Generally speaking, the human economic activity comes true through companies, in the form of production of the goods and services or exchanges. This activity goes from an isolated individual, a craftsman, up to the trans-national corporation which employs several hundreds of thousand employees on numerous countries.

The company is at the same moment an economic place (in term of production and distribution of the wealth) and social (in term of jobs and incomes which it offers to the employees). For others, it is an instrument of the power economic exercise but especially financial, because the company is also a place of production and accumulation of capital.

It is exactly under this political aspect that we are going to approach this subject, because the dictators in all kinds always put into practice the following principle: the one who wants to control all the social life (including the trade-union one) has to control the wealth conditions of production and distribution, thus the economy, in particular the company.

The current economy advocates the maximum profits at the world level. The liberalism established an extreme situation: accumulation of the wealth for someone, global impoverishment for the others. Therefore, the ditch between the North and the South, between the rich and the poor men, is only aggravating.

Today, it would be impossible to have a just vision on the modern economy without speaking about the role and the impact of the transnational corporations (TNCs).

They are more and more numerous on the planet and control the majority of the trades. We count 60 000 today. The globalisation threw to them the door wide open, by eliminating all the barriers and the obstacles to facilitate their activities. It is evident that their practices are only enriching the richest countries and the multinationals themselves and impoverishing the poorest countries and their population.

Any company even said trans-national has a centre of decision which has itself, a very concrete location and a nationality. But, at the same time, any transnational corporation takes place over the national interests, including over its country of origin. The upholders of the market economy recognize only the superior interest of the shareholders and the maximization of their wealth.

Trans-nationals implant their subsidiaries especially in developing countries, given that the manpower is there very cheap. The taxes are there low and the rights of the workers are there less binding and less respected than in the North (no social allowances nor unemployment insurance, women discrimination, work of the children allowed, absence of trade-union freedom, weak environmental standards). Their presence in these countries does not generally improve things, on the contrary. Their influence and their weight in the countries of the South and in the Stock Exchanges are gigantic. In these pour zones said free zones, the "no union, no strike" policy is imposed with the support of the local governments.

The blind submission to the ideology of the market freedom and the deregulation makes that numerous decisions escape the governments (nevertheless in charge to act for the public good) for the benefit of transnational corporations which care only about their profits and report to nobody.

There is a common characteristic of the current evolution whether it is in the world or European economy: it is the enormous concentration of power and resources in the hands of the TNCs. Very quickly, they seize the control of an increasing part of the global economy. More and more huge companies are formed by the wave of mega-merger which invades at present all the continents. By means of the privatisations, they quickly take the ownership of public services in every world corner. So, a big number of transnationals specialized them by basing their growth on the acquisition of public services. It is particularly true in sectors opened to the competition to open markets to the international actors. In this system, the TNCs became more powerful than whole countries.

One of the strategies of the transnationals consists in "slashing prices" - proposing an unbeatable offer, which does not even cover the costs of the supplied services, to suppress the competitors. And this, in the hope that this strategy will pay later when the more or less monopolistic situation will allow to increase the prices and the profits. It is what notably takes place in the field of the energy, this sector being particularly desired by the TNCs.

The activity of the transnationals is strictly connected to the interests of the State of their country of origin. They need its support in the competitive fight against the transnationals of the other countries. With the political support of their States, multinationals act not only in their own interests, but also in the state interests, while taking advantage of natural and human resources of the other countries.

In the USA, for example, transnationals do not even need to exercise pressures on the government to seek its support. They are the government. Their high executives are Ministers, Joint Ministers, Under-Secretaries... To begin with the President Bush, who was a leader in diverse oil firms of which the Harken Energy Corporation.

All the Bush family has interests in the Oil, where she invested the fortune amassed by the grandfather of the current President when he made business with the Nazis.

His Vice-president Dick Cheney is a CEO and big shareholder of Halliburton (Oil). The Minister of Defence Donald Rumsfeld is Director of Asea Brown Boveri (Nuclear power) and executive partner of SCF-III LP (Energy). The Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is a member of the board of Chevron (Oil). The Joint Minister to the Defence Paul Wolfowitz is consultant of BP Amoco (Oil). The Under-Secretary to the Defence D.Feith is a shareholder of Sunoco (Oil).

As we said it, the globalisation of the economy, which should be used for the sustainable development of countries, serves in the first one only the interests of the big industrial and financial groups.

