Ferreras Firms as Political Entities

Saving Democracy through Economic Bicameralism
Erscheinungsjahr 2017
ISBN: 978-1-108-24676-7
Verlag: Cambridge University Press
Format: PDF
Kopierschutz: Adobe DRM (»Systemvoraussetzungen)

E-Book, Englisch, 0 Seiten

When people go to work, they cease to be citizens. At their desks they are transformed into employees, subordinate to the hierarchy of the workplace. The degree of their sense of voicelessness may vary from employer to employer, but it is real and growing, inflamed by populist propaganda that ridicules democracy as weak and ineffective amid global capitalism. At the same time, corporations continue untouched and even unremarked as a major source of the problem. Relying on 'economic bicameralism' to consider firms as political entities, this book sheds new light on the institutions of industrial relations that have marked the twentieth century, and argues that it is time to recognize that firms are a peculiar institution that must be properly organized in order to unshackle workers' motivation and creativity, and begin nurturing democracy again.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Ferreras, Isabelle

Fachgebiete

• Sozialwissenschaften Politikwissenschaft Politikwissenschaft Allgemein Politische Theorie, Politische Philosophie

Inhaltsverzeichnis

Introduction; Part I. Critical History of Power in the Firm: The Slow Transition of Work from the Private to the Public Sphere: 1. Stage One: the workplace and its emergence from the household; 2. The nineteenth and twentieth centuries: workers movements, and the invention of collective bargaining; 3. The twentieth century and the ambiguities of institutional innovations in the capitalist firm; 4. Today, the service economy is bringing work into the public sphere to govern; Part II. What is a Firm?: 5. Obsolete vision: instrumental rationality as the firm's sole logic; 6. Foundations for the political theory of the firm; 7. Bicameral movements: a pivotal institutional innovation for governments in democratic transition; 8. Analogy: the executive of the firm answering to two chambers; 9. To conclude.

Über Autor(innen)

Ferreras, Isabelle
Isabelle Ferreras is a tenured fellow of the Belgian National Science Foundation. A sociologist and political scientist by training, this book is the keystone of her long-term research into the tensions between capitalism and democracy.