President Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s New Deal campaign to overhaul the US economy—especially to rein in the excesses of corporations and protect workers from exploitation—is the moral high point of the decades-long quest to bring corporate activity under the control of public regulators. Though government takeovers of corporations are barely a factor, rules and penalties become greatly strengthened, and the days of near-complete corporate freedom are over.

The oil shock of the 1970s, when OPEC raises the price of oil, demonstrates the limits of government in managing economies; thereafter, companies campaign to unshackle corporate energies. The collapse of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s signals the victory of capitalism over communism, and a worldwide process of converting government services into private businesses, or “privatization,” gets underway. Western nations also continue to loosen restrictions on corporate activities. Malfeasance by corporations becomes more apparent during this period.

Companies are sensitive to how they are seen by society, and when masses of citizens protest corporate misdeeds—as during the Great Depression and, later, when ecological crises multiply—corporations make efforts to portray themselves as socially responsible, good citizens. Often they do this while simultaneously committing egregious acts that cause harm or death. This points out the sometimes psychopathic nature of corporations, who, like many antisocial humans, will say whatever makes them appear concerned for others, even if they care only for themselves.