In Professor Gupta’s class this week, we discussed corporations. We talked about what a corporation is, what we can expect from them, and how they should operate. On top of this, we watched the movie “The Corporation”, which further discussed this topic. This conversation was very interesting this week because it led to the consideration of the question “do corporations have ethics”? When looking at legal descriptions of corporations, and what a corporation is in the literal sense, we were led to the conclusion that corporations do not have a sense of ethical versus unethical, because a corporation is a non-human being that lives for the purpose of making profit. This has really caused me to consider whether or not corporations should have ethical responsibility, which I have always just assumed yes. However, I now wonder if corporations are serving their ethical purpose by simply focusing on profit, because they are serving the best interest of their shareholders, who are essentially the reason that the corporation exists. The documentary really challenged this stance when it showed different scenes of negative impacts from corporations, such as poverty and pollution. I still find this topic conflicting and complicated, and am interested to further discuss it next week.
On a different note, for our internship seminar this week we read two different articles about the Italian economy. These articles were actually much more interesting than I expected, because they explained how the Italian economy is confined by not only restrictive government regulations, but even more so by the Italian culture. I was very surprised to learn that the Italian economy is the most concerning out of all the major economies in the world, and that it has actually decreased very slightly since World War II. One of the major contributing factors to this is that Italy’s economy is over 90% made up of micro-businesses, with micro-businesses referring to any company with less than 10 employees. That is crazy! This is rooted deeply in the Italian family-focused culture that also has a deep mistrust of government and large corporations. Once learning this, I realized that this is very evident when working in Italy, and furthermore explains a lot of their customs and hospitality.
As for work, I continued working on the several different projects Lucia assigned to me last week. Me and my co-intern had to put in extra hours to finish a specific project Lucia requested to be completed by Tuesday, which she then reviewed with us and was very pleased with. Other than this, this past week was mostly filled with Lucia teaching us the rest of the small details of the business that she had forgotten or skipped over before. We spent a lot of time reviewing this information because me and Sebastian (the co-intern) will actually be running the majority of the company’s operations for the next week and a half while Lucia is away on a business trip. I really enjoy working for a boss that trusts me and my work so wholeheartedly and so quickly.
This past week was another full and lively week of Milan life. Living in this city has been such a fun and learning experience, and I truly feel like I learn an important lesson everyday. This week especially, my days have been made up of lots of little moments that remind me to appreciate where I am. Monday, I learned where to get the best sandwich in Milan. Yesterday, when working in the coffee shop next to aparto, I had the cutest dog keep me company on the bench next to me all day. Today, I learned how to retrieve a package from the Italian post office (thanks to the kind post office worker), and the best places to travel within Italy (thanks to the energetic kid across from us on the train). Although these small moments seem generally insignificant, they are a great reminder everyday to appreciate the culture and attitudes around me, and keep learning what Milan has to offer. I can’t believe we are already halfway through this trip!
