In the early 1990s the Nordic countries were considered to be in a serious situation. The costs of welfare states, generous unemployment benefits, high taxation rates, strong unions, and centralized wage bargaining were thought to be undermining their competitiveness in an age of rapid globalization. By 2005 however, they all ranked at the top of a number of performance indexes on economic competitiveness and sustainability. Citizens in the Nordic countries continue to participate in and benefit from globalization on a much wider scale than in any other similarly highly developed country, and these countries increasingly provide templates within the EU for imitation and social innovation.
This book investigates how and why welfare services, active labour market institutions, and public policies were re-combined into enabling and risk-sharing mechanisms to stimulate innovation, and how this made it possible for firms to change their work organization and pursue highly rewarding and distinctive globalization strategies. Through detailed analysis of Finland, Denmark, Norway, and Sweden, this book reveals the dynamics and transformations of their national business systems, and the emerging new patterns of interaction between firms, labour markets, and institutions. It will be valuable addition to the literature on social innovation and institutional entrepreneurship.

In the early 1990s the Nordic countries were considered to be in a serious situation. The costs of welfare states, generous unemployment benefits, high taxation rates, strong unions, and centralized wage bargaining were thought to be undermining their competitiveness in an age of rapid globalization. By 2005 however, they all ranked at the top of a number of performance indexes on economic competitiveness and sustainability. Citizens in the Nordic countries continue to participate in and benefit from globalization on a much wider scale than in any other similarly highly developed country, and these countries increasingly provide templates within the EU for imitation and social innovation. This book investigates how and why welfare services, active labour market institutions, and public policies were re-combined into enabling and risk-sharing mechanisms to stimulate innovation, and how this made it possible for firms to change their work organization and pursue highly rewarding and distinctive globalization strategies. Through detailed analysis of Finland, Denmark, Norway, and Sweden, this book reveals the dynamics and transformations of their national business systems, and the emerging new patterns of interaction between firms, labour markets, and institutions. It will be valuable addition to the literature on social innovation and institutional entrepreneurship.

What happens when previously autonomous firms from different countries, each with their own identities, routines and capabilities, come together inside a single multinational corporation? Can a cooperative strategy be established that advances the development of the multinational as a whole, or do mutual misunderstandings and the unintended consequences of strategic interaction among the players' lead instead to endemic conflict and disintegration?
This book tackles these novel and important questions through an empirical study of the strategic constitution of an 'actually existing' multinational. It does so by tracing the historical construction of the multinational corporation from the confluence of multiple formerly independent firms and analyzing the interacting web of strategies pursued by different actors within it. The analysis reveals how workers, unionists, subsidiary managers, and corporate executives pursue separate strategic games rooted in their local contexts, whose global outcome contrasts sharply with idealized views of the multinational as an integrated and coordinated organization.
By comparing these findings to those of the broader literature, the book proceeds to a theoretical examination of the challenges of managing the multinational, and the difficulties of resolving them through conventional organizational means. The authors propose new procedural solutions aimed at fostering mutual recognition and knowledge exchange within the multinational corporation, and explore how a multinational public may be created to press for the necessary reforms in corporate governance. As the success of such reforms is far from preordained, the book concludes with a seriesof alternative scenarios that illustrate the many obstacles to a smooth continuation of the globalization process.
This is an important and original study of significance for researchers, academics, and advanced students of international business, business strategy, comparative management and organizational studies.

Global pressures present similar challenges to companies in different countries, but how those organizations deal with them depends on the social and institutional framework in which they develop and operate. In this book, leading academics explore and explain variations in governance systems, focusing in particular on European trends. In Governance at Work: The Social Regulation of Economic Relations the authors ask: ? Are structures of work and business organization changing? Are we seeing a move away from large-scale (Fordist) mass-production systems that have dominated the industrialized world in the 20th century? ? What are the local/national determinants of business organization? ? Can we speak of different national business systems if so, how do these interact with the operations of international companies in global competition?;This book is intended for academics, researchers, and graduate students in business, economics, management, and organization studies.

Throughout Europe, governments have acted in accordance with the conviction that a larger and uniform market would enable greater economics of scale and the growth of large corporations. This is seen in terms of the spread of multinational, US-style companies, enforcing a uniform type of firm across countries. The contributions to this volume, in contrast, show how the nature of firms is embedded in the larger societal context of nations, preventing a homogenised firm-type spreading across European countries. It becomes clear that researchers should locate the firm in the social context in which it is rooted, rather than looking to economic science to explain a 'non-ideal type.' Areas covered by the contributors include the comparison of typical firms in Denmark adn Finland; the limited transformation of large enterprises in Hungary; and an analysis of supply networks in Britain and Germany. Through these essays and a discussion of the variations in the nature of the firm in Europe by leading Eur