Citizens or Stakeholders?

The insurance industry's recent effort to scare the American public about the costs of health care reform reveals one of the fundamental flaws in the Obama administration's strategy to reform the system of health care in the United States. Surprisingly enough this weakness has come in an area normally regarded as one the president's strong suits: his grasp of rhetoric and the power of language. For at the core of his inability to make a case for the public option was his decision to treat the politics of health care as a negotiation between "stakeholders" rather than a struggle for the rights of citizens. In so doing, he allowed the process to be controlled by Senators Baucus and Snowe, themselves representing Senate "moderates" and House "Blue Dogs" in back door negotiations with the corporate interests that now control the flow of health care in this country. Is it any surprise, then, that health insurers would feel free to try to upend the process when they thought they weren't getting all they could out of it? It is their industry after all.

The problem with the language of "stakeholders" is, however, deeper than the fact of one group's temper tantrum. Given the structure of American politics, "stakeholders" is really another name for those who already have money in the game and who profit from it. In the case of health care, this sleight of hand has meant that insurance companies, hospitals, some doctors, the pharmaceutical industry, and Wall Street have shaped the outcome. Left out of that list is most of the country's doctors, its nurses, and above all its citizenry. By taking the issue of Single Payer off the table as desirable but not essential Obama transformed the debate from one over health care reform to one over health insurance reform; in so doing he ensured that the "stakeholders" would keep their privileged places at the table. Stakeholders have rights in these discussions, citizens do not. They are simply consumers or, if uninsured, mere objects of the largesse of our leaders.

The Town Halls of the summer may have been manipulated and mislead about the content of the health reform proposals. And for some on the right opposed to, "stakeholder government" their opposition is rooted in their fear that Obama is creating a State controlling everyday choices and individual morality. But they are not wrong about the way that most citizens are excluded from the process. Whether it is about ensuring the continuation of corporate profits, making sure that banks don't fail even if homeowners do, or protecting the political class by refusing to "look backwards," our political and economic system now protects the stakeholders at the expense of citizens. This problem has been abetted by both Democrats and Republicans; it is an aspect of the dominance of financial capital over our economy; and its symptom was the financial collapse of 2008 and the Great Recession it triggered.

"Stakeholders" is the contemporary version of the language of exclusion (its comrade is "taxpayer" as if most people don't pay taxes). And it excludes in a particular way -- it is a throwback to the days when the majority was excluded from politics. It is a historical retrogression, in effect an updated version of the early modern notion that only property holders should have a voice in politics because only they had a permanent stake in society. Legally, the United States rejected property qualifications for voting a long time ago. But insofar as we speak the language of stakeholders we return them to our political practice. Even more striking, seventeenth and eighteenth century arguments for stakeholders were about those who owned real estate or produced things of worth. Now it is about those who manipulate markets or hold political power or capital. That such a skillful speaker as the president would popularize this notion is one of the great ironies, and failures, of the Obama Presidency.

Facing execution for rebelling against James II of England, Richard Rumbold, an English radical of the seventeenth century, is reported to have said that he was "sure there was no man born marked of God above another; for none comes into the world with a saddle on his back, neither any booted and spurred to ride him." It is a thought to counter the language of "stakeholders."

 

 

Comments

[mendocoaster]

Excellent, thoughtful article. I really began to question the process of reform when the language was changed to "health insurance reform" as opposed to "health care reform". Ahjp, Pharma, Etc. have the most at stake here: we little people only have our well-being and lives at stake.

[Colorado Bobby]

Well written. Good points. We need to ALL be included, not just "stakehold­ers."

[saltysea]

Great point. Similar to calling Republicans and Blue Cross Dogs "conservat­ive."

[Mover]

"manipulated and mislead"

The problem with the content of the health care bill is that it has been exposed. The so called "Public Option" is, and it the furthest thing from competition that it can be. The public option's sole function is the destruction of private health care insurance providers in favor of a single payer government run program.

We know this because candidate Obama repeatedly spoke on his desire for a “single payer” government run health care system in the United States.

The president, congressional Democrats, and the sycophants in the legacy media, claim that the public option is competition. But, they have no clue of the meaning of competition. Not a single White House economic adviser, nor the president himself, has ever held a private sector job. They only know that the villagers seem to like this mysterious word, so they use it with abandon in order to convince the villagers that they should put down their pitchforks.

There are already at least 52 insurance companies competing with each other in America. How much difference could one more make?

They describe the public option as being like Medicare. But Medicare is a monopoly that is hugely subsidized by tax dollars from the general fund. Part B‘s expense’s are 75% funded by money from the general fund. Is the US congress going to give private sector insurance companies a 75% subsidy?

The simple answer is “no”. No because they want them to fail.

