Brian Highsmith (APRW)

Today's Speaker

Brian Highsmith, “Governing the Company Town” (job market talk)

Note from the speaker

Thank you very much for accommodating this talk, presenting a forthcoming (but still in-progress) law review article that draws from my dissertation. I am mostly targeting jobs at law schools, so the format of the talk will vary slightly: I’d like to present for about 15-20 minutes, taking mostly clarifying questions, and then open up for substantive discussion for about 45 minutes, with feedback after. (I need to leave for a train by 1:30pm, so we won’t take the full two hours.) Because it is a law review article, it also is very long; if you are skimming, I would start with the introduction and then focus on the historical sections: Part I:A, and then as much of Parts II and III as interest you.
 

Abstract

This Article explores the forms of public and private governance that facilitate localized corporate domination. Researchers have documented the oppressive employment relationship that characterized historical “company towns,” but few accounts yet have examined these communities as local governments. I use archival research to identify institutional continuities between corporate fiefdoms like George Pullman’s model town outside Chicago (1880-1898) and Disney’s self-governed district near Orlando (1967-2023). I demonstrate that local government law has contributed to the reemergence of company-dominated enclaves, namely by deferring to private governance and facilitating jurisdictional fragmentation.

During the Gilded Age and Progressive Era, proprietors of company-owned towns exercised absolute control over workers through the private law of property and contract. Mining bosses and industrial barons like Pullman intentionally rejected the municipal form, using dismissal and eviction to enforce company policy as the operative governing authority within their dominions. This strategy became less effective after the New Deal, leading observers to pronounce the demise of the company town. But I argue that parallel developments in local government law have allowed its continuation through new institutional forms, enabling corporate titans to wield public powers without accountability to any broad public. Rather than facilitating domination over captive worker-residents, these institutional forms are used primarily to externalize costs and escape democratic obligations like taxation—goals that, I show, also deeply shaped the governance of historical company towns. I review this playbook through several recent case studies, demonstrating how defensive incorporation and new legal structures like special purpose districts can be abused to maintain this form of private control.

I suggest that the company town is most accurately understood as a democratic phenomenon: a distinctive form of private tyranny. Concern about the domination of faction within a fragmented polity dates to the founding. By contextualizing new examples like Elon Musk’s efforts to incorporate his model towns in Texas, I show that this fear is realized where corporate interests either commandeer our formal institutions of governance or displace their typical role in structuring public life.

The American Politics Research Workshop (Gov 3004) meets all academic year, Tuesdays, 12:00–2:00 PM, in CGIS K354. This workshop presents an opportunity for graduate students and Harvard faculty to present and receive feedback on their current research. The workshop highlights key theoretical and empirical findings from Harvard affiliates on topics related to American politics.

All interested Harvard affiliates are invited to attend. Zoom link is distributed via mailing list.