Getting Democracy into General Motors
P., S.
BACK IN THE THIRTIES a small group of Marxists tried, unsuccessfully, to raise the slogan, "Open the Books!" as a way of compelling American giant corporations to disclose the true state of...
...1.3 million stockholders, and an enormous percentage of the stock university-owned...
...The antitrust laws are all but abandoned, a failure...
...Harvard University alone holds 287,000 shares of GM stock, and in recent months there was a great deal of discussion on the Harvard campus, much of it initiated by the action of the local branch of the Young Peoples Socialist League, concerning the need for Harvard to vote its shares in behalf of the Nader proposals...
...Professor Barber concludes that the top 100 American firms now own half of all the nation's manufacturing assets (means of production), while the top 200 corporations own 60 percent (20 years ago the figure was 50 percent...
...It was done in the hope that the unions, in their negotiations with industry, would pick up this idea and that it would become part of a growing worker's militancy...
...It is estimated that 29 million GM shares are in the hands of institutions, including universities...
...The American people, increasingly aware of the environmental crisis and unhappy over the plainly obstructionist attitude of the business world (where is that fumeless auto engine...
...Its clearest manifestation to date has been Ralph Nader's "Campaign for Corporate Responsibility" directed against General Motors' management, with the goal of getting support for a series of proposals: three consumers' representatives to be added to General Motors' board of directors...
...It is the widening drive, spearheaded by students and the United Auto Workers Union, to get the major corporations to adopt more socially responsible and responsive positions on questions such as pollution June 10, 1970 and the hiring of minorities...
...a series of resolutions pertaining to GM irresponsibility in the area of pollution, auto safety, employee safety, and racial discrimination in the handing-out of franchises...
...a permanent watchdog committee— to be formed by UAW representatives, civil-rights and religious groups, etc.—that will report on GM fulfillment of these proposals...
...The issue of social responsibility is clearly joined...
...This issue has enormous political and social potential, for it raises, even if thus far mildly, a central issue that we socialists have always concentrated upon: the issue of economic and industrial democracy...
...The action is constructive, and it ought to be broadened and deepened...
...COMMENTS AND OPINIONS THE NADER PROPOSALS' defeat at the last GM stockholders' meeting does not take away from the significance of this new movement...
...New studies analyzing American capitalism (e.g., Richard Barber's The American Corporation) indicate that we are going through the greatest corporation merger movement in our history-50 of the corporations listed among the 500 largest by Fortune magazine in 1962 have since that time been absorbed by other giants, and 30 of these since 1968...
...and foreign employees...
...BACK IN THE THIRTIES a small group of Marxists tried, unsuccessfully, to raise the slogan, "Open the Books...
...General Motors, the world's greatest industrial concern (700,000 U.S...
...as a way of compelling American giant corporations to disclose the true state of their financial dealings and holdings...
...Now, some decades later a parallel idea is taking hold...
...a concern with five times the annual income of the population of Rhode Island), will have to reckon with this movement from now on...
...may be ripe for a new approach to corporate gigantism...
...Again, the students have an opportunity to link up with other progressive forces in our society: the unions, the consumers and their organizations...
Vol. 17 • July 1970 • No. 4
