At its most powerful, the modern corporation transcends national borders and surpasses the wealth of sovereign states. It wields this power to capture markets, regulatory and legislative bodies, justice systems and juries, and — critically — the civic, intellectual, and community spaces that might otherwise rise to counter such a dominant force in social, economic, and political life.

The corporate “form” — the underlying architecture governing what a corporation is (and what it isn’t) — is dominant because it is simple. Most corporations are one-dimensional. They have singular purpose: to generate ever more value to their owners. This is by design, and it’s tremendously effective.

The largest U.S. corporations have dual capacity to be wildly productive and dangerously depleting. They create abundance for shareholders by selling scarcity to workers, consumers, affected communities and ecosystems, citizens, and public institutions.

For us, the solution is about more than redistribution. It’s about more than interrupting monopoly, securing accountability, or mandating transparency. We’re here to reimagine and reinvent the legal and market structures that govern what a corporation is. And we’re here to ask the question: What is political and economic power for?

Power Lab’s mission is to radically redesign the corporate form, and in so doing, assign new purpose to its power.