The Corporate Control Industry and Human Rights: The Case of Iraq

In this brief essay, I sketch out a major problem area that has emerged in late modernity: the development of the corporate control industry, particularly as this has come to manifest itself in the war in Iraq. We are witness to the reemergence of private armies (or mercenaries), whose funding however often comes from the state. In order to comprehend the issues posed by the corporate control apparatus in the Iraq war and their relevance for human rights, we shall place these new corporate military firms within a broader historical and moral context. These large-scale entities, often transnational in scope, are in large part a product of the privatization movement that has taken hold in recent decades. And these corporate control structures pose serious moral challenges that can only effectively be addressed by extending the moral framework of human rights so as to encompass their activities.