The corporation is a documentary by Mark Achbar and Jennifer Abott that examines the concept of the corporation throughout history. It begins by explaining how corporation lawyers achieved to give rights to corporations using the 14th amendment, which was originally written to protect slaves.

Then the documentary shows that corporations after becoming legal ´´persons´´ are designed by law to have only one purpose: gain profits for their stakeholders, putting their bottom-line before everything else. Even if this implies that they are going to let others deal with the problems that their operations may create, becoming externalizing machines that won´t take care of the damages created to third parties.

The corporation´s purpose is also accepted and justified by capitalism, an economic system that encourages private individuals and corporations to own the means of production and operate to obtain profit. The documentary then puts the corporation on the psychiatrist´s couch to analyze a disturbing reality, if corporations are supposed to be legal entities (recognized by the law as a juristic person), why do they exhibit all the characteristics that psychopaths have according to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) published by the American Psychiatric Association? and more disturbing, if corporations, the dominant institutions of modern times, have been created in the image of a psychopath, who´s going to deal with the moral responsibility of their actions? Because employees are only obeying what their contract says, the building has no moral it´s just a structure of concrete and bricks, and its executives and stakeholders have a financial liability limited to a fixed sum, the corporation itself is defined as an artificial creation of its members, so is there anyone left that can bear with the moral responsibility and the damages that corporations have made? The answer is no.

 

REFERENCES 
Goldberg, R., Droste, J.(2007). Mcdonald´s corporation:managing a sustainable supply chain. Harvard case study.

Mcvictory. (Online research). Access date: March 4th,2011 retrieved from
http://www.greenpeace.org/international/en/news/features/McVictory-200706/

Devorando la amazonia.(Online research). Access date: march 4th 2011. Available at:  http://www.greenpeace.org/raw/content/espana/reports/devorando-la-amazonia.pdf


The corporation logo.(Image).Access date:march 4th 2011. Available at: http://conciencianoosfera.wordpress.com/d-o-c-u-m-e-n-t-a-l-e-s/ 


 Achbar,M., Abbott J.(2003) (directors).The corporation (film).


The definition of a corporation.Access date:march 4th 2011. Available at: http://www.allbusiness.com/legal/contracts-agreements-incorporation/529-1.html

QUESTION

In this documentary, corporations are defined as "legal entities" and they meet the clinical definition of psychopathic behavior. Do you agree, why, or why not?

I disagree with the generalizations made in the film that make the viewer think that all corporations are externalizing monsters displaying a psychopathic behavior, because even if SOME corporations have done certain unethical actions and display a lack of empathy and moral , it doesn´t mean that all corporations are the same. The documentary only looks at bad examples but the authors don´t take in consideration that many corporations after learning from their mistakes, have tried to correct them, and as far as I know Psychopaths would not try to fix their mistakes as they feel no remorse. Let´s take Mcdonald´s as an example, this corporation has been criticized many times for not taking into consideration the impact of their operations over the environment, but after they discovered the damages that one of their suppliers was doing to the amazon rainforest to extract soya, they inmediately responded by promising to never buy soya from newly deforested areas, until now they have kept their promise, and they are working with Greenpeace closely to find other ways to develop green initiatives . Psychopaths on the other hand, are not able to mantain long relationships or commit truly to a campaign.