in turn of the century America. We buy gas from them (Exxon, Chevron, Unocal). We take pictures with their cameras and film (Eastman Kodak). We drink their beer (Coors). We buy insurance from them to guard against financial catastrophe if we get sick (Blue Cross Blue Shield). And then when we get sick, we buy pharmaceuticals from them (Pfizer, Warner Lambert, Ortho Pharmaceuticals). We do our laundry washers and dryers from them (General Electric). We vacation with them (Royal Caribbean Cruise Lines). We buy our food from them (Archer Daniels Midland, Southland, Tyson Foods, U.S. Sugar). We drive with them (Hyundai) and fly with them (Korean Air Lines). All of these companies and more turned up on Corporate Crime Reporter's list of the Top 100 Corporate Criminals of the 1990s, released this past week at a news conference at the National Press Club. Standing before a roomful of reporters and cameras (including a C-Span camera which took us live to our TV nation), we made the following points: Every year, the major business magazines put out their annual surveys of big business in America. You have the Fortune 500, the Forbes 400, the Forbes Platinum 100, the International 800 -- among others. These lists rank big corporations by sales, assets, profits and market share. The point of these surveys is simple -- to identify and glorify the biggest and most profitable corporations. The point of releasing The Top 100 Corporate Criminals of the Decade, on the other hand, was to focus public attention on the pervasive criminality that has corrupted the marketplace and that is given little sustained attention and analysis by politicians and news outlets. To compile The Top 100 Corporate Criminals of the 1990s, we used the most narrow and conservative of definitions -- corporations that have pled guilty or no contest to crimes and have been criminally fined. And still, with the most narrow and conservative of definitions of corporate crime, we came up with society's most powerful actors. Six corporations that made the list of the Top 100 Corporate Criminals were criminal recidivist companies during the 1990s. Exxon, Royal Caribbean, Rockwell International, Warner-Lambert, Teledyne, and United Technologies each pled guilty to more than one crime during the 1990s. And we warned that we in no way imply that these corporations are in any way the worst or have committed the most egregious crimes. We did not try to assess and compare the damage committed by these corporate criminals or by other corporate wrongdoers. We warned that companies that are criminally prosecuted represent only the tip of a very large iceberg of corporate wrongdoing. For every company convicted of health care fraud, there are hundreds of others who get away with ripping off Medicare and Medicaid, or face only mild slap-on-the-wrist fines and civil penalties when caught. For every company convicted of polluting the nation's waterways, there are many others who are not prosecuted because their corporate defense lawyers are able to offer up a low-level employee to go to jail in exchange for a promise from prosecutors not to touch the company or high-level executives. For every corporation convicted of bribery or of giving money directly to a public official in violation of federal law, there are thousands who give money legally through political action committees to candidates and political parties. They profit from a system that effectively has legalized bribery. For every corporation convicted of selling illegal pesticides, there are hundreds more who are not prosecuted because their lobbyists have worked their way in Washington to ensure that dangerous pesticides remain legal. For every corporation convicted of reckless homicide in the death of a worker, there are hundreds of others that don't even get investigated for reckless homicide when a worker is killed on the job. Only a few district attorneys across the country (Michael McCann, the DA in Milwaukee County, Wisconsin, being one) regularly investigate workplace deaths as homicides. We pointed out that corporations define the laws under which they live. An argument can be made that the most egregious wrongful corporate acts -- the genetic engineering of the food supply, or the systematic pollution of the nation's air and waterways, or the bribery by corporate criminals of the political parties -- are totally legal. For your convenience, we print here the list of 100 crooks that fall well within a very conservative definition of criminality. Carry this list wherever you go, and when the subject turns to crime, feel free to pull out the list and lash the criminal element. THE TOP 100 CORPORATE CRIMINALS OF THE 1990S 1) F. Hoffmann-La Roche Ltd. Type of Crime: Antitrust Criminal Fine: $500 million 2) Daiwa Bank Ltd. Type of Crime: Financial