My Underwatered Down Response to John Morrison of the Institute for Human Rights and Business:

My Underwatered Down Response to John Morrison of the Institute for Human Rights and Business:

We the (Natural) People Are Asserting Our Sovereignty. Lead or Get Out of Our Way.


The extent to which the latest and greatest UN convention/framework/statement/process on human rights makes any elite-controlled institutions of power (see the second to last paragraph of John Morrison’s piece for an incomplete list) more responsive to the rights and needs of human beings will be dictated by democratic force. Effective human rights policies will not be achieved by semantic sparring between corporate lawyers and nominal reformers.

Occupy Corporate Political Spending

Corporate influence over our political system is one of the concerns heard loudest from the Occupations springing up everywhere these days.

The standard corporate response to those who notice that corporate capture of politics is harming our country goes something like this: (in your whiniest, spoiled-child-complaining-to-Mom-like voice): "but corporations are people too and dominating the political discourse is our ri-ight. The Supreme Court even says so!"

That's technically true little Jonny, but you and I both know it is also some of the most dangerous horse s--t our legal system has ever produced. While corporations are legally recognized "persons," the reality is that public corporations are vast, ungainly amalgamations of people and institutions. And their political influence is eating away at the fabric of our Republic with increasingly greedy mouthfuls.

The People at the Head of the Table Are Talking Past the People Sitting Around the Table

Last week I sat in on a graduate seminar facilitated by the Honorable Mary Robinson. Not that you might need reminding, but she was the first female president of Ireland (1990-1997), a famously influential former UN High Commissioner on Human Rights (1997-2002), and is currently one of the twelve Global Elders. While I'm at it, I might as well mention that she founded Realizing Rights: The Ethical Globalization Initiative, "which aimed to put human rights standards at the heart of global governance and to ensure that the needs of the poorest and most vulnerable are addressed on the global stage." Her new project is The Mary Robinson Foundation - Climate Justice, "a centre for education and advocacy on sustainable and people-centred development in the world's poorest communities."

She sat at the head of the seminar table. We discussed the intersection of business and human rights. Actually, she mostly lectured.