Renouncing Sins Against the Corporate Faith
by Norman Solomon
July 11, 2002
Just about every politician and pundit is eager to denounce
wrongdoing in business these days. Sinners have defiled the holy quest for a
high rate of return. Damn those who left devoted investors standing bereft at
corporate altars!
On the surface, media outlets are filled with condemnations
of avarice. The July 15 edition of Newsweek features a story headlined
"Going After Greed," complete with a full-page picture of George W.
Bush's anguished face. But after multibillion-dollar debacles from Enron to
WorldCom, the usual media messages are actually quite equivocal – wailing about
greedy CEOs while piping in a kind of hallelujah chorus to affirm the sanctity
of the economic system that empowered them.
At a Wall Street pulpit, Bush declared that America needs
business leaders "who know the difference between ambition and destructive
greed." Presumably, other types of greed are fine and dandy.
During his much-ballyhooed speech, the president asserted
that "all investment is an act of faith." With that spirit, a
righteous form of business fundamentalism is firmly in place. The great god of
capitalism is always due enormous tribute. Yet wicked people get most of the blame
when things go wrong. "The American system of enterprise has not failed
us," Bush proclaimed. "Some dishonest individuals have failed our
system."
Corporate theology about "the free enterprise
system" readily acknowledges bad apples while steadfastly denying that the
barrels are rotten. After all, every large-scale racket needs enforceable
rules. Rigid conservatives may take their faith to an extreme. ("Let's
hold people responsible -- not institutions," a recent Wall Street
Journal column urged.) But pro-corporate institutional reform is on the
mainstream agenda, as media responses to Bush's sermon on Wall Street made
clear.
The Atlanta Constitution summarized a key
theme with its headline over an editorial: "Take Hard-Line Approach to
Restore Faith in Business." Many newspapers complained that Bush had not
gone far enough to crack down on corporate malfeasants. "His speech was
more pulpit than punch," lamented the Christian Science Monitor.
A July 10 editorial in the Washington Post observed that "it
is naive to suppose that business can be regulated by some kind of national
honor code." But such positions should not be confused with advocacy of
progressive social policies.
"There is one objective that companies can unite
around," the Post editorial said, "and that is to make
money. This is not a criticism: The basis of our market system is that, by
maximizing profits, firms also maximize the collective good." Coming from
media conglomerates and other corporate giants, that sort of rhetoric is
notably self-serving.
It takes quite a leap of faith to believe that when firms
maximize profits they also "maximize the collective good." A much
stronger case could be made for opposite conclusions.
The Washington Post Co. itself has long served as a good
example. A quarter-century ago, the media firm crushed striking press workers
at its flagship newspaper. That development contributed to "maximizing
profits" but surely did nothing to "maximize the collective
good" -- unless we assume that busting unions, throwing people out of work
and holding down wages for remaining employees is beneficial for all concerned.
Current news coverage does not challenge the goal of
amassing as much wealth and power as possible. For Enron's Ken Lay and similar
executives, falling from media grace has been simultaneous with their loss of
wealth and power. Those corporate hotshots would still be media darlings if
they'd kept their nauseating greed clearly within legal limits.
Why "nauseating" greed? Well, maybe you can think
of a better adjective for people who are intent on adding still more money to
their hundreds of millions or billions of dollars in personal riches -- while,
every day, thousands of other human beings are dying from lack of such
necessities as minimal health care and nutrition.
One day in the mid-1970s, at a news conference, I asked
Nelson Rockefeller how he felt about being so wealthy while millions of
children were starving in poor countries. Rockefeller, who was vice president
of the United States at the time, replied a bit testily that his grandfather
John D. Rockefeller had been very generous toward the less fortunate. As I
began a follow-up, other reporters interrupted so that they could ask more
news-savvy questions.
Basic questions about wealth and poverty -- about economic
relations that are glorious for a few, adequate for some and injurious for
countless others -- remain outside the professional focus of American
journalism. In our society, prevalent inequities are largely the results of
corporate function, not corporate dysfunction. But we're encouraged to believe
that faith in the current system of corporate capitalism will be redemptive.
Norman
Solomon's latest book is The Habits of Highly
Deceptive Media.
His
syndicated column focuses on media and politics. Email: mediabeat@igc.org