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March
13, 2002
Alexander
Cockburn
When
Billy Graham Wanted
to Kill One Million People
March
12, 2002
Kay Lee
Dangerous
Changes in
California's Prisons
John Patrick
Leary
The
Return of Otto Reich
Wole Akande
US
is Being Discredited
in the Eyes of Africa
March
11, 2002
Hani Shukrallah
This
is the Way the World Ends
Tommy
Ates
Bush's
New Nuke Policy:
Target Allies and Enemies
Lidia Andrusenko
The Great
Chicken War:
Bush v. Putin
Dave Marsh
10
CDs Playing On My Desk
John Chuckman
Footprints
in the Dust
Norman
Madarasz
Max
Steel in a Time of Chaos
March
10, 2002
Thomas
Croft
Year
of Living Dangerously
March
9, 2002
Bill Cook
Sharon's
Bulldozer
Alexander
Cockburn
The
Nightmare in Israel
March
8, 2002
Mokhiber
/ Weissman
When
Business Men
Make Boo-Boos
CounterPunch
Exclusive
Enron's
Spooky
Image Consultant
Rep. Ron
Paul
Stop
the War on Colombia
Andre
Achong
The
Failed War on Drugs
John B.
Kelly
Michael
Moore and Me:
Disability Rights and
a Big Stupid White Guy
March
7, 2002
CounterPunch
Wire
Congressman
McInnis Equates Enviros to al-Qaeda
Mike Rogers
Will
the Battle of Shah-i-Kot Become the Taliban's Alamo
Walt Brasch
Patriot
Act and Free Speech
John Jonik
Insurance
Scams:
Who Are the Scofflaws?
Cockburn
/ St. Clair
Bumper
Crop: The Politics
of Afghan Opium
March
6, 2002
CounterPunch
Wire
A
Beautiful Mind:
Another Dangerous Lie?
Tom Turnipseed
War
Is Wrong
David
Vest
Billy
Graham and Nixon:
Tangled Up in Tape
Patrick
Cockburn
The
Bombings That
Made Putin a Hero
CounterPunch
Wire
Berezovsky
Fingers Putin
in Bombings
Edward
Said
Thoughts
About America
March
5, 2002
CounterPunch
Wire
Ann
Coulter At It Again:
Race-Baiting Norm Mineta
Bill Christison
A
Former CIA Officer
Explains Why the War
on Terror Won't Work
Delkhasteh and Wright
What
Should We be Fighting For? An Open Letter
to Pro-War Academics
Mariya
Tsvekova
Putin's
Georgian Gambit
March
4, 2002
Ralph
Nader
Dick
Cheney: A Dinosaur
in the Age of Mammals
Uri Avnery
How
Israel Will Torpedo
the Saudi Peace Plan
Southern
/ Kubrick
Stangelove
Scenario
for Shadow Govt. Bunker
David
Vest
Grammy's
of Constant Sorrow
A Photographic Journal of Life
in an Afghan Refugee Camp
By Judith Mann
Resources:
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About 9/11
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Days That
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Seattle and Beyond
By Alexander
Cockburn
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CIA's Assassination Plan a History of
Torture in US Prisons
bin Laden and Bush
Business Connections
Aisha Ikramuddin on the Hidden Hype
of US Food Bombs
Peter Linebaugh on
Pakistan
Christopher Hitchens' Love for Mrs. Thatcher
Jiang Zemin Tells Bush:
Nuke 'Em
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and Osama bin Laden
Whiteout:
CIA, Drugs & the
Press
by Alexander
Cockburn
and Jeffrey St. Clair
The New Crusade:
America's War on Terrorism
By Rahul Mahajan
The Memphis Blues Again:
Six Decades of Memphis Music Photographs
Photos by Ernest Withers
Text by Daniel Wolff
The New Intifada:
Resisting Israel's Apartheid
Edited by Roane Carey
A Pocket Guide to
Environmental Bad Guys
by James Ridgeway
and Jeffrey St. Clair
The
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by Douglas Valentine
Al Gore:
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March 13, 2002
Personal Responsibility
for the Corporate Elite
By Russell Mokhiber and
Robert Weissman
Before the corporate and political elite consign
the "corporate accountability" proposal issued by
President Bush last week to the dustbin, it is worth highlighting
one element: the idea that CEOs sign and personally attest to
the accuracy of the financial numbers their companies make
public.