[Colorado Bobby]

All of the insurance companies you mention are profit driven, and must deny claims to support increasing demands for improved stock prices and profit. The government run "public option" would be administered by a staff that got a decent salary, but not megabucks. This would free more $ for claims payment from the pool of premium payers.

[Mover]

You miss the point, so i'll clarify.

The public option cannot be competitive because it would be mostly funded through government subsidy, like Medicare is now.

When it is hyped as being competitive, they are deliberately lying to you. If it is such a great proposition, why do they need to lie about it?

[jws2346]

Jeez Micheal, the only "stakeholders" I even knew about were the ole' Vampire killers in the movies

[Ben Dixon]

Through out this article one thing keep coming to mind, that the author has obviously confused stakeholders with shareholders.

[reddflagg]

In what way? I too share concern with the euphemism "stakeholders" which, in the context of health care only seems to refer to wealthy entities- insurance companies, pharmaceutical companies, hospitals, physicians, etc.- and to exclude the overwhelming majority of the population.

[Mover]

That's right. President Obama is ignoring the people in favor of the lobbyists, or stakeholders as defined by the author.

FYI: To Mr. Obama, he is the only stakeholder.

[HelloFunnyWorld]

Hello Professor,

We're curious about what Democracy, in the 21st Century, will be like, for our children, and future generations and so, it's nice to see that debate begun already, though of course we understand, you speak to the American people and current situations in the US.
Still ~
Thank you.
Found it interesting. As you know, as goes the US, so goes the rest of the world, eventually.
:)
Moms in Canada

[spottery2k]

Excellent article!

[IndependentBadger]

I hate to poop on the parade, because I think the author of this article seems rather intelligent, and motivated by a desire to re-direct our focus to one that prioritizes all parties to a conflict, or situation requiring compromise or sharing.

I know too many people, however, especially in academia, who spent tremendous personal resources doing the kind of research that noone could call selfish. And many of those people have often used the term "stakeholder" SPECIFICALLY to include more people and socio-economic groups into equations, or projects, or concerns that traditionally were decided by a much smaller body of "participants".

The term stakeholder should not be vilified so much. It's like vilifying a hammer. It's HOW you use the hammer that determines the quality of the feat (or crime).

[maxgen]

While I agree on the use of "stakeholders doesn't hit the mark," I completely agree with the article.

To put it another way: The profit making insurance and drug companies have dominated the discussion and its outcome (by use of bribes, er, campaign contributions). A serious discussion based on the merits did not take place, because the citizens (whom the President is supposed to protect) were not represented in the discussion. One glaring omission was the SINGLE PAYER plan, which Obama took off the table before the discussions began.

[wblack]

It is with such cleaver twists of language that we are to forget that there is no formal barrier separating people in this Class-Free society; the girl down the hall, who is raising two children, and struggling to get by working in office support for an insurance company is also one of the evil "stakeholders" the liberal-socialist likes to go on about. Try to forget that when they speak of removing the evil of vast corporate profits. Their only interest is in committing theft on the grand scale. The essential characteristic of socialism is the denial of individual property rights; under socialism, the right to property (which is the right of use and disposal) is vested in “society as a whole,” i.e., in the collective, with production and distribution controlled by the state, i.e., by the government. Please remain fixated like a doped gerbil while they commit this theft in order that you not notice that hundreds of thousands of working class moms and dads have lost their income and retirement pensions when the insurance companies are turned over in whole to the State.

Please remain calm and try not to notice the collateral damage this will cause in an already destabilized economy. Be assured that your new Socialist State will seize control over vast sectors of the traditionally free economy very soon in order to reduce financial chaos. Remain in your homes and be aware Marshal Law is in effect. Thank you.

[JesseChanley]

Your basic assumptions about our society are flawed. Inequality produces different classes. Our society has vast inequality, more so than any other society.

Inequality is heritable. Rich people are able to establish trusts and other legal mechanisms to pass class status from parent to child (even if some children are unable to maintain their status).

There is a formal barrier to greater equity in our society. That barrier is publicly enforced property rights. Property rights are socially created. They do not automatically exist.

Free markets do not exist. All markets depend on a system of publicly agreed upon property rights. All interactions in markets are subject to laws. We are not supposed to lie, steal, injure, etc. The many ethical rules that underlie our laws are limits on market behavior.

It is difficult to improve our society when so many people misrepresent our current circumstances.

[wblack]

I speak not from "assumption, but from knowledge.

The source of property rights is the law of causality. All property and all forms of wealth are produced by man’s mind and labor. As you cannot have effects without causes, so you cannot have wealth without its source: without intelligence. You cannot force intelligence to work: those who’re able to think, will not work under compulsion; those who will, won’t produce much more than the price of the whip needed to keep them enslaved. You cannot obtain the products of a mind except on the owner’s terms, by trade and by volitional consent. Any other policy of men toward man’s property is the policy of criminals, no matter what their numbers. Criminals are savages who play it short-range and starve when their prey runs out.

