Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!hoptoad!ptsfa!pyramid!decwrl!labrea!rutgers!rochester!PT.CS.CMU.EDU!SPEECH2.CS.CMU.EDU!yamauchi From: yamauchi@SPEECH2.CS.CMU.EDU.UUCP Newsgroups: alt.cyberpunk Subject: Re: Story ideas (Companies as Nations) Message-ID: <324@PT.CS.CMU.EDU> Date: Sun, 8-Nov-87 01:46:26 EST Article-I.D.: PT.324 Posted: Sun Nov 8 01:46:26 1987 Date-Received: Mon, 9-Nov-87 06:32:12 EST References: <323@PT.CS.CMU.EDU> Sender: netnews@PT.CS.CMU.EDU Organization: Carnegie-Mellon University, CS/RI Lines: 93 In article <323@PT.CS.CMU.EDU>, skh@SPICE.CS.CMU.EDU (Steve Handerson) writes: > > > While flaming out Ray Frank, I got a great idea for cyberpunk. > I haven't read any (?) cyberpunk novels, but I hope to get to it soon. > Well, ok, I've read some P.K.Dick, and actually this was probably > implicit in Bladerunner. Anyway, here it is: > > COMPANIES AS GANGS > > Some time in the distant dusty legal history of our society, > some jerk came up with the idea that COMPANIES WERE INDIVIDUALS. > Therefore, they have all the rights of individuals. > (with none of the responsibility -- no ONE PERSON is responsible > for the company's actions. Or maybe that's the president or > something, while the chairman is who makes the decisions...) > > Basically it's getting harder to survive without belonging to some > company. This "join or die" philosophy naturally links in with gangs, > gang warfare, etc. Actually, an idea that is implicit in William Gibson's universe is: Companies as Nations Traditional (geographic) nations still exist, but their power has been superceeded by that of the multinationals. Corporate citizenship basically takes the place of national citizenship, and the companies take all of the roles of nations: from maintaining intracorporate peace and order to engaging in intercorporate wars and intrigue. Elite scientists who want to change corporations arrange defections by hiring mercenaries (financed by the company to which they are defecting) to arrange their escape from their current corporation. I'm not sure that corporations would go as far as you are suggesting in eliminating personal rights. Employees would probably have a degree of rights proportional to their personal worth: a brilliant scientist would be very valuable to the corporation and would have almost total freedom (subject to the requirement of producing valuable research) -- on the other hand an assembly-line worker or paper-pushing clerk (assuming any of either remain in the automated workplace) would have minimal rights since they are easily replacable. Even so, it would be to the corporation's advantage to keep even their low-worth employees satisfied, since workers who are happy tend to work more efficiently. I have written a number of SF stories (not really cyberpunk) set in an interstellar society I have developed named the Confederation. In the Confederation, governments and corporations are recognized as the same thing: powerbases. Both types of powerbases engage in the same sorts of activites: manufacturing, trade, exploration, development, security, warfare, espionage, sabotage, assassination, etc. The only difference is that the primary motivation behind a corporate powerbase is economic, while the primary motivation behind a governmental powerbase is political and/or military. For this reason, corporations tend to take a *less* intrusive role in their citizen's lives than governments. Corporations view their employees as machines which require a certain cost (salary, benefits, protection, etc.) and which serve a certain function in the profit-making system. The corporations have a completely lassiez-faire attitude toward any employee actions which do not directly affect profits. In contrast, governments generally require that their citizens live within a variety of rules which define "good citizenship" in the view of the government -- usually in terms which ensure the power of the ruling elite over a wide area of personal affairs, including areas completely separate from economic production. Governments usually attempt to legislate some form of ideology upon their population, regardless of whether the leaders believe in it themselves. In today's world, this ranges from the rigid puritan morality of the far right to the collectivist wealth redistribution of the far left. Of course, since corporate powerbases in the Confederation are completely non-ideological, they make no attempt to implement a "justice system" independent of corporate interests, so any retribution for individual actions will be conducted on the basis of what is best for the corporation. For example: if a competent middle-level manager kills a menial laborer, he will probably only receive a reprimand (for possibly damaging employee morale, and hence employee productivity), but if the same manager were to kill a top researcher or a high-ranking executive, he would be hunted down and terminated. Note that the same thing might happen in a governmental powerbase whose legal system favors members of the bureacracy, but the government would try to justify its actions as being in the (always nebulous) "public interest", while the corporation would simply act in manner to maximize the efficacy of the corporate system. ______________________________________________________________________________ Brian Yamauchi INTERNET: yamauchi@speech2.cs.cmu.edu Carnegie-Mellon University Computer Science Department ______________________________________________________________________________