Re: Relativism
> And yes, I consider it not merely incorrect, but itself evil to ascribe evil to other than a thinking being, a "person". The "personhood" of a corporation is a legal fiction, not a reality. Assigning evil to the gun rather than the wielder, the corporation rather than the executives, or the party rather than its members, excuses the wielder, the exec, and the members -- and if you excuse it, you participate in it.
I am not labeling corporations evil to excuse the actions of individuals. Rather, what I am talking about is the capacity for corporations to inflict harm even when the actions of none of the employees could be considered evil themselves.
To put together an example, lets say company Z sets up a factory in some third world country. They want to minimize the number of factories they have, so they have built a very large one. The size of the factory is such that they have to offer higher wages to attact employees, but also means that they are by far the single largest employeer in the country.
Several years later they decide to move on to another country that has a larger unemployeed population, so they can hire more people at a lower wage.
This causes the economy of of the first country to collapse, destroying the lives of thousands.
The question is, who, if anybody, could be considered evil here? The managers of company Z can not really be blaimed for minimizing company expenses, nor can the citizens of country be blaimed for taking the highest paying job. The government of that country does carry some fault for letting all their eggs in one basket, but they can't be said to have to much.
This is the sort of evil I am ascribing to the company as a whole, evil that can not be reasonably ascribed to any individual.
However, the above does not excuse intentional acts of malice or corruption. If some manager at company Z bribes a local offical to shut down compeating factories to free up employees at a lower rate that is direct evil by that manager and anybody at the company that knew of it.
> Hypothetical example, which somebody may be able to find a concrete version of: the X Corporation, in obedience with the new ordnances, forbids smoking in the workplace. The smokers among the workers evade the new regime by sneaking out the fire exits to grab a smoke. The managers of the plant, concerned by the resulting decrease in productivity, order the security section to chain the fire exits shut. There is a fire in the plant, and several workers die because the fire exits couldn't be used.
>
> What's going to happen?
>
> Well, the X Corporation is obviously gonna get sued, right? And they'll lose, because X Corporation is obviously "guilty". So the widows, widowers, and orphans of the dead workers get a nice piece of change.
>
> But who's really guilty? The _actor_ who caused the deaths is the security guard who physically chained the doors shut; and, under any reasonable definition of the terms, the exec who ordered that action is accessory before the fact and probably a conspirator, in other words just as guilty as the guard is; to my mind, more so, since he effectively extorts misbehavior from the guard by threat of dismissal if the doors aren't chained toot-sweet.
>
> Under the existing system, the investors and stockholders of X Corporation -- many, if not most, of whom knew nothing of the action and would not have condoned it if they did -- get a substantial portion of their wealth taken away, to pay the WWO and their lawyers. The security guard who obeyed orders gets fired. And the executive who gave the order gets a bonus for constructive contributions to the legal effort, and goes home happy.
>
> In other words: Hammer the uninvolved, punish the hapless, and let the real author of all those deaths go free with a fat check to console his conscience. If you want evil, as far as I'm concerned that's it.
That the manager in this case gets off without punishment is wrong, I would agree with that. But I would not hold the investors and shareholders blameless in a situation like this. They knew (or should have) what sort of company they where investing in. As the owners of the company they have responsibility to see that the people under them are not breaking the law.
As a matter of fact, I believe that much of the problem with the current situation is that investors and shareholders do not share sufficent blame in these cases. Because they can not lose more then their original investment, they are encourged to invest their money in the company promising the highest return, even if the company is obviously shady or questionable, they pick managers based on who seems to promise the greatest cash flow, not which will keep the company out of court.
On a side note, is it just me or is the style used by the Quote button clumsy? It makes it hard to tell what is a quote and what is not.
Jay
