Are Corporations People?

                The argument that corporations are people is a very intriguing one because it is trying to give a large entity with the potential to generate an immense amount of money a human role. Corporations can have similarities to human behavior because they are created by man, so they will be fashioned in a similar manner. When we look at any situation, problem, or anything in our world and we try to understand it, we will give it human characteristics. When we do that we bring it down to our level so that we can find solutions, foresee problems, etc. This is actually a very efficient and smart way to tackle the unknown and make sense of our world. The thing about this is that even though they are fashioned in our manner and we explain a thing through human characteristics does not mean that that thing is human; in this case corporations are not human.

                The fact of the matter is that even though we do give corporations human characteristics to best understand them, they are not human. Corporations are entities that generate money that help our economy grow and be stable. They are good for people when they are managed correctly, but when misguided can be detrimental to human stability.  

                Even though a corporation has a birth, a productive life, and the potential of death does not make it human. If that were the case, any living object would be human; such as a worm, bacteria, a tree, etc.  Another human characteristic is that a corporation has “feelings.” Just because we use the word feel for a lack of a better word to describe what a corporation will transpire over time and explain the reactions to what can affect it does not really make it have feelings like a human. This would mean that water is human because it feels and reacts by moving when one blows on it. The violation of human rights is also a human characteristic that can be placed upon a corporation because it can mistreat the worker (the human). This will also mean that a hurricane is human because it has the potential to mistreat or violate the rights of the people it comes to contact with.

GOP, Corporations, and the Average Person

In Corporations, People, and Truth, Gary Gutting presents a great argument over what corporations really are and what they stand for. This commentary by Gutting is a response to GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney’s response to hecklers in which he stated that “Corporations are people.” He breaks down this statement to figure out if corporations really are people. If one is technically speaking, as Gutting mentions, “corporations are people because they are made up of people; but corporations do not feel, hurt, or love, so in reality they are not people.”  He goes on to question whether corporations are pro consumer (fundamental human value) or pro shareholder (profit making). In the end the corporations will decide and lean toward the profit making side of business. He ends with a good quote from Michael Foucault that states, “Of all power structures, it’s not that corporations are bad but that they are dangerous.”

                When looking at this topic and comparing it to what is happening in our nation and world today, one can really get emotional over the statement that Mitt Romney said. When one is comparing a corporation, which is intended to make a lot of money  and  a whole lot more to a certain few,  to a person who in today’s world is struggling to make ends meet, that person will get a lot of push back. These types of statements really make the GOP look and sound insensitive to the average person. I understand that people need corporations to make jobs but at the same time corporations need people to work in them and to trust in them so that they do not falter. Neither side is more important than the other and Romney’s statement makes it seem and sound like the corporation is more important than the individual. In order to have a healthy economy both sides need to trust each other. It is like Foucault says that corporations are not bad; as a matter of fact they are needed for our economy to grow and prosper. The thing is that if the corporation is just in the lookout for the few and bends the whole; that can become dangerous very quickly