Multinationals On The Periphery

Multinational enterprises do not regard all locations as being equivalent. Smaller economies and less-developed countries are not as attractive because of a limited market size or lack of proximity to other locations. This book focuses on how multinational activity to and from peripheral economies differs from their activity in core economies.

Utilising the DaimlerChrysler human resources upgrade in one of South Africa's least developed provinces as the basis, this text is a case study of the relationship between human capital in host economies and international capital inflows.

"In the 1990s, Yugoslavia, which had once been a role model for development, became a symbol for state collapse, external intervention and post-war reconstruction. Today the region has two international protectorates, contested states and borders, severe ethnic polarisation and minority concerns. In this first in-depth critical analysis of international administration, aid and reconstruction policies in Kosovo, Jens Stilhoff Sorensen argues that the region must be analysed as a whole, and that the process of state collapse and recent changes in aid policy must be interpreted in connection to the wider transformation of the global political economy and world order. He examines the shifting inter- and intracommunity relations, the emergence of a 'political economy' of conflict, and of informal clientelist arrangements in Serbia and Kosovo and provides a framework for interpreting the collapse of the Yugoslav state, the emergence of ethnic conflict and shadow economies, and the character of western aid and intervention. Western governments and agencies have built policies on conceptions and assumptions for which there is no genuine historical or contemporary economic, social or political basis in the region. As the author persuasively argues, this discrepancy has exacerbated and cemented problems in the region and provided further complications that are likely to remain for years to come." -- Back cover.

Mathews examines a handful of multinationals from the "Periphery" that have globalized their operations extremely rapidly. These firms have utilized strategies of international linkage and leverage to speed their global coverage. Mathews contends that the new global business world will offer unprecedented opportunities for firms that know how to enmesh themselves in global networks.

Core-Periphery Relations and Organization Studies draws together postcolonial and indigenous thinking through the conceptual lens of core-periphery relations to advance debate in organization studies. A particular aim of this book is to broaden, deepen and critically reassert a postcolonial imagination in this domain.

This book reviews the paradigm which has come to be known as post-Keynesian economics, concentrating on the main issues that form the heart of this paradigm: money and finance; conflict in wage and price settings; the degree of monopoly and pricing in an open economy; divergence rather than convergence in the European Union; financial and economic development; economic policy and methodological issues.

The rise of multinational enterprises (MNEs) from emerging markets is topical, important and poses a number of questions and challenges that require considerable attention in the future from academia as well as business management. The recent takeovers of high-profile companies in developed or developing countries by non-European emerging-market MNEs (EMNEs) – such as Lenovo, Wanhua (China), Hindalco (India), CVRD (Brazil), Cemex (Mexico), Lukoil (Russia), etc. – as well as the greenfield or brownfield investments of emerging companies (such as Huawei, ZTE, Tata, Pepco, etc.) show a new trend where new kind of firms become major players globally. EMNEs have become important players in several regions around the globe, ranging from the least developed countries of Africa through the developing markets in Latin America and Asia to the developed countries of the United States or the European Union, including East Central European (ECE) countries. EMNEs presence on the global level has resulted in numerous studies in the international literature but those research results barely cover EMNEs’ activities in the ECE region (in the East Central European EU member countries, including the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Slovakia and Slovenia). The existing books typically focus on the investment activity of a single country or region (such as China or East Asia) but a comprehensive analysis is still missing in this regard. The novelty of this edited volume is that it aims at exploring EMNEs location determinants, strategies, activities and challenges in East Central Europe by discussing its anomalies to the traditional theories as well as to other types of MNEs in the ECE region. The authors focus on EMNEs not only from China but from other important emerging countries, too, such as Russia, India, South Korea, Taiwan, Turkey, Brazil or South Africa.