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How Amazon is disrupting democracy

How Amazon is disrupting democracy

FromDemocracy Works


How Amazon is disrupting democracy

FromDemocracy Works

ratings:
Length:
45 minutes
Released:
Sep 20, 2021
Format:
Podcast episode

Description

As we've said many times on this show, democracy is long and slow, which is the exact opposite of the ethos that Amazon has pushed into our culture through quick shipping, easily accessible entertainment, its takeover of cloud computing, and more.Amazon's expansion across America, from distribution facilities to data centers, is exacerbating regional inequities and contributing to the unraveling of America's social fabric. Not only that, cities competing for Amazon's  new facilities offer tax breaks that prevent funding from going to basic government services. And, the company's takeover of government procurement has taken lucrative contracts away from local businesses.Alec MacGillis, a senior reporter at ProPublica, chronicles these trends in new book Fulfillment: Winning and Losing in One-Click America. The book chronicles how Amazon contributed to the gap between the country’s winning and losing regions, and how its workplace practices foster isolation and competition, rather than camaraderie and shared goals. Was Amazon deliberately trying to undermine democracy? Or using the existing system to its benefit?  We talk with MacGillis about founder Jeff Bezos's political philosophy and how it's impacted the company's decision-making over the years. We also discuss what we as democratic citizens can do to push back against some of these forces.  Additional InformationFulfillment: Winning and Losing in One-Click AmericaAlec MacGillis on TwitterAlec's websiteRelated EpisodesCan corporations be democratic citizens?Reimagining citizenship in a consumer world
Released:
Sep 20, 2021
Format:
Podcast episode

Titles in the series (100)

The Democracy Works podcast seeks to answer that question by examining a different aspect of democratic life each week — from voting to criminal justice to the free press and everything in between. We interview experts who study democracy, as well as people who are out there doing the hard work of democracy day in and day out. The show’s name comes from Pennsylvania’s long tradition of iron and steel works — people coming together to build things greater than the sum of their parts. We believe that democracy is the same way. Each of us has a role to play in building and sustaining a healthy democracy and our show is all about helping people understand what that means. Democracy Works is part of The Democracy Group, a network of podcasts that examines what’s broken in our democracy and how we can work together to fix it.