INCORPORATING GOVERNANCE IN CAPITALIST ENTERPRISES: CORPORATE GOVERNANCE UNDER CONDITIONS OF GLOBAL CAPITALISM

This essay is an attempt to unpack the logic of 'governance' in general and of 'corporate governance' in particular under conditions of contemporary neo-liberal globalisation. The argument of the essay is straightforward: the contemporary governance projects at the global, national, and corporate scales are for capital for the purpose of universalising the disciplines central to capitalist reproduction. The essay is organised in 5 inter-related sections. First, it situates corporations against the background of globalising capitalism founded on the ideology of two-liberalism. Second, it attempts to unpack the nature of global governance' of contemporary political economy of development with particular attention to the governance mechanisms of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF). This section also lays the analytical foundation of 'meta-governance' as an intellectual filter through which the governance project of the Bank and the Fund is framed. Third, it sees these multilateral institutions acting like a 'global panopticon' in the institutionalisation of capitalist discipline from state to state within the system through a set of operating principles embodied in their good governance projects, and as shown in their poverty reduction strategies and surveillance mechanisms. Fourth, it tries to reveal the exploitative nature of corporate governance within the broader capitalist structure as an ideological assault to the working class. Finally, the concluding section sums up the essay and advances 5 theses on the logic of governance under conditions of global capitalism, and likewise hints at spaces in which alternative future beyond the constraints of the market forces could be advanced.