THE SOVEREIGN STATE OF ITT

by Anthony Sampson ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 27, 1973

The boggling dimensions of the Watergate scandal have pushed the ITT affair off the front page and hence out of mind. Dita who? But Anthony Sampson's highly critical investigative history of the corporation -- the first comprehensive accounting -- reminds us how closely related those star-crossed spectacles are. After describing its birth and early steps, which included a ""very special relationship between ITT and the Third Reich"" and postwar sabotage in Red Hungary, Sampson targets in on ITT's development during the last decade or so into a monster multinational conglomerate which boasts Avis Rent-A-Car, the Sheraton hotel chain, a business college, two publishing houses (Bobbs-Merrill and Putnam), and insurance, dog food, and perfume companies among its more than 300 subsidiaries and 700 subsidiaries of subsidiaries, all overseen by ""master manager"" Harold Geneen. The recent efforts to undermine the Chilean elections (which show, ""in a magnified form, the familiar characteristics of the company""), the ITT-CIA special relationship, the assorted and sordid attempts to influence antitrust decisions through questionable lobbying practices (Dita Beard -- remember now?) and large cash contributions to the Nixon administration wind up Sampson's scrupulously authenticated report -- a bold, maddening, reform-spirited story of arrogant abuses of corporate power in the compassionless race for profits and, above all, the immoral coupling of easy government and imperial industry.

Pub Date: June 27, 1973

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Stein & Day

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 1973

Categories: NONFICTION