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The Corporation

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The Corporation: The Corporation is today's dominant institution, creating great wealth but also great harm. This 26 award-winning documentary examines the nature, evolution, impacts and future of the modern business corporation and the increasing role it plays in society and our everyday lives.

The birth of the corporation: How the corporation came to be. Originally, corporations were set up to serve the public good. Corporation lawyers gained rights through the US Supreme Court using the 14th Amendment (set up to protect slaves) that gives them the rights of a person. In the last century, the corporation is given more and more rights while people are increasingly stripped of theirs.

Origins of Corporations

Although definitions and descriptions of corporations have changed dramatically through the last few hundred years, the first corporation actually began long ago – as early as the sixteenth century. It was a benchmark in the history of money and business, transforming an economy from what was essentially a debt economy (when it came to merchant work) to a state-sponsored enterprise. This type of business was brilliant and revolutionary for the early business world, allowing businesses to take risks and expand in ways they had been unable to do before. The concept spread and grew, and by the seventeenth century, the corporation was well on its way to being an acclaimed and established center for regular commerce.

When corporate business came to the newly born United States of America, shortly after their break from England, the corporation was looked on with suspicion and mistrust. Although economically it seemed like a safe bet for profit, it was clear that those profits would be limited to a few powerful people, who would then hold immense sway over large chunks of the industry. The founding fathers were wary of such power, and so allowed

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