"International Business and Society" is the first text to explore the breadth of business and society topics - corporate social performance, business ethics, business-government relations, stakeholder management, and issues management/public affairs - within the broader context of the international environment.

The book takes knowledge and understanding developed within uni-societal studies of business and society and extends the frame of reference to the international arena. To facilitate this exploration, the authors offer many new frameworks and conceptualizations such as the "institutional ideological model" and "stakeholder power bases" while they continue to address the more conventional topics of the field.

-Gives a new perspective on the politics of drug supply

-Will interest those involved with the management of medicines at any level

-Indispensable for students of public health

The global economy is changing rapidly and multinational corporations (MNCs) are at the forefront of this transformation. The book provides novel and profound analyses of how MNCs and emerging economies are related, and how this relationship affects the dynamics of the global economy. In particular, the authors deal with the nexus between multinationals, emerging economies and innovation from a variety of different perspectives. Innovation is regarded as a core driving force in the global economy but the authors show how it can impede as well as encourage sustainability. Multinationals and Emerging Economies brings together insights from business studies and economics, and combines concise theoretical discussion with empirical analyses of unique data. Researchers and graduate students in the fields of international business, international economics, international relations, innovation studies and strategy will find much of interest to them throughout the book. It will also be an invaluable tool for policy-makers in economics and commerce.

Public relations experts and crisis management personnel have done an excellent job over the years of drawing attention to the grand scope of risks associated with crisis. Particularly in the present challenging economic conditions, organizations have become aware of the costs of crises and are willing to put forth effort and resources in crisis prevention. In this book, the editors and contributors offer significant insight into the critical considerations of crisis preparation as well as the importance of anticipation and pre-crisis planning. Pre-crisis planning has been a part of crisis management ever since scholars and practitioners began researching it. This book presents some of the most detailed and thorough insights published to date and serves as an example of where future research can go.

This book develops a conceptual framework for understanding the network of relationships that exists around the hub of large multinational firms. The authors bring together perspectives from international business and the organizational analysis of networks to explain their model which is supported by case evidence from several sectorsDStelecoms, autos, chemicals, retailing, and financial services.

This book examines the interaction between multinationals and women in UK, Ireland, France and Germany, looking at inward investment by US and Japanese multinationals, as well as outward investment by European multinationals.;It attempts to show how multinationals perpetuate an unequal division of labour by gender in which women production workers are merely "nimble fingers". It discusses whether multinationals are exporting women's jobs from Europe in an international search for cheap labour; and it looks at how women have reacted to both the creation and destruction of employment by multinationals.

This original and important book explores how the interaction between China and multinational enterprises (MNEs) has the potential to affect the future of the Chinese economy, the global economy, and international business. It examines the interaction of two of the most important forces affecting the development of the global economy in recent decades - firstly the opening and massive growth of the Chinese economy, and secondly the rise in foreign direct investment per se and the consequent strategic restructuring of major MNEs. The expert contributors begin by investigating precisely how leading MNEs, with well-honed international practices and commitments, have drawn their subsidiaries in China into their established networks. They suggest that MNEs' operations are increasingly embedded in the growth and sustainability of the Chinese economy itself, rather than merely serving as a supply base for their global markets. The second part of the book examines the emergence of new MNEs from China itself. It shows how these MNEs are seen as integral to China's development, and how their ability to expand reflects strengths from China's growth as well as revealing the growing needs required for sustainability. This timely study will be of great interest not just to those following one of the world's key economies, but also to researchers and students of the fast-paced changes in international business strategy.

Firm-to-firm relationships, along with the overall structure of industry, have changed markedly over the past decades. Replacing the model of vertical integration with one of global business, firms have started to outsource more by using a wider global network. At the same time, they have begun to increase their control and coordination along the value chain to remain competitive, blurring the boundaries between companies. Understanding the nature of the firm and its role in coordinating the supply chain will help firms to better define global competitive strategies.. The challenges that lie ahead for global business render obsolete the traditional model of procuring each service without long-term supply chain management. Current trends suggest that in the future there will be even deeper supply chain integration in most industries. The Nature of the Firm in the Oil Industry aims to facilitate the understanding of 'the firm' via the analysis of the specific relationship between international oil companies, which are among the world's biggest firms and which act as 'core system integrators', and the oil services companies, which help to find, extract, produce and distribute oil along the petroleum industry supply chain. This relationship serves as an example of deep integration by core system integrators and provides insights into the change in the nature of the firm in the era of modern globalization. Aimed at researchers and academics, The Nature of the Firm in the Oil Industry offers a thorough examination of this relationship in an effort to shed light on the nature of the firm, both in the oil industry and in global business today. It is a humble attempt to better understand the firm in a crucial industry.

