Corporatism Origins and Development Forms of Corporatism The Three Great “Isms”

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.

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.

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.

Forms of Corporatism Natural-historical-cultural corporatism Social-group-oriented corporatism Authoritarian statist corporatism Liberal-democratic neo-corporatism

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.

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.

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.

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.

-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.