Rebuilding Public Power

This 90-minute workshop dives into the history of how corporate power is organized in the United States and contemporary cases of how growing corporate power has rolled back successful gains in democratic rights, environmental justice, migrant...

The History of Corporate Power

This article is derived from, but not a synopsis of, " Beyond Public/Private: Understanding Excessive Corporate Prerogative" by john a. powell and Stephen Menendian, which makes the case that corporations have overstepped their appropriate role in...

Margins in Movement

This report chronicles more than two years of research with the people of the Inland Empire — the two-county region of Southern California often seen as a periphery “at the margins” of Los Angeles. This research seeks to understand prevailing beliefs and narratives across different groups on ideas of community, economic opportunity, government, and more.

Reimagining Revenue Measures by Centering Community Voices

Introduction California’s convoluted system for raising revenue is not transparent, and confusing to the general public. Unless they closely follow wonky budgeting and legislative news, most people typically don’t learn about upcoming revenue...

Blog: A solution to Africa's food insecurity

Any serious attempt to tackle many of Africa’s interlocking socio-political and economic challenges, such as food insecurity, must accept that Africa’s “problems” are global as much as they are local.

Podcast: The economic case for a $15 minimum wage

In this episode of Who Belongs? we look at the impacts of minimum wage increases with Michael Reich, a Professor of Economics and Chair of the Center on Wage and Employment Dynamics at UC Berkeley.

Blog: On Texas, the climate crisis, and a just transition to renewable energy

What’s behind the climate crisis in Texas is what’s behind the crisis more globally: corporate management fixated on extracting short-term profits, resistance to shifting to renewable energy, and disregard for communities.

Blog: Trump's eleventh-hour blitz to preserve the racial order

As the country continues to make sense of the storming of the US Capitol last Wednesday, the Trump administration is engaged in another form of deluge—an ongoing torrent of last minute regressive rules to lock into place right-wing policy priorities before the president’s last day in office.

Video: The Surveillance State, Social Safety, and Building Power

While technology has made it easier to connect with faraway family and friends and gain access to the world’s libraries of information, it has also led to a stark loss of privacy through widespread data collection and surveillance by both government agencies and for-profit companies.

Blog: Corporate Control of Global Food Markets a Recipe for Disaster

WHAT DO PURINA DOG FOOD, CHEERIOS, DORITOS, AND AQUAFINA ALL HAVE IN COMMON? They’re all owned by Nestle. While Nestle is most famous for its chocolate and coffee, it actually owns over 2,000 product brands in various industries, from cosmetics (L...

Haas Institute Probes Corporate Role in the Global Food Crisis

BERKELEY, CA: The Haas Institute at UC Berkeley Wednesday launched a new monitoring project that investigates and documents the power and influence of 10 mega corporations—which own hundreds of subsidiaries in the agriculture, food production, and...

The Era of Corporate Consolidation and the End of Competition

Introduction IN THE PAST TWO YEARS ALONE, three major corporate mergers have begun to reshape what was an already concentrated international market for agricultural chemicals, seeds, and fertilizers. If the mergers gain approval from their relevant...

Corporate Democrats and the Corporate Power Structure in California Politics

After the 2016 presidential election, California has been a leader in progressive politics, pushing back against the agenda of Trump. However, a growing corporate-backed moderate faction of the Democrat Party in California has been able to stop policies that are seen as dangerous to corporate interests.

Trans Pacific Partnership: Corporations Before People and Democracy

Our new report on the Trans-Pacific Partnership raises serious concerns about the plurilateral, mega-regional trade deal, with an analysis that the TPP puts the interests of corporations before the interests of people and core democratic principles...

The US Farm Bill

In a report examining the US Farm Bill, the Haas Institute finds that corporate control and structural racialization within the US food system leaves marginalized communities disproportionately impacted by the agricultural policies and outcomes generated by the Farm Bill.

Blog: Lessons from the Food Justice Summit

On February 21, 2015, the Haas Institute participated in an all-day Food Justice Forum organized by Holy Names University in Oakland, California.

Bowman v. Monsanto: The monopoly over the global food system

On February 21, 2013, the Supreme Court heard legal arguments on Bowman v. Monsanto in what is sure to become a landmark patent and intellectual property case in the United States. The case involves the giant seed agrichemical company Monsanto vs. a...

Food is a human right not a commodity, experts say

East Bay chapter of the United Nations Association discusses challenges to eliminating hunger and opportunities to eliminate corporate control of agriculture