The President of ABB, powerful transnational of the electrotechnics sector, said: "I would define the globalisation as the freedom for my Group to invest where it wants, the time it wants, to produce what it wants, by stocking up and by selling where it wants, and by having to bear least possible constraints in Labour Law and in social agreements".

From this point of view, it is very interesting to compare this quotation with "the Agreement on the professional relations at the transnational level and on the social responsibility of the company", signed on November 29th, 2002 in Rome between the ENI Energy Transnational and the ICEM Energy International Trade unions.

The agreement notably underlines that "the increasing internationalization of the ENI Group asks for the development of a transnational vision of the problems connected to this process. The signatory parts made a commitment to value the working practices capable of promoting the economic and social progress.

With the present agreement, the ENI intends to confirm its own commitment in the respect for human rights and fundamental securities in all the Group activities and base new forms of exchange of information on the thematic of relevance of the professional relations at the world level, to improve and promote good working practices. The ENI and its companies recognize the fundamental principles of the "Universal Declaration of Human Rights" of the United Nations and the ILO fundamental Agreements and declare to want to act indeed for their application within the framework of the unwound activities ".

Who lies and who is sincere? We think that the boss of ABB was frank in his refusal of the social. At first, because he expressed himself without contractual constraints. Furthermore, it is the reality which nobody can deny.

Nevertheless, this globalisation is not a fate. It results from operated political choices. Without the active intervention of Thatcher and Reagan, then of all the governments which agreed to follow them, the TNCs would not have been able to blow up so fast and so radically the obstacles which slowed down their freedom to spread as they want to do, to exploit the human, economic and natural resources where it is convenient for them. Actually, the impotence of States notably appears in the cases of relocations of companies, locks, etc.

More powerful than States, the transnationals tolerate no "intervention" in their business, especially in Third World countries and those said in transition.

The Rio Tinto British group is one of the biggest mining transnationals of the world which employs 51 000 persons in 40 countries. Known well by its antitrade-union practices, Rio Tinto has already had major conflicts with the employees and their trade unions. By realizing 10 billion dollar receipts a year, Rio Tinto shows publicly its contempt to the social problems. Furthermore, the behaviour of this transnational is very aggressive: many union activists are simply targeted and dismissed to have exercised their fundamental rights.

Lauded by the ICFTU, "a code of manners" (or the social responsibility of the transnational corporations) is the object of difficult debates for more than 20 years. Certain transnationals, notably those of the Energy, agree to sign texts which are rather recommendations and which have no legal value.

Within the framework of the UNO, all the attempts to negotiate a "code of conduct" for the TNCs failed and no official document was ever able to be adopted. In 1974, a Centre on the TNCs (TNCC) as autonomous organ of the UNO Secretariat was created. Totally ineffective and sabotaged by the transnationals, the TNCC was got rid of in 1993 to be replaced by a TNCS Division and foreign investments with UNCTAD. It meant the abandonment of any attempt to establish a social control over the TNCS. The UNO decided to take charge only of the contribution of transnationals to the growth and to the development, whereas the new Division serves the lobbying of the TNCs interests.

We attend even the inverse phenomenon. It is the World Bank (in theory a UNO specialized institution but which escapes totally its control) which tries to put the system of the United Nations in the service of transnationals. In this initiative, helped by UNO internal accomplices, the WB appears as a faithful instrument of the rich countries (in particular the USA).

This omni power of transnationals arouses questions: these structures, which are over States, being actually above state powers which tolerate no intervention in their business, why do they thus agree "to negotiate" with trade unions? How can they accept the social while throwing back it? Could they sign "global agreements» against their interests? Then, what are the value and the utility of these agreements which arrange perfectly the transnational corporations? And who determines the rules of the game?

According to the definition of the economist William Dugger, "in their mechanical race for the power and for the profits, the TNCs are responsible for the productivity and for the growth of the wealth only in front of themselves. The TNCs are the pure and simple personification of the capitalism, being interested in nothing, except the profits and the power" (Corporate Hegemony, NY, 1989, p. 3).

We were also able to see that the politicians are in the service of the TNCs. Otherwise, why the increasing internationalization of the TNCs activities were able to be made without that is set up an effective mechanism to regulate the behaviour of the TNCs or give responsibilities to them? The UNO submission in the interests of transnationals became evident in July, 2000 with the agreement said Global Compact celebrated by the UN Secretary-General together with the biggest TNCs.

In brief, the subject we tried to study here asks numerous questions. The answer to these questions could certainly help trade unions to define their strategy and their actions in front of the influence of the transnationals.