How Multinationals Can Adapt to a Political Mood That Doesn’t Care for Them at All

Under the economically liberal policy consensus of the last 30 years, the senior management of multi-national corporations concerned themselves with commercial matters – consumer demand, production efficiency, investor appetite, and so on. They must now pay far more attention to innovation and politics. Political sentiment has turned against globalization and the political and economic policies that promoted it. As this mood is translated into policy, the structural advantages of multi-national corporations are coming under threat, from increased trade protectionism to broader demands for corporations to be socially responsible. This new world order means multinationals will need to change. They will need to adopt corporate goals that go beyond short-term gain for shareholders, attending also to the longer-term interests of all stakeholders, and shift from global models to approaches based on a global-local hybrid approach. Moreover, they should remember that intellectual property is the one corporate asset that cannot be stopped at the border. Remember the wisdom of Pericles: “Just because you do not take an interest in politics, does not mean politics will not take an interest in you.”