This contributed volume seeks to provide a unique window on the globalization process by analyzing the dynamics of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) in Europe and Asia, as well as its influence on the renewal of public policies and regulations, both transnational and local. It discusses the link between the trans-nationalization of productive and business systems and the renewal of local regulations in the light of concerns over competitiveness and attractiveness, as well as new social tensions. Multinational corporations (MNCs) as key actors of globalization are central for understanding the new interactions between the global, regional and local dimensions as well as for highlighting the challenges of regulation both at transnational level and within national boundaries.

Research approaches along two broad lines are presented: First, a theoretical and empirical approach that examines links between the strategies of multinationals and local public policy in order to contribute to a better understanding of the institutional dynamics of social regulation. Second, a comparative approach that compares regional spaces, with particular attention to Europe on the one hand, and to the two great emerging powers, China and India, on the other.

The challenges faced by Latin American multinational companies, or multilatinas, often require unique strategies tailored to a demanding global environment. This book studies the strategies of internationalism exercised by large multilatinas, offering the first systematic, quantitative effort to examine the pattern of their international investments within the context of their competitive position in the domestic market. Multilatinas uncovers common strategies among sixty-two multilatinas from six countries, and emphasizes the unique challenges they face, as well as the diversity of their organizational resources. It also brings the institutional environment of Latin American countries to the fore, assessing its role as an essential component in understanding internationalization decisions. Finally, the book studies the role of non-market organizational resources such as bribes, negotiations and favours in business strategies. Multilatinas is an invaluable read for students, scholars, practitioners and executives studying Latin America's place in international business.

Over the past decade, politics perspectives in international business have moved into the mainstream repertoire of research, theory development and teaching about the organisational behaviour of multinational corporations (MNCs). Politics perspectives contribute substantially to understanding the behaviour in and of MNCs in their different contexts and environments but so far these burgeoning perspectives have not been systematically and comprehensively reviewed. This book offers the first detailed overview of the theoretical foundations, methodologies and empirical applications of politics perspectives in MNCs. A group of international authors discuss twelve seminal contributions to the study of politics, power and conflict in MNCs, followed by a summary and synthesis of the literature into a comprehensive analytical framework. The book closes with a discussion of future directions in the field. This is a thorough introduction to political behaviour in MNCs written for scholars and graduate students in the fields of organisation studies and international business.

This is the first full account of how an influential form of commercial organization - the multinational enterprise - drove globalization and contributed to the making of the modern world. Robert Fitzgerald explores the major role of multinational enterprises in the events of world history, from the nineteenth century to the present, revealing how the growth of businesses that operated across borders contributed to an unprecedented worldwide transformation and deepening interdependence between countries. He demonstrates how international businesses shaped the economic development and competitiveness of nations, their politics and sovereignty, and the balance of power in international relations. The Rise of the Global Company uses the lessons of history to question prominent contemporary interpretations of multinationals and their consequences, and offers a truly wide-ranging survey of multinational enterprise, spanning two hundred years and five continents.

Why have relatively poor and underdeveloped countries been able to spawn so many global firms in the last two decades? Are emerging market multinationals (EMNCs) really different from successful multinationals from developed economies? This book tackles these and other fundamental theoretical questions about EMNCs. A distinguished group of researchers assesses the unique strategies and behavior of successful EMNCs, from the Chinese telecommunications firm Huawei to the Indian conglomerate Tata, to the South African beverages firm SABMiller. They address a range of topics, such as the drivers of internationalization by EMNCs; their distinctive process capabilities; how they catch up with established rivals on technology; how state ownership or business-group affiliation affects their behavior; and why they sometimes relocate their headquarters to advanced economies. This book will appeal to scholars and graduate students in global strategy and international business, as well as consultants of multinational companies, looking for state-of-the-art analysis of EMNCs.

Latin American multinationals (multilatinas) have been central in the rise of emerging markets in the last few decades. Their development comprises part of the global shift of wealth and power between nations. The rise of firms in a broad range of sectors - including construction, oil, telecommunications and the aeronautical industry - as important regional and global players is spreading: companies in Brazil, Mexico, Colombia, Chile and many others are part of this increasing phenomenon. This book analyses the trends, the countries and the firms involved, and explores the implications for the US, China, Spain and the rest of Europe. In particular, Javier Santiso examines how Spain might profit from positioning itself as a unique hub between Europe and Latin America. The Decade of the Multilatinas includes a wide range of statistical data which will be useful to scholars, policymakers and commentators on Latin America in particular, and international business and emerging markets more generally.

