With the possible exception of the CIA, no United States invention has stirred more emotion, suspicion and criticism round the world than the modern multinational corporation. Many of the complaints are unjustified and highly exaggerated. Nonetheless, there have been enough genuine episodes of corporate misbehavior to spur demands for bringing the companies under stricter control.
Now, after a year of discussion and hearings, the Paris-based Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, which represents the governments of the 24 most highly developed non-Communist nations, has drawn up a code of ethics intended...