Corporate Power's War on the American Public

It’s quite easy- natural, even – to assume that the way things are reflects the way things ought to be. Though many recognize that the universe isn’t intelligently designed, they assume that at least America is. On average, the modern American citizen rarely questions the capitalist superstructure upon which our society operates. But the overwhelming spread of spin in politics and the excessive extension of copyright are not inevitable results of a process of modernization. These two phenomena reflect the burgeoning neoliberal corporate power that threatens to permanently dominate American culture and government and infiltrate the last few sacred areas of individual expression. Neoliberal restructuring of America has erased the barrier between the public and the private sector, allowing politics, media, and art to fall under the control of corporate interest. Elections, paintings, campfire songs: all have become privatized to a ridiculous extent. Yet paradoxically, the private citizen has become lost in the public arena. Power and ownership today are more privileged than ever, predicated on an exclusory system of class and wealth. As Gerald Sussman’s Global Electioneering and Brand Name Bullies by David Bollier suggest, corporate power has waged a war on the American people, and what’s at stake is democracy itself.

Bollier introduces his text with a clear explanation of the value of copyright law. It was designed and initially used for encouraging creativity among authors and artists, and was deemed successful in that it allowed these producers to sustain themselves for a limited period of time, in which they could create a new work. This law kept a judicious balance between private ownership and public use rights. But in recent years, copyright and trademark law have been rapidly expanded, mainly in favor of large entertainment industries. The result? The decline of democracy as we know it.