[extropy-chat] Depressing Thought. from Laurence of Berkeley

[Samantha Atkins]

On Sunday 09 November 2003 16:03, Greg Burch wrote:
> The corporate form per se is no more or less problematic than any other
> means of holding and using property and contract rights.  The problem
> arises when state power is fused with the form through corporatist
> government policies.  Blaiming "corporations" is like blaming any other
> interest group that bids for and buys government favor, be they "farmers,"
> "unions" or other organized groups that manage to garner preferential
> treatment from the state.  Corporations are RELATVELY weak in the EU
> (compared to the US), but these other organized interest groups have done
> just as much harm by co-opting state power for their special interests in
> the EU -- viz. France and their endless strikes and labor-driven politics,
> or the agricultural protectionism in the EU that is one of the main factors
> derailing free trade in the world.  The evil doesn't lie in the legal form
> per se, but in the sell-out of state power.

Yes.  I would go further to say that if significant state power exists then 
there will be a bidding war to gain access and control that power.  

Speaking of agricultural protectionism, what of the effects of that as 
practiced by the US?  I believe we are a much more significant agricultural 
player worldwide than the EU.  

- s