Profit Over People
Neoliberalism and Global Order
byNoam Chomsky, Robert W. McChesney
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Summary
In "Profit Over People," Noam Chomsky illuminates the shadowy corridors of neoliberalism, where the rhetoric of democracy is wielded as a mask for corporate conquest. This incisive critique pulls back the curtain on a world where economic policies favor the elite, eroding the foundation of true democratic engagement. Chomsky meticulously dissects the dangerous dance between market forces and political power, exposing how this alliance siphons wealth and dismisses ecological and social costs with chilling nonchalance. With a compelling call to arms, he champions the power of social activism to reclaim the public sphere, inviting readers to reimagine democracy as a vibrant global force rooted in citizenship, not consumerism. This book is a rallying cry for those who believe in the transformative power of people united against the tyranny of profit-driven governance.
Introduction
The contemporary world operates under a dominant economic paradigm that presents itself as natural, inevitable, and beneficial to all. Yet beneath the rhetoric of freedom, democracy, and market efficiency lies a systematic architecture of power that serves narrow interests while imposing devastating costs on the majority of humanity. This examination reveals how neoliberalism functions not as an economic theory but as a political project designed to concentrate wealth and power in the hands of corporate elites and their governmental allies. The analysis proceeds through careful dissection of official claims versus documented realities, tracing the gap between democratic ideals and actual practice in societies that proclaim themselves the champions of freedom. Through detailed case studies of policy implementation, international agreements, and institutional behavior, a pattern emerges of manufactured consent, where populations are systematically excluded from decisions that fundamentally affect their lives while being told they live in the freest societies in history. The evidence presented challenges readers to look beyond surface proclamations and examine the mechanisms by which power operates in modern democracies. By understanding these processes, citizens can better assess the true nature of contemporary political and economic arrangements and consider alternative possibilities for organizing society around genuine human needs rather than private profit.
The Neoliberal Deception: Market Fundamentalism vs Democratic Reality
The neoliberal doctrine presents itself as both new and rooted in classical liberal tradition, yet closer examination reveals it to be neither. The Washington consensus emerged not from Adam Smith's vision of competitive markets but from the needs of powerful corporations and wealthy nations seeking to maintain their dominance through new means. Where classical liberalism warned against concentrated power and monopoly, contemporary neoliberalism actively promotes corporate concentration while dismantling democratic constraints on private tyranny. The historical record demonstrates that successful economic development has consistently required departure from free market orthodoxy. Britain industrialized behind high tariff walls and used state power to destroy competitors, only embracing free trade after achieving overwhelming advantage. The United States followed an identical pattern, as did Japan and the East Asian economies. Meanwhile, countries forced to adopt liberal policies through colonial subjugation or structural adjustment programs experienced economic decline and social devastation. Modern neoliberalism operates as a dual system where market discipline applies only to the weak while the powerful receive massive state protection and subsidy. The Reagan administration, celebrated as the champion of free markets, imposed more protectionist measures than all previous administrations combined while funneling unprecedented public funds to private corporations through military spending and other channels. This pattern continues today as governments socialize costs and risks for transnational corporations while privatizing their profits. The gap between neoliberal theory and practice reveals the doctrine's true function as ideological cover for a system of corporate welfare and public subsidy that concentrates wealth upward while imposing market discipline on working people, the poor, and developing nations.
Manufacturing Consent: Media Control and Public Mind Management
Democratic theory requires that citizens have access to information and genuine opportunities to participate in decisions affecting their lives. Yet systematic analysis of media coverage and public discourse reveals elaborate mechanisms for managing public opinion while maintaining the appearance of free debate. The propaganda model demonstrates how structural factors ensure that media serves power rather than democracy, filtering information to support elite interests while marginalizing dissenting voices. The concept of manufacturing consent operates through subtle mechanisms rather than crude censorship. Corporate media depends on government and business sources for information, advertising revenue for profits, and shared ideological frameworks that make certain viewpoints literally unthinkable. These filters ensure that debate occurs within narrow parameters acceptable to power while excluding alternatives that might threaten established interests. Historical examination of specific cases reveals how this system operates in practice. Coverage of elections in client states receives lavish attention and praise regardless of obvious fraud, while elections in enemy nations face harsh scrutiny. Dissidents in hostile countries become celebrated heroes while dissidents in friendly regimes disappear from view. Military interventions receive different treatment depending on whether they serve official interests, with identical actions praised or condemned based entirely on political utility. The manufacturing of consent extends beyond foreign policy to domestic issues, where genuine popular preferences are systematically distorted or ignored. Policies overwhelmingly opposed by the public advance under euphemistic labels while their supporters claim democratic mandates that exist only in the distorted mirror of managed opinion.
