In many foreign nations, especially those in the Third World, political and social evolution has been such as to produce a monolithic state that lack… - Neil H. Jacoby

Foreign oil companies suffered major expropriations of their property during the postwar period, usually without payment of full compensation to the private owners. These episodes—the most significant were in Algeria, Ceylon, Cuba, Egypt , Iran, Libya, and Peru—followed by many years the first major oil industry expropriation by the Bolshevik government of Russia in 1918 and a second major expropriation of foreign oil properties by the Mexican government in 1938. All illustrated the great latent power of governments over the international oil companies and the reality of the political risks inherent in the industry.

The 4,400 business corporations that disappeared by merger during 1968 were a small number compared with the 12,000 that disappeared by failure, or the 207,000 new corporations that were formed. Even the $43 billion in securities exchanged in mergers that year were only 3.3 percent of the market value of corporate securities.

Because exporting and importing nations have conflicting goals, and the interests of individual countries within each group are not identical, United Nations efforts to regulate the industry have not been successful.