Why have relatively poor and underdeveloped countries been able to spawn so many global firms in the last two decades? Are emerging market multinationals (EMNCs) really different from successful multinationals from developed economies? This book tackles these and other fundamental theoretical questions about EMNCs. A distinguished group of researchers assesses the unique strategies and behavior of successful EMNCs, from the Chinese telecommunications firm Huawei to the Indian conglomerate Tata, to the South African beverages firm SABMiller. They address a range of topics, such as the drivers of internationalization by EMNCs; their distinctive process capabilities; how they catch up with established rivals on technology; how state ownership or business-group affiliation affects their behavior; and why they sometimes relocate their headquarters to advanced economies. This book will appeal to scholars and graduate students in global strategy and international business, as well as consultants of multinational companies, looking for state-of-the-art analysis of EMNCs.

In a world focused on science and new technology, brands help to explain why several of the world's multinational corporations have little to do with either. Rather they are old firms with little critical investment in patents or copyrights. For these firms, the critical intellectual property is trademarks. Global Brands, first published in 2007, explains how the world's largest multinationals in alcoholic beverages achieved global leadership; considers the predominant corporate governance structures for such firms; and looks at why these firms form alliances with direct competitors. Brands also determine the waves of mergers and acquisitions in the beverage industry. Global Brands contrasts with existing studies by providing a new dimension to the literature on the growth of multinationals through the focus on brands, using an institutional and evolutionary approach based on original and published sources about the industry and the firms.

Multinationals from Brazil, Russia, India and China, known as the BRIC countries, are a new and powerful force in global competition and are challenging the incumbency of much older global companies from the developed world. Emerging market multinational enterprises (EMNEs) now account for a quarter of foreign investment in the world, are a prolific source of innovation and make almost one in three cross-border acquisitions globally. Despite this, traditional theories of international business do not provide a satisfactory explanation of their behaviour or performance. The authors of this book shine new light on the rise of the EMNEs and how they have built a competitive advantage through innovation, novel configurations of their international value chains and the acquisition of companies overseas. Any manager, policy maker or researcher who wishes to understand the emergence of this new breed of multinational will find this book an invaluable resource.

This book was first published in 2011. The current financial and economic crisis has negatively underlined the vital role of multinational companies (MNCs) in our daily lives. The breakdown and crisis of flagship MNCs, such as Enron, WorldCom, Lehman Brothers, Toyota and General Motors, does not merely reveal the problems of corporate malfeasance and market dysfunction. It also raises important questions, both for the public and the academic community, about the use and misuse of power by MNCs in the wider society, as well as the exercise of power by key actors within internationally operating firms. This book examines how issues of power and politics affect MNCs at three different levels; the macro-level, the meso-level and the micro-level. This wide-ranging analysis shows not only that power matters but also how and why it matters, pointing to the political interactions of key power holders and actors within the MNC, both managers and employees.

Since the 1950s, subsidiaries of the most prestigious foreign multinationals have played a key role in Brazilian economic development, thus creating a very competitive domestic market. On top of this, government interventions in the last few decades have been inconsistent and contradictory, resulting in a series of economic crises. Only the most resilient Brazilian firms have been able to survive and prosper in this challenging environment. This book, first published in 2011, analyzes a variety of leading Brazilian multinationals and examines their competencies and competitive strategies in a variety of different settings. It develops an innovative analytical framework based on international business, international operations management, and international human resources management. This framework is then applied not only to Brazilian multinationals, but also firms from Latin America, Russia, India and China. This provides novel insights into the rise of Brazilian multinationals and the increasingly important role played by emerging economy multinationals in the global economy.

1. 1 Background of the Study: Ef?ciency in Cross-Cultural International Business Management Ef?cient business management is crucial in achieving corporate (national or int- national/multinational) goals such as higher value, comprehensiveness, corporate governance, etc. Ef?cient business management can be achieved by resolving agency problems existing among different stakeholders in corporations. In inter- tional business, agency problems may exist between managers, owners, staff, and other stakeholders who come from different cultures. Therefore, there is a need in designing ef?cient management of international business by in?uencing the factors (the convergence factors) which cause differences in the interests and cultures of different stakeholders. International business refers to all commercial transactions between two or more nations. Because it comprises a large and growing portion of current world business practice, international business has received considerable attention in academic research (Daniels and Radebaugh 1998). International bu- ness differs in important ways from business conducted within national borders, and poses additional challenges to managers and investors in foreign countries (Mahoney et al. 1998). In this context, Black et al. (1999) state that effective management is increasingly recognized as a key determinant of success or failure, arguing that the success of international business in multinational companies depends most signi?cantly on the quality of management systems (Stroh and Caligiuri 1998). As international business involves people from different cultures, every business function including managing a workforce, marketing output, and dealing with regulators, has the potential to involve cross-cultural problems (Zineldin 2007).