[wblack]

Just as man can’t exist without his body, so no rights can exist without the right to translate one’s rights into reality—to think, to work and to keep the results—which means: the right of property. The modern mystics of muscle who offer you the fraudulent alternative of “human rights” versus “property rights,” as if one could exist without the other, are making a last, grotesque attempt to revive the doctrine of soul versus body. Only a ghost can exist without material property; only a slave can work with no right to the product of his effort. The doctrine that “human rights” are superior to “property rights” simply means that some human beings have the right to make property out of others; since the competent have nothing to gain from the incompetent, it means the right of the incompetent to own their betters and to use them as productive cattle. Whoever regards this as human and right, has no right to the title of “human.”

[wblack]

The right to life is the source of all rights—and the right to property is their only implementation. Without property rights, no other rights are possible. Since man has to sustain his life by his own effort, the man who has no right to the product of his effort has no means to sustain his life. The man who produces while others dispose of his product, is a slave.

Bear in mind that the right to property is a right to action, like all the others: it is not the right to an object, but to the action and the consequences of producing or earning that object. It is not a guarantee that a man will earn any property, but only a guarantee that he will own it if he earns it. It is the right to gain, to keep, to use and to dispose of material values.

[Colorado Bobby]

Yes, heritability is part of the problem. Maybe we're born naked, no boots OR saddle, but if daddy owns the boot AND saddle shop we'll soon be donning boots and outfitting the others with saddles.

[jotunloki]

You might be more persuasive if you had a clue about the meanings of the words you use - i.e. MARTIAL, not MARSHAL.

[Colorado Bobby]

Since other word snobs have jumped aboard, might as well check your spelling on clever. Not cleaver. Beaver.

[kodon]

Excellent piece! It is a distinction that is easily clouded. I often notice that the language of business is being used in government to make the public sector seem somehow more credible or "with it." And people seem to think that electing a CEO to high public office is a good idea, that somehow the CEO has special abilities to "clean it up" and "make it efficient" and "eliminate waste" when governing is a much different thing than running a company. I think it's time to reinforce the language, and action, of citizenry. Thank you!

[iblogleft]

Most excellent piece. Thank you.

[CAPTAINSKIPPY]

Those of us who have worked at real jobs are very familiar with "vote" (rigging) and power games used to implement pre-determined outcomes; perhaps we need politicians who have had to deal with these problems before they hold elective office.

[wblack]

I don't suppose you can produce third party verifiable material evidence of your claims, perhaps citing names, election dates, names of the election officials involved, the identities of those involved in the conspiracy, and material evidence to support those claims?

No?

Didn't think so.

[lp57]

Name: George W. Bush

Election date: 11/2000

Election Official: Katherine Harris

Identity of Co-conspiritor: Diebold Corporation

Proof: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FhMUtzOxjJY

[tbone99]

Stakeholder is the language of Investment and reflects our country's obsession with the profit motive and move to legalized gambling ( also known as speculation) as a legitimate way to make a living. We have likewise changed to goal of education to preparing our children for slots in industries, not for citizenship in a democracy. In that end the Bush administration modeled the schools after business models in have which the school ( business) receives a profit if successfully meets its number goals or is closed if fails. Our children have become products to be traded in and to think of life only in terms of measurable goals and payoffs.

The GOP has held the private business model up as a paragon of efficiency again and again , but how efifcient is it to waste millions at the top while the business fails to achieve its actual objective - that of
creating a quality product.Th­ese days we have seen private industry succeeds only with no bid contracts, bribes and driving out competition. They have not even hewed to their own iconic model of free marketism.

[Mover]

Sorry, "stakeholder" is the language of interested parties, not just business.

Looking it up we learn that it means, "One who has a share or an interest, as in an enterprise­."

In the professor's view, it is exclusionary. In your view it describes those who create jobs and pay for health care insurance.

Why all the grief?

FYI: We are not a Democracy. By constitutional law, we are a representative democracy, also known as a "republic".

[tbone99]

dictionary; enterprise -a company organized for commercial purposes; business firm.

[HelloFunnyWorld]

tbone99~
Yours is one of the best definition of Stakeholders we've heard - "obsession with the profit motive"

As for education "preparing our children for slots in industries, not for citizenship in a democracy" and our children having "become products to be traded in...." - Scary thought, though probably accurate.

Moms in Canada
Read more at: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-meranze/citizens-or-stakeholders_b_325910.html

[overd0g1]

Giving property owners more of a say would be a good thing, as they have more to lose. Giving them all of the say seems incorrect. Giving public employees and recipients of government aid of any kind should be outlawed.