Do transnational corporations that operate under the aegis of repressive regimes prove that capitalism can exist wholly without democracy?

If you’ve ever pondered the issues surrounding the tenuous relationship between democracy and capitalism, most likely, you’ve considered them as both foreign and abstract. Are, say, China and Russia authoritarian, capitalist or both at the same time? Can Middle Eastern countries use their sovereign wealth funds to build prosperous free-market economies while those nations also deny their citizens basic freedoms? Do transnational corporations that operate under the aegis of repressive regimes prove that capitalism can exist wholly without democracy?

While these are certainly significant questions, they obscure the fact that the tension between democracy and capitalism is also intensifying here at home. For instance, taxpayer-sponsored bailouts of and direct subsidies to particular politically connected industries effectively employ our democracy’s public power to undermine capitalism s notion of “creative destruction Regulatory and tax code loopholes for other industries do much the same. Meanwhile, the landmark Citizens United decision accelerates the trend whereby capitalism’s winners are able to wield disproportionate political power, effectively undermining democracy’s egalitarian notions of one person, one vote.”

Question 1: Explain how democracy and capitalism may lead to poverty

Social scientists interested in criminal activity have generally neglected the topic of 2. democracy, while researchers interested in the topic of democracy have virtually ignored activity. This confluence of neglect has been especially obvious in research on intellectual property (P) theft. Piracy data from eighty-two countries between the to 1995 and 2000 have been used to examine how democratization relates rates of software piracy. Digital software, hardware, and intellectual property as well as cyber crime is on the upswing throughout the globe.

Question 2: Does democracy protect or encourage intellectual property theft (copyrights, trademarks, software?)

Please use one of these books as your source.
Democracy, Crime, and Justice

Edited by:

Susanne Karstedt

University of Keele, UK

Gary D. LaFree

University of Maryland

Published in Association with American Academy of Political and Social Science

Series:

The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science Series

Understanding Criminal Justice

Sociological Perspectives

Authored by:

Philip D Smith

Yale University, USA

Kristin Natalier
University of Tasmania, Australia