Britain used to solicit money that the US would not touch – but with oligarchs and fraudsters on the rise, it must now uphold the law
Five decades ago, the United States was in turmoil. A long and unpopular war was ending in defeat; inflation was high; and American politicians were accused of high-handed and illegal behaviour.
If all this sounds remarkably similar to the last few years, that’s because it is. But the mid-1970s was different in one crucial respect: how the US responded to it, and particularly how it responded to corruption. Major corporations had been giving bribes to win contracts in South Korea, Italy and Saudi Arabia; US politicians were appalled – and they acted to uphold values other than money.
Oliver Bullough is the author of Butler to the World: How Britain Became the Servant of Tycoons, Tax Dodgers, Kleptocrats and Criminals, and Moneyland: Why Thieves and Crooks Now Rule the World and How to Take It Back
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