Is There a Transnational Business Community?

Abstract

This article tries to answer two questions. The first is whether capitalist class formation is now taking place at a transnational level; the second is what regime of corporate governance was becoming dominant in the last quarter of the 20th century. The answers given are based on a comparison of the networks of interlocking directorates among the 176 largest corporations in the world economy as of 1976 and 1996. The analysis suggests that from the 1970s to the 1990s an Atlantic business system developed. However, Japanese firms were not integrated into this network while the European Union was indeed creating a European business community. The research lends support to the hypothesis that the network has become less a device for domination and control and more a device for building hegemony. This also suggests that corporate governance is increasingly based on exit strategies rather than on voice as has been common in continental European contexts.