Criminal Fine: $340 million 3) BASF Aktiengesellschaft Type of Crime: Antitrust Criminal Fine: $225 million 4) SGL Carbon Aktiengesellschaft (SGL AG) Type of Crime: Antitrust Criminal Fine: $135 million 5) Exxon Corporation and Exxon Shipping Type of Crime: Environmental Criminal Fine: $125 million 6) UCAR International, Inc. Type of Crime: Antitrust Criminal Fine: $110 million 7) Archer Daniels Midland Type of Crime: Antitrust Criminal Fine: $100 million 8)(tie) Banker's Trust Type of Crime: Financial Criminal Fine: $60 million 8)(tie) Sears Bankruptcy Recovery Management Services Type of Crime: Fraud Criminal Fine: $60 million 10) Haarman & Reimer Corp. Type of Crime: Antitrust Criminal fine: $50 million 11) Louisiana-Pacific Corporation Type of Crime: Environmental Criminal Fine: $37 million 12) Hoechst AG Type of Crime: Antitrust Criminal Fine: $36 million 13) Damon Clinical Laboratories, Inc. Type of Crime: Fraud Criminal Fine: $35.2 million 14) C.R. Bard Inc. Type of Crime: Food and drug Criminal Fine: $30.9 million 7 Corporate Crime Reporter 41(1), October 25, 1993 15) Genentech Inc. Type of Crime: Food and drug Criminal Fine: $30 million 16) Nippon Gohsei Type of Crime: Antitrust Criminal Fine: $21 million 17)(tie) Pfizer Inc. Type of Crime: Antitrust Criminal Fine: $20 million 17)(tie) Summitville Consolidated Mining Co. Inc. Type of Crime: Environmental Criminal Fine: $20 million 10 Corporate Crime Reporter 20(3) May 20, 1996 19)(tie) Lucas Western Inc. Type of Crime: False Statements Criminal Fine: $18.5 million 9 Corporate Crime Reporter 4(6), January 30, 1995 19)(tie) Rockwell International Corporation Type of Crime: Environmental Criminal Fine: $18.5 million 21) Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd. Type of Crime: Environmental Criminal Fine: $18 million 22) Teledyne Industries Inc. Type of Crime: Fraud Criminal Fine: $17.5 million 23) Northrop Type of Crime: False statements Criminal Fine: $17 million 24) Litton Applied Technology Division (ATD) and Litton Systems Canada (LSL) Type of Crime: Fraud Criminal Fine: $16.5 million 25) Iroquois Pipeline Operating Company Type of Crime: Environmental Criminal Fine: $15 million 26) Eastman Chemical Company Type of Crime: Antitrust Criminal Fine: $11 million 27) Copley Pharmaceutical, Inc. Type of Crime: Food and drug Criminal Fine: $10.65 million 28) Lonza AG Type of Crime: Antitrust Criminal Fine: $10.5 million 29) Kimberly Home Health Care Inc. Type of Crime: Fraud Criminal Fine: $10.08 million 30)(tie) Ajinomoto Co. Inc. Type of Crime: Antitrust Criminal Fine: $10 million 30)(tie) Bank of Credit and Commerce International (BCCI) Type of Crime: Financial Criminal Fine: $10 million 30)(tie) Kyowa Hakko Kogyo Co. Ltd. Type of Crime: Antitrust Criminal Fine: $10 million 30)(tie) Warner-Lambert Company Type of Crime: Food and drug Criminal Fine: $10 million 34) General Electric Type of Crime: Fraud Criminal Fine: $9.5 million 35)(tie) Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd. Type of Crime: Environmental Criminal Fine: $9 million 35)(tie) Showa Denko Carbon Type of Crime: Antitrust Criminal Fine: $9 million 37) IBM East Europe/Asia Ltd. Type of Crime: Illegal exports Criminal Fine: $8.5 million 38) Empire Sanitary Landfill Inc. Type of crime: Campaign finance Criminal fine: $8 million 39)(tie) Colonial Pipeline Company Type of Crime: Environmental Criminal Fine: $7 million 39)(tie) Eklof Marine Corporation Type of Crime: Environmental Criminal Fine: $7 million 41)(tie) Chevron Type of Crime: Environmental Criminal Fine: $6.5 million 41)(tie) Rockwell International Corporation Type of Crime: Environmental Criminal Fine: $6.5 million 43) Tokai Carbon Ltd. Co. Type of Crime: Antitrust Criminal Fine: $6 million 44)(tie) Allied Clinical Laboratories, Inc. Type of Crime: Fraud Criminal Fine: $5 million 44)(tie) Northern Brands International Inc. Type of Crime: Fraud Criminal Fine: $5 million 44)(tie) Ortho Pharmaceutical Corporation Type of Crime: Obstruction of justice Criminal Fine: $5 million 44)(tie) Unisys Type of Crime: Bribery Criminal Fine: $5 million 44)(tie) Georgia Pacific Corporation Type of Crime: Tax evasion Criminal Fine: $5 million 5 Corporate Crime Reporter 38(8), October 7, 1991 49) Kanzaki Specialty Papers Inc. Type of Crime: Antitrust Criminal Fine: $4.5 million 50) ConAgra Inc. Type of Crime: Fraud Criminal Fine: $4.4 million 51) Ryland Mortgage Company Type of Crime: Financial Criminal Fine: $4.2 million 52)(tie) Blue Cross Blue Shield of Illinois Type of Crime: Fraud Criminal Fine: $4 million 52)(tie) Borden Inc. Type of Crime: Antitrust Criminal Fine: $4 million 52)(tie) Dexter Corporation Type of Crime: Environmental Criminal Fine: $4 million 52)(tie) Southland Corporation Type of Crime: Antitrust Criminal Fine: $4 million 52)(tie) Teledyne Industries