ABSTRACT
This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book talks about a small, if fascinating, cranny of economic policy, and multinational corporations. It explores the tangled trail of economic policy formulation, a path that leads from multinational corporations on to trade policy and ultimately to the wealth weapon. The book presents four fictional composite characters and one real one. The fictional characters represent some of the major parties involved in the heated debate about multinationals and about economic policy. A case is made that the US government ought to pull its socks up and take a broad look at just what tools, levers, scalpels, carrots and sticks it has available to wage a foreign policy in a time when military power balances in the world may have tipped.
