Battleships and Cruisers: The New Geography of Multinational Corporations

Abstract

It is the beginning of another bleak, winter’s day in Bristol. All over the city people are settling down to work. In Severnside, ICI’s plant is producing ammonia and fertilisers through snakes of pipes and hissing stacks. You can tell by the yellow green plume of smoke hanging over the works. Down the road in Avonmouth, Commonwealth Smelting is a similar hive of activity churning out zinc and lead. Meanwhile, five miles away, among the terraces and crescents of the salubrious area of Clifton, the partners and employees of the accounting firm of Price Waterhouse sit in their office hard at work preparing audits.¹