How Employers Manipulate Their Workforce To Promote Political Aims; Threaten Free Speech

Globalization is marked by the growing influence of corporations on the global scene. But they are not only a form of economic production and distribution of goods and services. Through lobbying efforts, they have managed to become a form of veto power against specific government policies, and continue to shape public discourse in our modern societies. 

It is clear companies have engaged and pressured their employees to mobilize in favor of their interest throughout the entire history of capitalism. And while this deliberate action ebbs and flows, a resurgence seems to be pretty much underway: 

In his piece for Fast Company, Alexander Fertel-Hernandez argues that there is a worrisome trend towards employers making more direct political appeals and mobilizing employees in favor of their economic interests. "Companies have come to see recruitment of their workers as a crucial part of their political arsenal, along with more standard strategies like hiring lobbyists, participating in business trade groups, and making campaign contributions to candidates," he explains. 

Apart from worries about political coercion, we should also be reminded that there is a move toward greater consolidation and monopoly across a series of industries. So if "speech from bosses to employees often carries with it implicit economic weight", and a range of factors from communication technologies to permissive legal environments enables tougher limits on what workers can say and do, there is plenty of reason to worry.

If the vast majority of workers are employees who effectively spend half of more of their waking hours at the workplace, we should be thinking about the effects of this trend for democracy and basic civil rights.