Global monitor: Royal Dutch/Shell

With the onset of globalisation and deregulation, the influence of national governments is diminishing and transnational corporations are becoming increasingly open to public scrutiny. Hardly any other large corporation has been more scrutinised than Royal Dutch/Shell, the transnational oil company, which came under intense public pressure in the mid 1990s. Two events galvanised public opinion in 1995: the company’s controversial decision to dump the Brent Spar platform in the North Sea and the execution of Ken Saro-Wiwa, a leader of the Ogoni people who campaigned against the company’s Nigerian operations. These events highlighted the fact that Royal Dutch/Shell is a major player in the international political economy and, as such, a worthy object of in-depth study with reference to global governance. This report aims to shed some light as to how a major transnational corporation operates in the new world of globalisation and deregulation.