In Private Empire , Steve Coll investigates the notoriously secretive ExxonMobil Corporation, revealing the true extent of the power wielded by a company whose annual revenues are larger than the total economic activity in most countries. In many of the nations where it operates, ExxonMobil has a greater sway than that of the US embassy, and in Washington it spends more on lobbying than any other corporation. Yet despite its outsized influence, it remains a black box to all but a few. Private Empire begins with the Exxon Valdez accident in 1989 and closes with the Deepwater Horizon oil spill. The narrative spans the globe, taking readers to Moscow, impoverished African capitals, Indonesia and elsewhere as ExxonMobil carries out its activities against a backdrop of blackmail threats, kidnapping, civil wars, and high-stakes struggles at the Kremlin. In the US, Coll goes inside ExxonMobil's ruthless Washington lobbying offices and its corporate headquarters in Irving, Texas, where top executives oversee a bizarre corporate culture of discipline and secrecy. The action is driven by such extraordinary characters as Lee 'Iron Ass' Raymond - ExxonMobil's chief executive until 2005 and an unabashed sceptic about climate change and government in all its aspects - and Raymond's successor Rex Tillerson, as well as the countless world leaders, plutocrats, dictators, guerrillas, and corporate scientists who are part of ExxonMobil's story. Private Empire is the masterful result of Steve Coll's indefatigable reporting.

He draws here on more than 400 interviews; field reporting from the halls of Congress to the oil-laden swamps of the Niger Delta; more than 1,000 pages of previously classified US documents; heretofore unexamined court records; and a wealth of other sources. Private Empire is the definitive story of ExxonMobil, and a chilling portrait of unchecked power.