Corporate Violence

Victims of Corporate Violence

There are several categories of victims of corporate violence, such as individuals, groups of individuals (e.g., employees and consumers), and the natural environment. Several case studies conducted by scholars of corporate violence illustrate the harms caused to these categories of victims.

One case that illustrates violence against workers is the Imperial Food Products fire in Hamlet, North Carolina. In this instance, 25 workers died in a fire at the Imperial Foods processing plant when plant managers locked the fire escapes to prevent employees from stealing chicken nuggets. Other forms of violence against workers can result when companies do not follow Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) laws, thus failing to protect workers.

For example, with the deaths of several miners in recent years, attention has been given to the subject of unsafe working conditions. However, those who study corporate violence have noted that there is a long history of some corporations in the mining industry failing to adequately protect workers (e.g., “black lung” disease, collapsing mines, fires and explosions). Finally, some corporations have been accused of conspiring with paramilitary death squads in economically undeveloped countries to prevent unionization through acts of violence directed toward union organizers and/or employees.

Consumers have also been victimized by corporate violence, which has been documented in a substantial body of research. One example is the crash of ValuJet Flight 592 in 1996 where 105 passengers (and 5 crew members) were killed as a result of ValuJet's failure to follow Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) regulations. Other groups of consumers who may have been victims of corporate violence include those killed or injured because of fires in Ford Pinto cars resulting from design flaws, women who were harmed by the Dalkon Shield (an IUD birth control device known to be the cause of uterine infections, blood poisoning, and the deaths of 12 women), children born with birth defects because their mothers had taken thalidomide (a drug used to offset morning sickness), those who have died or have serious illnesses caused by the effects of products sold by major tobacco companies, and those involved in accidents linked to unsafe tires.

While consumers and workers are easy to identify as victims, violence to the environment and its subsequent harmful effects on humans have not always been easily recognized as corporate violence. Recently, however, researchers have begun exploring the ways in which corporate violence to the environment is a significant threat to the natural habitat as well as to large groups of people.

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