The increasing importance of corporate social responsibility (CSR) means that companies must consider multi-stakeholder interests as well as the social, political, economic, environmental and developmental impact of their actions. However, the pursuit of profits by multinational corporations has led to a series of questionable corporate actions and the consequences of such practices are particularly evident in developing countries. Adefolake O. Adeyeye explores how CSR has evolved to aid the anti-corruption campaign. By examining voluntary rules applicable for curbing corruption, particularly bribery and analysing the domestic and extra-territorial laws of Nigeria, the United Kingdom and the United States for holding corporations liable for bribery, she assesses the adequacy of international law's approach towards corporate liability for bribery and explores direct corporate responsibility for international corruption. The roles of corporate governance, global governance and civil liability in curbing corporate corrupt practices are given special focus.

Managing an international operation is seen by many as one of the most challenging activities in an enterprise. Uwe Sachse offers substantial answers to the question of how companies behave after they have entered a particular foreign market. The results of the empirical study show that the mode switch is an important option for improving performance in foreign markets. Uwe Sachse shows that, over the duration of foreign business activity, companies pursue characteristic internationalisation pathways through their choice of mode.

A new breed of multinational companies is reshaping competition in global industries. For most of the 19th and 20th centuries, multinational firms came from the most technologically advanced countries in the world. Over the last two decades, however, new multinational firms from upper-middle-income economies (e.g. Spain, Ireland, Portugal, South Korea, and Taiwan), developing countries (e.g. Egypt, Indonesia, and Thailand), and oil-rich countries (e.g. United Arab Emirates, Nigeria, Russia, and Venezuela) have become formidable global competitors. These firms do not necessarily possess technological or marketing skills. In contrast to the classic multinationals, they found strength in their ability to organize, manage, execute, and network. They pursued a variety of strategies including vertical integration, product diversification, learning by doing, exploration of new capabilities, and collaboration with other firms. This book documents this phenomenon, identifies key capabilities of the new multinationals, and provides a new conceptual framework to understand its causes and implications.

Combining comprehensive coverage with a wide variety of real-life cases, International Entrepreneurship: Starting, Developing, and Managing a Global Venture gives entrepreneurs the tools they need to successfully launch international ventures in today's hypercompetitive world. Bestselling author Dr. Robert D. Hisrich helps students and entrepreneurs develop global business plans, select international opportunities, and determine the best entry strategy. The text also covers practical considerations such as legal concerns, the global monetary systems, global marketing, and global human resource management for entrepreneurs. The Third Edition provides increased attention to culture and reflects recent changes in our increasingly globalized world. Readers will also be exposed to new cases featuring international activities of entrepreneurs and ventures throughout the world.

The third edition of Multinational Enterprise and Economic Analysis surveys the contributions that economic analysis has made to our understanding of why multinational enterprises exist and what consequences they have for the workings of the national and international economies. It shows how economic analysis can explain multinationals' activity patterns and how economics can shed conceptual light on problems of business policies and managerial decisions arising in practice. It addresses the welfare problems arising from multinationals' activities and the logic of governments' preferences and choices in their dealings with multinationals. Suitable for researchers, graduates and upper-level undergraduates. The third edition of this highly accessible book incorporates the many additions to our knowledge of multinationals accumulated in research appearing in the past decade.

The integrating thesis of this study is the inevitability of heterogeneity in FDI and MNCs and, accordingly, the imperative of disaggregation. Nuance is too pervasive to permit many valid generalizations. This leads to a hardly earth-shattering, but surprisingly infrequently-offered conclusion that FDI, i.e. that any individual foreign-owned subsidiaries can, on balance, have a positive, negative, neutral (and/or irrelevant), or indeterminate effect. Foreign-owned subsidiaries are seldom if ever identical and need to be considered on a case by case basis according to circumstances. Hence, the phrase "it depends" is the mantra of this study. Disaggregation is an essential diagnostic tool to identify and measure the different levels of quality of MNCs subsidiaries. Most policy advocates and researchers, whatever their ideological persuasion, have failed to acknowledge the seemingly obvious: different kinds of businesses engage in different kinds of corporate activity and diverse results. The result of different input is different output. A nearly limitless number of characteristics are associated with three main variables: the nature and the effects of tens of thousands of individual foreign subsidiaries plus conditions in countries where they are located. MNCs are better described as the middlemen of change since they themselves are largely the effect of even larger phenomena, namely technological changes that restructure the international economic order. An opening exists for an even-handed, "no attitude" analysis that incorporates a methodology and viewpoint different from the thousands of books, articles, book chapters, and speeches written about MNCs and FDI. A large majority have failed to explicitly recognize how important perceptions, value judgments, ideology, and, sometimes, self-interest are in shaping discussions by both advocates and critics. People tend to view the FDI/MNC phenomena through differently configured lenses that have been individually molded by the unique mix of values and experiences that shapes our thinking. Evaluations of FDI and MNCs are prime examples of relatively oversimplified perceptions defining "truth". This book argues that a different route to understanding is needed and overdue: acknowledge the diversity and heterogeneity of phenomena that are lumped under very broad rubrics. MNCs are different by nature and therefore different in their respective mix of costs and benefits.

