Corporatism

1
Corporatism

• Origins and Development
• Forms of Corporatism
• The Three Great Isms

2
What is Corporatism?

• Corporatism refers to a set of beliefs that seek
  to bring about the institutions and practices
  that involve a system of interest representation
  or a kind of state-society relationship that is
  controlled and regulated by the state, the
  requirements of the law, or the predominant
  social norms, and their interactions are
  incorporated into the formal structures of the
  state, monitored and guided by the state in
  modern society or political authority in
  traditional society.

3
Origins

• The origins of corporatism in the Western
  tradition can be traced back to the very first
  expressions of political philosophy the Bible,
  Greek philosophy, and Ancient Rome, which shared
  the organic views of society and state relations,
  and sought to organize society along natural,
  class, or occupational lines into well-ordered
  and integrated functional or corporative units.
  Historically, their influences helped give rise
  to the natural, traditional, or historical forms
  of corporatism, top-down, authoritarian, and
  statist form of corporatism and a more
  democratic, pluralistic, representative, and
  societal form of corporatism.

4
Development

• Corporatism can be seen as a mixture of those
  ideologies between or as an alternative or a
  third approach to Liberalism and Marxism.
  Corporatism has become a global phenomenon,
  rather than one limited to just one or two areas,
  Europe or Latin America.
• Modern corporatism have taken a variety of forms
  in different countries, ranging from
  natural-historical-cultural corporatism in its
  tribal, ethnic and communal forms, or
  social-group-oriented corporatism in its
  pluralist forms, social-control-oriented
  corporatism in its authoritarian statist forms,
  and neo-corporatism in its modern
  liberal-pluralistic and managed capitalistic
  forms.

5
Forms of Corporatism

• Natural-historical-cultural corporatism
• Social-group-oriented corporatism
• Authoritarian statist corporatism
• Liberal-democratic neo-corporatism

6
The Three Great Isms

• Liberalism
• (1) Liberalism focuses on individuals who pursue
  their own economic and political interests
  rationally in the economic and political
  marketplace.
• (2) Liberalism believes that the primary
  motivating force is the competition between
  individuals who seek to maximize their
  self-interests, satisfaction, or utility through
  the free market.
• (3) Liberalism emphasizes the role of the market
  mechanism through which economic activity and
  allocation of resources are coordinated.
• (4) Since society is consisted of multiple
  interest groups, conflicts among them are
  inevitable. But the multiple interest groups and
  their competitions are performing the function of
  bargaining and compromise that will eventually
  minimize the conflicts and play a decisive role
  in shaping public policy.
• (5) Democracy, the free market, and the
  private-owned property are viewed as better
  political and economic institutions at
  facilitating and maximizing economic development,
  economic efficiency, social justice, freedom,
  human rights, and many values of human society.

7

• Marxism
• (1) Marxism rejects the starting point of
  liberalism (individuals) and argues that it is
  impossible to discuss any individual without at
  the same time discussing the total social
  relationships within which individuals interact
  with one another.
• (2) Marxism also rejects liberalism assumption
  that free competition will contribute to the
  greatest good of the largest number as well as
  minimize the conflicts among interest groups.
• (3) The state is seen as the coercive instrument
  of the ruling class, rather than providing
  neutral procedural guarantees for a free
  competition among classes, groups, and
  individuals.
• (4) Capitalist private property is the source of
  greed, exploitation, class struggle, injustice,
  and all social evils, making it possible that
  some people live by owning and other people live
  by working
• (5) Socialist democracy ( the proletariat
  dictatorship), planned economy, and public or
  state ownership are viewed as better political
  and economic institutions at mitigating social
  inequality, insecurity, injustice, and other
  social evils and maximizing economic development,
  human potentiality, and common wealth.

8

• Corporatism
• (1) In contrast to Liberalism and Marxism, the
  focus is not on the individual, nor on the class
  structure, but on the process of collective
  action, interests intermediation, and social
  cooperation.
• (2) Corporatism aims to establish a new social
  order or a new political system in which harmony
  of classes and interests can be achieved through
  the reconciliation of the classes in modern
  society.
• (3) The state can neither be neutral with respect
  to organized interests, nor be understood simply
  as a class bias, but has its own moral end and
  pursues the common good for all.
• (4) Therefore, the state is interventionist and
  architectural, and it has enough autonomy to
  initiate policies, establish rules and guidance
  on how individuals or groups interact with one
  another and who has access to policy process.
• (5) Corporatism, which is essentially based upon
  democracy and the market economy, is a better
  social system at mitigating social inequality,
  insecurity, and conflicts of classes while
  maximizing harmony of interests, sustainable
  economic development, and collectivist ends or
  public goods.

9
Corporatism in Practice

• Liberalism attempts to maximize self-interest,
  freedom, and competition to arrive at maximum
  economic efficiency and political equilibrium.
• Communism attempts to maximize control of the
  economy by state planning and state ownership to
  achieve a monolithic society by eliminating the
  autonomy of civil society and by building new
  collectivist values and structures.
• Corporatism does not maximize any of the polar
  principles of egoistic individualism and state
  centralism. Corporatism implies both strong
  constraints on laissez faire market and strong
  limitations on legitimacy of the state to act as
  the chief owner of the means of production and
  chief planner of the economy.

10
-continued Corporatism

• In this model, the state attempts to establish
  the parameters, rules, priorities, and
  infrastructures for the harmonious integration of
  the component parts of the society and the
  economy to achieve the common good of the whole
  society. The state ensures this integration
  between the component parts and the whole, while
  each of the component parts is self-managing and
  has a high degree of freedom and participation
  within state-initiated, organic structures.