This book gives students a new perspective on entrepreneurial venturing in an international context. By analyzing the dynamics in international companies, they will be armed with the skills they need to build successful strategies for entering new international markets. Williams presents a framework built around four contexts for international venturing: headquarters-driven through internal capabilities; subsidiary-driven through peripheral capabilities; headquarters-driven through external capabilities; and subsidiary-driven though external capabilities. Through this, students gain insight into the conditions that enable venturing in different types of MNEs, the mechanisms by which MNEs pursue international opportunities, and the leadership and managerial challenges of developing entrepreneurial capabilities across borders. Following a definition and analysis of each context, the book synthesizes the outcomes in an integrative way, providing implications for strategic leaders in international firms as well as for researchers and students. These contexts are used to frame the literature and engage with eight topical cases, which are also published in full in the Appendix of the book. With case studies from around the world that focus both on smaller and larger enterprises, Venturing in International Firms will give students of international entrepreneurship, corporate entrepreneurship and international business an edge when venturing internationally in the real world.

In contrast to widespread assessments that family enterprises lack sufficient resources and capabilities to go global, many family companies are competing successfully in an increasingly globalized business environment. Worldwide, a large number of thriving multinationals are still family-owned and/or under family control. While there is abundant literature on the phenomenon of globalization from many different disciplines, neither the literature on multinationals nor the growing field of family business studies have systematically investigated family multinationals yet. This volume is one of the first to deal explicitly with family multinationals and the role of the family in internationalization. It situates itself at the crossroads of internationalization studies on the one hand and family business research on the other. Why do families continue to play such a large role in some of the most prominent firms in emerging and mature economies? How did they manage to maintain ownership control, yet divest of unrelated business ventures? How did they internationalize yet maintain control? This book identifies the idiosyncratic strategies and structures of family multinationals in different countries and at different points in time. A comparative historical and case study approach allows us to explore the role of the family through the firms' various internationalization pathways and understand long-term developments and path dependencies.

This book analyses media conglomerates owning multiple media holdings under centralized ownership within and across media markets. It argues that Asian capitalists utilize both a market-oriented ideology and family connections to build their media empires, thereby creating cultural conglomerates that exercise corporate censorship over media markets. It focuses on family-controlled media conglomerates in Korea, specifically the international business giant, Samsung, and its related media companies, Cheil Jedang and JoongAng Ilbo, all of which are controlled by the single Lee family. Utilizing the theoretical approach of political economy of communication, the book examines how and why the Lee family exercise corporate censorship over Korean society. Offering an essential take on Asia's political economy of communication in order to understand the workings of Asian media empires, this book will appeal to students and scholars of Korean Studies, Korean Business and Mass Communications.

This book provides rigorous analysis of the wide range of questions surrounding the role of international institutions in governing global business, especially multinational enterprises (MNEs). The analysis, both theoretical and empirical, focuses on the corporate governance of MNEs and to what extent their management takes into account the negative effects of their activities. Also discussed are: how nation states and international institutions control the activities of MNEs, and how the role and strategies of international institutions can be changed to minimise any negative effects without hampering the positive aspects and effects of MNEs.Besides the general questions of corporate governance, the fundamental differences between shareholder and stakeholder concepts are also carefully examined. A number of moral aspects in corporate governance are touched upon including the effect of international entrepreneurial activities on wages, labour markets and environmental issues. International Institutions and Multinational Enterprises is a fascinating book that will appeal to scholars of international and development economics, international business management and institutional economics. NGOs and policymakers involved in international trade, monetary and development policy formulation and associated institutions will also find much to interest them.

In the face of globalization, multinational companies have become the norm, rather than the exception. HR professionals now need to manage across borders, cultures and time zones, meaning that a complete understanding of the theory and practice of International Human Resource Management (HRM) is essential. International Human Resource Management is a concise introduction for all students studying International HRM at the Masters level. It covers everything from the cultural and institutional contexts, international employment law and the role of International Framework Agreements to recruitment and selection, training and development, performance management, reward and benefits, job design and other functional areas of International HRM. With numerous industry examples and global case studies from companies such as Telefonica, Unilever and Volkswagen, International Human Resource Management goes beyond the theory to fully explore how International HRM works in practice. It is an indispensable textbook to prepare students for successful careers in human resources. Online supporting resources include additional case studies, lecture slides for every chapter, self-test exercises for students, discussion questions and further reading.

John Dunning's general theory of international production, first propounded in the late 1970's, has generated considerable debate. This work thoughtfully reassesses the paradigm, and extends the analysis to embrace issues of theoretical and empirical importance. In a collection of essays, the changing characteristics of international production are examined, and an interdisciplinary approach suggested for understanding the multinational enterprise in the world economy. This book, first published in 1988, will be of value not only to economists and international business analysts, but to scholars in other fields, notably organizational, marketing and management specialists.

