[Yoric]

Well, historically, there have been a number of companies with the right to violence. The East Indies and West Indies Companies, for instance, or more recently United Fruit. I haven't bothered to check, but I'd be surprised if Big Oil didn't have mercenaries on call in hot zones, with little to no oversight.

Nobody (company, nation or gang) needs a monopoly on violence to become dangerous.

[Jensson]

Those companies didn't have the right to violence in their home countries, they waged wars in other countries instead. Companies overthrowing their home country hasn't really been a thing.

[Yoric]

True. However, please don't forget that the conglomerates being discussed initially do exist and have considerable influence in other countries than the US, so my remark remains :)

Also, the Medici family was initially a wool company, then grabbed power in their homeland, kept it for about three centuries and somewhere along the way produced descendants that ruled over much of Europe. Similarly, the fascist uprising that gave power to Franco over Spain was largely privately funded by a bank [1] and I seem to remember that the German Nazi party was largely funded by industrialists and bankers [2] until reached power.

So, I'd say that companies overthrowing their home country's government has unfortunately been a thing for quite some time.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juan_March

[2] https://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/sociopolitica/wall_street...