Remaking the Economy: Escaping Corporate Capture

What is “corporate capture” and how can people escape its effects—in our politics, our culture, our daily life, and in the nonprofit sector? How do people, in short, build an actual everyday politics and economics of liberation?

This was the organizing question for the summer 2024 issue of Nonprofit Quarterly. To addresses this question and expand upon their contributions, four authors from NPQ’s summer economic justice magazine explore the concept of corporate capture and how movement-based groups can build viable escape routes to advance economic justice.

Participating in the webinar conversation are the following people:

Kali Akuno is the cofounder and executive director of Cooperation Jackson, based in Jackson, Mississippi.

Hannah Appel is cofounder of the Debt Collective, a professor of anthropology, and associate director of the UCLA Luskin Institute on Inequality and Democracy, based in Los Angeles, California.

Arlene Martinez is deputy executive director of Good Jobs First, based in Washington, DC.

Sara Myklebust is research director for Bargaining for the Common Good, based at Georgetown University’s Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor and the Working Poor in Washington, DC.

This webinar explores:

What do we mean by corporate capture? How does it affect economic justice work?
How can debtors organize to build power and restrain the power of banks and financial institutions?
How can communities organize effectively to limit corporate tax breaks?
How can workers and labor unions leverage trillions of worker pension dollars to advance an economy that prioritizes the common good?
How does one build a solidarity economy on the ground?
What does it look like to transform racial capitalism? What are points of leverage and how do we engage for the long haul?
What is the role of cultural change in economic change work?
What are the democratic economic structures that people want and need—and are worth fighting for?

Resources:

Kali Akuno, “Building a Solidarity Economy in the South (and Beyond)—Cooperation Jackson,” NPQ, September 4, 2024.

Steve Dubb and Rithika Ramamurthy, “Corporate Capture—Can We Find a Way Out?, NPQ, July 31, 2024.

Arlene Martinez and Greg LeRoy, “Corporate Economic Blackmail and What to Do about It,” NPQ, August 7, 2024.

Sara Myklebust, Bahar Tolou and Stephen Lerner, “Whose Capital? Our Capital! The Power of Workers’ Pensions for the Common Good,” NPQ, July 31, 2024.

Astra Taylor and Hannah Appel, “They Need Us More Than We Need Them—The Power of Debtor Organizing,” NPQ, August 7, 2024.

About the authors

Steve Dubb

Steve Dubb is senior editor of economic justice at NPQ, where he writes articles (including NPQ’s Economy Remix column), moderates Remaking the Economy webinars, and works to cultivate voices from the field and help them reach a broader audience. Prior to coming to NPQ in 2017, Steve worked with cooperatives and nonprofits for over two decades, including twelve years at The Democracy Collaborative and three years as executive director of NASCO (North American Students of Cooperation). In his work, Steve has authored, co-authored, and edited numerous reports; participated in and facilitated learning cohorts; designed community building strategies; and helped build the field of community wealth building. Steve is the lead author of Building Wealth: The Asset-Based Approach to Solving Social and Economic Problems (Aspen 2005) and coauthor (with Rita Hodges) of The Road Half Traveled: University Engagement at a Crossroads, published by MSU Press in 2012. In 2016, Steve curated and authored Conversations on Community Wealth Building, a collection of interviews of community builders that Steve had conducted over the previous decade.

Kali Akuno

Kali Akuno is a cofounder and codirector of Cooperation Jackson. Previously, Akuno served as the director of Special Projects and External Funding in the mayoral administration of the late Chokwe Lumumba of Jackson, MS. He has also served as the codirector of the US Human Rights Network, the executive director of the Peoples’ Hurricane Relief Fund (PHRF) based in New Orleans, LA after Hurricane Katrina, and was a cofounder of the School of Social Justice and Community Development (SSJCD)—a public school serving the academic needs of low-income African American and Latinx communities in Oakland, CA.

Hannah Appel

Hannah Appel is cofounder of the Debt Collective and associate professor of anthropology at UCLA, where she also serves as associate director of the UCLA Luskin Institute on Inequality and Democracy.

Arlene Martínez

Arlene Martínez is Deputy Executive Director and Communications Director of Good Jobs First, a non-profit advocacy and resource center focused on corporate and government accountability. Follow her @avmartinez.

Sara Myklebust

Sara Myklebust is research director at the Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor and the Working Poor. Previously, she worked for the Bricklayers and Allied Craftworkers (BAC) as their deputy director for research and education and as a senior lead researcher in the Organizing Department of the AFL-CIO. Myklebust has helped to organize immigrant rebar workers across the Southwest, and has worked as a community organizer and policy analyst at FRESC, now UNE (United for a New Economy). She has an MA in public affairs from the University of Texas at Austin.

More about: Corporations and Inequity Remaking the Economy

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