Multinational enterprises (MNEs) experienced 'golden days' during the 1990s and 2000s, they expanded globally and were major players in globalization. Today they have become powerful actors in the global economy. CEOs of international businesses are welcomed by heads of state as their counterparts, they are invited by governments to help solve global issues such as climate change and poverty, and they are facing dilemmas comparable to those of other international actors. However, MNEs are facing global legitimacy challenges. They are suspected of tax avoidance, using low wage countries for corporate benefits only, disrespecting privacy regulations, abusing consumer data, violating local community rights, exploiting natural resources, ignoring basic human rights, and employing too many lobbyists targeting national and international political decision-making processes for their own corporate interests. Although many of these challenges are not new, they have resurfaced and become more apparent during the past couple of years, partly due to the economic recession that many developed economies have faced and to the broader awareness of increasing global inequality and the importance of sustainability. How can international business respond? Strategic business diplomacy may be the answer. Business diplomacy involves developing strategies for long-term, positive relationship building with governments, local communities, and interest groups, aiming to establish and sustain legitimacy and to mitigate the risks arising from all non-commercial or exogenous factors in the global business environment. Business diplomacy is different from lobbying or strategic political activity; it implies an (strategic / holistic) approach of an international business to look at itself as an actor in the international diplomatic arena. Representation, communication and negotiation are key in such an approach. One of the consequences is that MNEs are able to operate in and show respect for an international business environment that consists of multiple stakeholders. This demands a strategic perspective and vision on the sector and the business environments in which the company wants to operate, and requires a specific set of instruments, skills and competences.

As globalization has brought about new concerns and responsibilities for business, particularly in the realm of human rights, many multinational corporations (MNC) operating in Asia have argued that such rights are the responsibility of government. However, as globalization continues to improve market access for MNCs, it increasingly exposes them to new forms of transnational social movements, and as a result the private sector has emerged as one of the central stakeholders in the region's human rights dialogue. Taking three of Asia's fastest emerging economies - Cambodia, China and Thailand - as its starting point, Corporate Social Responsibility and Human Rights in Asia explores the business case for corporate social responsibility, human rights and anti-corruption in the region. In doing so, it examines how industry perceives human rights and corruption within the corporate social responsibility (CSR) paradigm, and builds on the argument that the CSR regime is a socially constructed concept. Drawing on interviews with key stakeholders including business leaders, nongovernmental organizations, international organizations and government officials, Robert Hanlon argues that industry perceives human rights as outside their sphere of influence; that divergent stakeholder interests are side-lining the human rights debate; and that human rights are increasingly ignored in the quest for profit-maximization. This leads to the conclusion that human rights and corruption will remain peripheral business issues until stakeholders find new ways of creating space for CSR engagement, and business actors will continue to marginalize the human rights issue so long as governments in the region let them. This interdisciplinary book draws on political science, business and sociological perspectives and as such, will be of great interest to students and scholars working across the fields of Asian business, corporate social responsibility and business ethics, human rights and international political economy.

A major new edition of the classic work that revolutionised the way business is conducted across cultures and around the globe. It provides leaders and managers with practical strategies to embrace differences and successfully work across diverse business cultures. Capturing the rising influence and the seismic changes throughout many regions of the world, cross-cultural expert and international businessman Richard Lewis has significantly broadened the scope of his seminal work on global business and communication. Thoroughly updated to include the latest political events and cultural changes, as well as covering nine new countries to complete Europe, broadening the scope of the book. Building on his LMR model, Lewis gives leaders and managers practical strategies to embrace differences and work successfully across increasingly diverse business cultures.

This book uses the examples of local supply firms in China and Brazil and their connections to the global automotive industry to explore the nature of current global value chains. It argues that lead firms make use of product architecture to globalize their procurement and supply chain management and that they effectively restructure the global supply base by internationalizing the most capable supply firms, thereby creating oligopolies controlled by the lead firm. The book goes on to contend that some firms have gained such powerful positions that they have gained a degree of control over other firms without the necessity of ownership - altering the mechanics of governance. Also, it shows how, although some supply firms from emerging markets have utilized their business ties with western assembly firms to upgrade themselves within the global value chain, most are squeezed out through increased global competition. Overall, the book makes a major new contribution to the economic theory of governance.

Multinational Enterprises and Host Country Development is a unique collection of papers looking at different aspects of the link between multinational enterprises and their effects on the host countries' economies. The volume studies effects of multinationals on R&D, innovation, productivity, wages, as well as growth and survival of firms in the host countries, and distinguishes direct and indirect effects through spillovers. All the analyses are conducted using firm level data for countries as diverse as China, Ireland, Sweden, Ghana, the UK or a group of countries in Central and Eastern Europe. This volume is a valuable reading for graduate students and researchers wishing to investigate the impact of multinationals.

