Last night on television, I saw part one in a three-part documentary entitled "The Corporation", written by Joel Bakan (who wrote the accompanying book "The Corporation: The Pathological Pursuit of Profit and Power") and directed by Mark Achbar (best known for the 1992 documentary "Manufacturing Consent: Noam Chomsky and the Media", which he co-directed and co-produced) and Jennifer Abbott (best known for "A Cow at My Table", a documentary about meat, culture and animals, which she produced and directed).
Visually, there was nothing special about this film, no breathtaking cinematography here. And the creators did not incorporate themselves into the film ala Michael Moore (of Fahrenheit 9/11 and Bowling For Columbine) and Morgan Spurlock (of Super Size Me) to appeal to a wider, more mainstream audience.
But it is brilliant, due to its ability to convey, rationally, coherently and captivatingly, its fundamental premise on the nature of the most important intitution in the world today -- corporations.
The film begins with a quick history lesson in how corporations were once merely institutions chartered by governments to carry out specific public functions, and how a 19th-century legal innovation led to treating them as legal "persons", entitled to the same rights and protections that people enjoy under the law. If the corporation is a person, the film asks, what sort of person is it?
The answer, using four case studies and actual diagnostic criteria of the World Health Organization and the DSM-IV (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders), is incontrovertible.
It's a psychopath.
![]](/images/header/edge.gif){kind=small}