This new textbook provides comprehensive coverage of the key issues facing multinational corporations (MNCs) in their management of human resources across diverse national boundaries. It attempts to answer the question, "Can there be a uniform set of best human resource management (HRM) practices applicable across a spectrum of nations irrespective of cultural and institutional individualities?" The book takes a broad definition of HRM and begins with a summary of key discussions and models in this area before setting them in the international context of the MNC. Adopting an integrated approach, the book covers the theories and practices of international HRM and sets them in context with numerous reference to news stories and case studies developed from the author's own extensive research. The book is student-focussed with strong learning features including learning objectives, chapter summaries, reading lists and an activities section in each chapter.

This book brings together research on the spread of Japanese multinational firms around the World. The authors examine how Japanese managers adapt management styles and manufacturing processes to workers in other countries.

Thomas L. Brewer and Stephen Young examine the future of the world economy and the key economic and political forces that will shape it. They consider the implications of historically important changes in the world economy in recent years including the expansion of the international investments of multinational corporations and the new role of the World Trade Organization (WTO). The authors present numerous examples of how countries have changed their international trade and investment policies, and examine how these changes are affecting firms' strategies and operations worldwide. They explain the importance to international investment, as well as trade and technology transfer, of the many agreements being implemented by the WTO. The role of other international agencies such as the UN, World Bank, OECD, EU, and NAFTA are also discussed. This book should be of value to all those with an interest in the future of the world economy and international business.

The world's multinational enterprises face a spell of rough weather, political economist Ray Vernon argues, not only from the host countries in which they have established their subsidiaries, but also from their home countries. Such enterprises--a few thousand in number, including Microsoft, Toyota, IBM, Siemens, Samsung, and others--now generate about half of the world's industrial output and half of the world's foreign trade; so any change in the relatively benign climate in which they have operated over the past decade will create serious tensions in international economic relations. The warnings of such a change are already here. In the United States, interests such as labor are increasingly hostile to what they see as the costs and uncertainties of an open economy. In Europe, those who want to preserve the social safety net and those who feel that the net must be dismantled are increasingly at odds. In Japan, the talk of "hollowing out" takes on a new urgency as the country's "lifetime employment" practices are threatened and as public and private institutions are subjected to unaccustomed stress. The tendency of multinationals in different countries to find common cause in open markets, strong patents and trademarks, and international technical standards has been viewed as a loss of national sovereignty and a weakening of the nation-state system, producing hostile reactions in home countries. The challenge for policy makers, Vernon argues, is to bridge the quite different regimes of the multinational enterprise and the nation-state. Both have a major role to play, and yet must make basic changes in their practices and policies to accommodate each other.

Challenging the long-held belief that economics is a discipline that can be adequately pursued in isolation from the other social sciences, this book develops a new theoretical approach to entrepreneurship in the firm. Casson argues that the productivity of economic units--whether families, firms, or nation states--is affected by the degree of cooperation between the members of these units, which cannot be fully understood unless one considers cultural dynamics. The book combines economic and cultural determinants of performance into a single analytical framework, applying theory to a wide range of topical issues that will be of major interest to policymakers and strategists. The book's international perspective highlights the way in which cultural differences influence innovation and competitiveness at both the corporate and national level.

This study deals with a topic of increasing concern--the relations between multinational corporations and their host countries in the Third World. Theodore H. Moran describes how a reaction against dependencia, a realization that the fate of the nation hinges on the decisions made by uncontrollable outside forces, can spur a host country to opt for control of an industry, exposing the country to new dangers as well as new opportunities. Originally published in 1975. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.

In The Supranatural Corporation, Laura Westra lays bare corporate actions both domestic and international - under the guise of legal 'personhood' - and shows how corporations flaunt laws and act as controlling powers beyond the constraints imposed on legal state citizens. Corporations are now embedded within domestic legal regimes and insinuate themselves to subvert the very systems designed to restrain corporate power and protect the public.