Half of the worldıs 100 largest economies are not nations, they are corporations. A mere 500 companies control 70 percent of world trade. Such concentrations of wealth pose a clear and present danger to the health of our democracy. Corporate campaign cash elects our politicians. Corporate lobbyists write our laws.
But what corporations have gained in political power they have lost in legitimacy. A growing number of people--environmental activists, trade unionists, family farmers--are challenging the power of giant corporations, demanding that they be held accountable to someone other than their shareholders.
These efforts exploded to the surface of American politics in November 1999,when tens of thousands of people shut down the World Trade Organization meetings in Seattle. Not long after that, a BusinessWeek poll found that 77 percent of U.S. citizens feel that corporations have too much power and that was before the Enron scandal broke.
In Insurrection, Kevin Danaher and Jason Mark, twohigh-profile activists, present a series of stories chronicling the accomplishments of the budding corporate accountability movement: the uncovering of major retailersı links to sweatshop abuses; the revelation that big tobacco companies deceived the public about the health risks of smoking; the questioning of corporationsı ties to repressive dictatorships; the shaming of food processors into selling dolphin-safe tuna; and the battles against NAFTA and the WTO. Together, these struggles seek to fulfill the idea that in a democracy no institution is above the law.
Filled with compelling accounts that are both lively and informative, Insurrection is the definitive book on the burgeoning anti-corporate globalization movement.