Corporate Power Unveiled: From Trade Agreements to Investment Treaties
International trade agreements represent themselves as treaties between nations seeking mutual benefit through reduced barriers to commerce. Analysis of actual texts and negotiation processes reveals them to be investor rights agreements designed to transfer power from democratic institutions to private corporations. The North American Free Trade Agreement and similar instruments contain provisions that have nothing to do with trade while systematically undermining democratic sovereignty and social protection. These agreements establish supranational tribunals where corporations can sue governments for policies that reduce expected profits, while governments and citizens have no reciprocal rights. Environmental protection, labor standards, and public health measures become barriers to trade subject to challenge by private interests seeking maximum short-term profit. The effect is to create what economists term a virtual senate of capital that can veto democratic decisions without being subject to democratic accountability. The negotiation process for such agreements reveals the true constituencies of democratic governments. Business organizations participate directly in drafting while Congress remains uninformed and the public excluded entirely. When the Multilateral Agreement on Investment faced unexpected public opposition, government officials explicitly identified corporate lobbies as their domestic constituencies while treating elected representatives and ordinary citizens as foreign obstacles to legitimate governance. The pattern extends beyond formal treaties to the entire architecture of global economic governance, where institutions like the World Trade Organization and International Monetary Fund operate in secret while imposing detailed requirements on domestic policy. Democratic governments voluntarily surrender sovereignty to unelected bureaucrats who implement the agenda of transnational corporate power.
Popular Resistance: The Ultimate Weapon Against Corporate Tyranny
Despite overwhelming advantages in resources, organization, and institutional control, corporate power faces a fundamental vulnerability in its dependence on public acquiescence. Historical analysis demonstrates that popular movements have repeatedly forced concessions from seemingly invincible concentrations of wealth and power through sustained organizing and resistance. The defeat of the Multilateral Agreement on Investment illustrates how grassroots activism can overcome massive institutional advantages when ordinary people understand what is at stake. The MAI campaign succeeded because activists broke through the veil of secrecy that typically surrounds such negotiations, forcing public debate about agreements designed to be implemented without democratic input. Despite minimal resources and no access to mainstream media, citizen organizations used new communication technologies to educate and mobilize opposition across national boundaries. The result was the first major defeat of the neoliberal project in decades. This victory demonstrates that corporate globalization is not inevitable but represents political choices that can be reversed through democratic action. The hysteria of business publications describing environmentalists and labor organizers as hordes of vigilantes reveals the genuine fear that ordinary people might claim their democratic rights. When governments and corporations must explain their actions in public rather than implementing them in secret, their arguments typically collapse under scrutiny. The lesson extends beyond single-issue campaigns to the broader possibility of democratic control over economic life. Popular movements have historically won fundamental changes in the balance of power between capital and labor, between private interests and public needs. Contemporary conditions offer new opportunities for such organizing as the contradictions of neoliberalism become impossible to ignore and growing numbers of people recognize the gap between democratic rhetoric and corporate reality.
Summary
The fundamental insight emerging from this analysis is that democracy and capitalism exist in permanent tension, with corporate power systematically undermining the conditions necessary for meaningful popular participation in social decisions. Neoliberalism represents the most aggressive attempt yet to resolve this contradiction in favor of private tyranny by gutting democratic institutions while maintaining their formal shell. Understanding these mechanisms of control is essential for anyone seeking to create genuine alternatives to a system that sacrifices human welfare for private profit.
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