From Allende to Albanese: The Legacies of Colonialism, Imperialism and the Struggle to Tame the Corporation

Today, more than fifty years later, another voice echoes across the corridors of the UN. The United Nations Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the occupied Palestinian territory, Francesca Albanese, has released a landmark report that charts the trajectory from an “economy of occupation” to an “economy of genocide.” In this bold assessment, Albanese names the entrenchment of economic interests—both state and corporate—that enable the Israeli regime’s illegal practices, including its vast military-industrial complex and extractive economic networks. Yet the Rapporteur’s focus—confined to the occupied territories—can only hint at the broader historical and systemic forces at play. It is precisely the failure to regulate transnational corporate activity under international law that has entrenched a global incentive structure for impunity. From the arms manufacturers supplying bombs to the jet fuel providers enabling airstrikes, corporations continue to benefit from and perpetuate violent dispossession and structural domination in Gaza.

The situation in the occupied Palestinian territory reveals not merely a humanitarian catastrophe, but a systemic global disorder rooted in impunity, racialized dispossession, and corporate profiteering. The violence unfolding in Gaza, the West Bank, and across historic Palestine is not only political and military—it is economic, and it is systemic.

At the center of this system lies a global economy that rewards conflict. The occupation is not sustained in a vacuum; companies supplying weapons, surveillance technologies, and critical infrastructure serve to underwrite it. The architecture of apartheid and displacement operates alongside the engines of industry, from the extraction and resale of natural resources to the provision of logistical and technological services. Where others see devastation, corporations see opportunity. Where civilians see bombs falling, boardrooms see markets growing.

This dynamic is not unique to Palestine. It reflects a long and violent history of economic systems built on colonial domination and racial capitalism. The persistence of settler colonial models in the modern age, dressed in the language of “security” and “development,” or overtly manifested in the genocide the Palestinian people are facing today, reveals the enduring power of capital to reshape geographies and extinguish people’s rights. Imperialism functions not through brute conquest alone, but through legal loopholes, opaque trade deals, and regulatory voids that shield corporations from accountability even as they enable and profit from war crimes and systemic oppression.

International law, in its current configuration, is ill equipped to respond. The frameworks that exist to regulate corporate conduct remain self-regulatory, voluntary, and riddled with exceptions—particularly in the defense and extractive sectors. While some domestic legal challenges have offered partial remedies, the vast machinery of economic complicity remains intact, unchecked, and dangerously normalized, with slow investigations, rare sanctions and a flagrant lack of political will.

Yet amidst these bleak realities, voices are rising. The courage of those who confront power—whether in the halls of the United Nations, in grassroots movements, or in besieged communities—demands recognition and solidarity. They remind us that resistance to impunity must be both principled and global, linking struggles across borders.

As of today, the most concrete step towards tackling corporate impunity at the international legal sphere lies in the elaboration of an effective legally binding treaty to regulate transnational corporations in international law, whose negotiations began following the adoption of Resolution 26/9 of the United Nations Human Rights Council in 2014. A strong commitment from states and civil society actors advocating for meaningful structural changes in the global economic order and architecture of impunity is imperative in this process. The Global Campaign to Reclaim Peoples’ Sovereignty, Dismantle Corporate Power and Stop Impunity is firmly committed to the development of this Binding Treaty. This instrument seeks to establish the basis for holding TNCs accountable for violations of human rights, thereby guaranteeing access to reparation and comprehensive justice for affected communities.

People’s sovereignty, dignity, and justice cannot coexist with corporate impunity. The challenge before us is not just to document violations but also to interrupt the systems that make them profitable. To do that, we must reclaim the language of law, the tools of economics, and the principles of international solidarity—not as abstractions, but as weapons in the struggle for liberation.

History has shown us what happens when we fail to act. The question now is whether we will finally listen.

You can revisit our recent webinar with Francesca Albanese 'Illegal Occupation, Genocide and Business: Reflections on the Case of Palestine (Part II)'