Here is what is important about this
proposal: No one believes the CEOs are going to actually generate
the numbers and track down each and every figure. Rather, the
expectation is that making the CEOs personally responsible
for the truthfulness of their statements will give them the
needed incentive to put in place systems to ensure accuracy.
This is a radical concept.
Don't worry. We haven't lost perspective.
We have zero expectation that the Bush administration is interested
in applying the concept seriously.
Our point here is to emphasize the power
of the concept.
One of the reasons corporations are so
powerful is that they are entities structured in complex fashion
to shield themselves and their top executives from responsibility
for damage they may inflict on others. One of the perquisites
of large size is that -- absent an Enron-scale debacle -- top
management can always claim that "they didn't know"
about the misdeeds committed by the corporation, presumably
ordered or overseen by a lower-level official.
The Bush proposal, taken seriously, cuts
through the protective layering insulating top executives.
It puts the onus on the CEO, making it
the CEO's job to know. Under the Bush proposal, if a CEO attests
to the validity of a grossly inaccurate financial statement,
he or she would be required to return bonuses, and could be
barred from serving as an officer or director of any publicly
traded company.
There's no reason this assignment of
personal responsibility to CEOs should be limited to financial
disclosures.
CEOs should be made personally responsible
for ensuring their corporation complies with its specific legal
duties, and particularly their obligation to comply with the
law.
Leave aside, for now, the issue of corporate
executives' obligations to shareholders. Under the "business
judgment" rule, executives are largely immune from liability
to shareholders for any action undertaken in good faith. Underlying
the business judgment rule is the notion that executives need
discretion to use their best judgment to make corporate decisions,
and that courts should not second-guess those decisions in hindsight.
There are problems with the business judgment rule, but it is
clear that executives do need some discretion when it comes
to running a business.
But that discretion cannot include contravening
statutory law and related regulations. Those rules circumscribe
permissible corporate behavior. Corporations have a legal duty
to respect occupational health and safety rules, environmental
laws, workers' labor rights, consumer regulations and criminal
codes.
And just the way President Bush was right
to propose tbat CEOs take personal responsibility for ensuring
their corporations fulfill their legal duty to issue accurate
financial statements, it makes sense to demand that corporations'
top officials -- their chief executive officers -- take personal
responsibility for ensuring the companies comply with legal
duties related to worker safety, worker rights, the environment,
consumer protection and avoiding criminal wrongdoing.
The logic here is the same as in the
Bush proposal. CEOs of large corporations cannot be expected
to know the details of every action undertaken in the corporate
name. But by being held personally responsible -- with meaningful
penalties in case of company noncompliance -- they can be given
the necessary incentive to put in place systems to ensure their
company respects the law.
"America is ushering in a responsibility
era," President Bush said in issuing his corporate accountability
proposal, "a culture regaining a sense of personal responsibility,
where each of us understands we're responsible for the decisions
we make in life. And this new culture must include a renewed
sense of corporate responsibility. If you lead a corporation,
you have a responsibility to serve your shareholders, to be
honest with your employees. You have a responsibility to obey
the law and to tell the truth."
Those are fine principles. Let's give
them teeth by holding CEOs personally responsible not just for
their corporation's financial statements, but for making sure
their corporations comply with the law.
Russell Mokhiber
is editor of the Washington, D.C.-based Corporate Crime Reporter.
Robert Weissman is editor of the Washington, D.C.-based
Multinational Monitor.
They are co-authors of Corporate
Predators: The Hunt for MegaProfits and the Attack on Democracy
(Monroe, Maine: Common Courage Press, 1999)
(c) Russell Mokhiber and Robert Weissman
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