Swaantje Siebke, MA

Corporations as Political Actors and their Duties of Justice – Climate Change and the Automobile Industry
I have three objectives in my doctoral project: First I will show that transnational corporations are best understood not only as powerful economic actors but also as political actors. I will argue that this is the case because they are structurally embedded in the political process – nationally as well as internationally. My second aim is to show that this in turn is a sound basis to ascribe specific duties of justice to them. These moral duties are twofold: They should use their political power to further just causes and they should conduct their economic endeavours in accordance with the requirements of justice. My third objective is to illustrate these claims: I will use the example of climate change and the automobile industry to explicate how the ascriptions of duties of justice to corporation can succeed from a non-ideal theory perspective.

Supervision: Prof. Dr. Corinna Mieth

Contact: swaantje.siebke@udo.edu