Beyond Corporate Fundamentalism: A Marxian Class Analysis of Corporate Crime Law Reform

Abstract

This article uses Marxian class theory to examine the state’s role in disciplining the modern corporation. Over the past decade, the Canadian government has enacted laws extending corporate criminal liability to safety crimes and stock market fraud, and considered, but ultimately decided against, legislation that would have made Canadian mining, oil and gas companies operating in developing countries liable under Canadian law. Using empirical data from Canadian parliamentary hearings, the author argues that efforts to punish corporations through law represent an important struggle over who should have the power to control the conditions for appropriating and distributing surplus value. At the same time, however, these struggles fail to address the fundamental exploitation that Marx identified in his surplus labour theory of class. The author concludes that we need to transcend the state’s law reform efforts to transform the manner in which surplus values are generated, appropriated and distributed.