The compensation or return theoretically due to or actually gained by a country’s citizens when a country’s resources such as oil or forests are exploited for export has always depended on complex social institutions, property rights and power relations. In an era of increasing trade, investment and financial liberalisation, the relationship between the exploitation of resources and the accrual of benefits to poor citizens is even more difficult. Many analysts of globalisation argue that transnational corporations are able to play countries off against each other to bid down concession prices and corporate taxes when negotiating rights to exploit resources. Thus.
