The reason why it's hard to stop huge multinational corporations is because they're unaccountable to the public, and because they're in league with governments. Legislation usually favours these huge corporations as a consequence.
That's the entire point of the article! It's saying that when (inevitably) US/EU business do terrible things then there are mechanisms available to try and stop them.
However - it claims - those mechanisms don't exist or a re weaker for multinationals outside EU/US.
I suspect the more likely explanation is that they have enormous influence because they have a lot of money. We certainly have a lot of evidence that people with lots of money continue to have a lot of influence even when they don't employ a lot of people.
Do we? The tech industry for example makes enormous amounts of money, but has relatively little political influence because it employs relatively few people in relatively few states. Sundar Pichai can't call up a Congressman in Indiana and casually mention the 5,000 workers they have in Fort Wayne.
* new industry, therefore less entrenched in existing power networks * until recently, relatively low spending on lobbying * technology people not known for political savvy * technology people inclined to assume that merit and savvy will carry the day * tech industry leaders more ethically inclined, or at least less inclined toward legalized bribery
I don't think making money is sufficient. Politicians care about other people's money because they can get some of it.
This political obsession with jobs seems to be a relatively recent phenomenon. Perhaps going hand-in-hand with the rising influence of corproations. It makes one wonder if the myopic focus on "job creation" is really what politicians should aspire to.
Also the way ownership and property rights are actually codified into law is very weird when you consider it from a global perspective. The reason shell companies work is that on some level the owners are not actually considered owners but on another level they are.
Not promoting narratives of western/white guilt is not the same thing as being "biased".
The majority of the problems in the 3rd world are caused primarily by native interests and inside forces - that are corrupt, divisive, don't care, will brutalize their own people, etc.
Yet the majority of stories completely absolve those parties, and focus entirely on the west.
And because of this, for this reason, the problem never gets solved.