"Business Across Cultures" is the keystone book in the Culture for Business series. It provides an overview of all subjects tackled in the other books of the series. Its particular aim is to provide executives with a cross-cultural perspective on how companies meet the diverse needs of customers, investors and employees; to introduce the main ideas in business in a multicultural context; and to show how they all fit together.

This volume describes how the conceptual and technical sophistication of contemporary cognitive and neuroscientific fields has enhanced the neurocognitive understanding of dreaming sleep. Because it is the only naturally-occurring state in which the active brain produces elaborate cognitive processes in the absence of sensory input, the study of dreaming offers a unique cognitive and neurophysiological view of the production of higher cognitive processes. The theory and research included is driven by the search for the most direct relationships linking the neurophysiological characteristics of sleepers to their concurrent cognitive experiences. The search is organized around three sets of theoretical models and the three classes of neurocognitive relationships upon which they are based. The contributions to this volume demonstrate that the field has begun to move in new directions opened up by the rapid advances in contemporary cognitive science, neuropsychology, and neurophysiology.

As a consequence of aggressive competition, Chinese industries have become increasingly consolidated. While the extent to which emerging local firms can challenge well-established multinational firms varies by industry, there are common characteristics of 'winners' within each firm type. A handful of multinational and local firms emerged victorious by acquiring small, weak, and regional players to become truly national players. During this process, weaker multinational firms were crowded out of the market by stronger multinationals as well as by emerging local powerhouses. The successful local firms that survive competition in China have global ambitions and venture into international markets, challenging foreign multinational firms in the global marketplace. This book examines how multinational firms grew their operations in China and how successful local firms emerged from the restructuring process, as well the competition between them, in the fierce marketplace of China's economic reform. While anecdotal evidence on this topic is widespread, there exists no comprehensive research. This book seeks to address this gap by rooting its discussion in the author's extensive and rigorous statistical analyses and detailed case studies across five industries: consumer products, beer, telecom, automobile, and steel.

* Profiles firms at the forefront of corporate diplomacy* Explores a fundamental challenge faced by managers of multinational corporations* Presents new tools to help develop smarter corporate strategies for stakeholder engagementManagers of multinational organizations are struggling to win the strategic competition for the hearts and minds of external stakeholders. These stakeholders differ fundamentally in their worldview, their understanding of the market economy and their aspirations and fears for the future. Their collective opinions of managers and corporations will shape the competitive landscape of the global economy and have serious consequences for businesses that fail to meet their expectations.This important book argues that the strategic management of relationships with external stakeholders what the author calls "Corporate Diplomacy" is not just canny PR, but creates real and lasting business value. Using a mix of colorful examples, practically relevant tools and considered perspectives, the book hones in on a fundamental challenge that managers of multinational corporations face as they strive to compete in the 21st century.As falling communication costs shrink the distance between external stakeholders, shareholder value is increasingly created and protected through a strategic integration of the external-stakeholder-facing functions. These include government affairs, stakeholder relations, sustainability, enterprise risk management, community relations and corporate communications. Through such integration, the place where business, politics and society intersect need not be a source of nasty surprises or unexpected expenses.Most of the firms profiled in the book are now at the frontier of corporate diplomacy. But they didn t start there. Many of them were motivated by past failings. They fell into conflicts with critical stakeholders politicians, communities, NGO staffers, or activists and they suffered. They experienced delays or disruptions to their operations, higher costs, angry customers, or thwarted attempts at expansion. Eventually, the managers of these companies developed smarter strategies for stakeholder engagement. They became corporate diplomats. The book draws on their experiences to take the reader to the forefront of stakeholder engagement and to highlight the six elements of Corporate Diplomacy."

In this new edition of a successful textbook the authors assess the turbulent environment in which international businesses operate and the approaches to strategy formulation and implementation which can be adopted. They also examine the functional and operational management of companies and fuse together the theoretical and empirical aspects of international management. New material includes coverage of leadership in transnational companies, cultural issues in international management, entrepreneurship and SMEs in global business, the impact of e-commerce, and the anti-globalization movement.

For the left and the right, major multinational companies are held up as the ultimate expressions of free-market capitalism. Their remarkable success appears to vindicate the old idea that modern society is too complex to be subjected to a plan. And yet, as Leigh Phillips and Michal Rozworski argue, much of the economy of the West is centrally planned at present. Not only is planning on vast scales possible, we already have it and it works. The real question is whether planning can be democratic. Can it be transformed to work for us? An engaging, polemical romp through economic theory, computational complexity, and the history of planning, The People's Republic of Walmart revives the conversation about how society can extend democratic decision-making to all economic matters. With the advances in information technology in recent decades and the emergence of globe-straddling collective enterprises, democratic planning in the interest of all humanity is more important and closer to attainment than ever before.