Inc. Type of Crime: Illegal exports Criminal Fine: $4 million 52)(tie) Tyson Foods Inc. Type of Crime: Public corruption Criminal Fine: $4 million 58)(tie) Aluminum Company of America (ALCOA) Type of Crime: Environmental Criminal Fine: $3.75 million 58)(tie) Costain Coal Inc. Type of Crime: Worker Death Criminal Fine: $3.75 million 58)(tie) United States Sugar Corporation Type of Crime: Environmental Criminal Fine: $3.75 million 61) Saybolt, Inc., Saybolt North America Type of Crime: Environmental, bribery Criminal Fine: $3.4 million 62)(tie) Bristol-Myers Squibb Type of Crime: Environmental Criminal Fine: $3 million 62)(tie) Chemical Waste Management Inc. Type of Crime: Environmental Criminal Fine: $3 million 62)(tie) Ketchikan Pulp Company Type of Crime: Environmental Criminal Fine: $3 million 62)(tie) United Technologies Corporation Type of Crime: Environmental Criminal Fine: $3 million 62)(tie) Warner-Lambert Inc. Type of Crime: Environmental Criminal Fine: $3 million 67)(tie) Arizona Chemical Co. Inc. Type of Crime: Environmental Criminal Fine: $2.5 million 67)(tie) Consolidated Rail Corporation (Conrail) Type of Crime: Environmental Criminal Fine: $2.5 million 69) International Paper Type of Crime: Environmental Criminal Fine: $2.2 million 70)(tie) Consolidated Edison Company Type of Crime: Environmental Criminal Fine: $2 million 70)(tie) Crop Growers Corporation Type of Crime: Campaign finance Criminal fine: $2 million 70)(tie) E-Systems Inc. Type of Crime: Fraud Criminal Fine: $2 million 70)(tie) HAL Beheer BV Type of Crime: Environmental Criminal Fine: $2 million 70)(tie) John Morrell and Company Type of Crime: Environmental Criminal Fine: $2 million 70)(tie) United Technologies Corporation Type of Crime: Fraud Criminal Fine: $2 million 76) Mitsubishi Corporation, Mitsubishi International Corporation Type of Crime: Antitrust Criminal Fine: $1.8 million 77)(tie) Blue Shield of California Type of Crime: Fraud Criminal Fine: $1.5 million 77)(tie) Browning-Ferris Inc. Type of Crime: Environmental Criminal Fine: $1.5 million 77)(tie) Odwalla Inc. Type of Crime: Food and drug Criminal Fine: $1.5 million 77)(tie) Teledyne Inc. Type of Crime: False statements Criminal Fine: $1.5 million 77)(tie) Unocal Corporation Type of Crime: Environmental Criminal Fine: $1.5 million 82)(tie) Doyon Drilling Inc. Type of Crime: Environmental Criminal Fine: $1 million 82)(tie) Eastman Kodak Type of Crime: Environmental Criminal Fine: $1 million 82)(tie) Case Corporation Type of Crime: Illegal exports Criminal Fine: $1 million 85) Marathon Oil Type of Crime: Environmental Criminal Fine: $900,000 86) Hyundai Motor Company Type of Crime: Campaign finance Criminal Fine: $600,000 87)(tie) Baxter International Inc. Type of Crime: Illegal Boycott Criminal Fine: $500,000 87)(tie) Bethship-Sabine Yard Type of Crime: Environmental Criminal Fine: $500,000 87(tie) Palm Beach Cruises Type of Crime: Environmental Criminal Fine: $500,000 87)(tie) Princess Cruises Inc. Type of Crime: Environmental Criminal Fine: $500,000 91)(tie) Cerestar Bioproducts BV Type of Crime: Antitrust Criminal Fine: $400,000 91)(tie) Sun-Land Products of California Type of Crime: Campaign finance Criminal Fine: $400,000 93)(tie) American Cyanamid Type of Crime: Environmental Criminal Fine: $250,000 93)(tie) Korean Air Lines Type of Crime: Campaign finance Criminal Fine: $250,000 93)(tie) Regency Cruises Inc. Type of Crime: Environmental Criminal Fine: $250,000 96)(tie) Adolph Coors Company Type of Crime: Environmental Criminal Fine: $200,000 96)(tie) Andrew and Williamson Sales Co. Type of crime: Food and drug Criminal fine: $200,000 96)(tie) Daewoo International (America) Corporation Type of Fine: Campaign finance Criminal Fine: $200,000 96)(tie) Exxon Corporation Type of Crime: Environmental Criminal Fine: $200,000 100) Samsung America Inc. Type of Crime: Campaign finance Criminal Fine: $150,000 Russell Mokhiber is editor of the Washington, D.C.-based Corporate Crime Reporter. Robert Weissman is editor of the Washington, D.C.-based Multinational Monitor. They are co-authors of Corporate Predators: The Hunt for Mega Profits and the Attack on Democracy (Monroe, Maine: Common Courage Press, 1999, http://www.corporatepredators.org) (c) Russell Mokhiber and Robert Weissman. ----------------------------------------------------- Focus on the Corporation is a weekly column written by Russell Mokhiber and Robert Weissman. Please feel free to forward the column to friends or repost the column on other lists. If you would like to post the column on a web site or publish it in print format, we ask that you first contact us (russell@essential.org or rob@essential.org). Focus on the Corporation is distributed to individuals on the listserve corp-focus@essential.org. 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