You’ve written a number of books dealing with the economic and political behavior of large American corporations, but I’m particularly interested in your marvelous 2013 book, The Fracturing of the American Corporate Elite. Geoff Kabaservice: I’m glad to have you with us. That’s quite a mouthful, but welcome Mark. My guest today is Mark Mizruchi from the University of Michigan, where he is the Robert Cooley Angell Collegiate Professor of Sociology, the Barger Family Professor of Organizational Studies, and professor of Management and Organizations.

Welcome to the Vital Center Podcast, where we try to sort through the problems of the muddled, moderate majority of Americans, drawing upon history, biography, and current events. Geoff Kabaservice: Hello! I’m Geoff Kabaservice for the Niskanen Center. This is the place that the Republican Party used to occupy, a position that has historically been occupied by big business, and right now it’s empty. Mark Mizruchi: But I think the single biggest problem in contemporary American politics is the absence of a significant element in the center-right. What accounts for the increasing extremism of the Republican Party, and the polarization that has resulted from it? It at least partly stems from what many may view as an unlikely source: a decline in leadership by large American corporations, a group Mark Mizruchi refers to as the American corporate elite. Here, Mizruchi joins Geoff Kabaservice to provide a detailed history of the role of the corporate elite in stabilizing American politics, and how elites have gradually abdicated that role.

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