Publications of Wong MNC Center Staff, Advisory Board Members, and Research Fellows

A Bargaining and Property Rights Perspective on the Belt and Road Initiative: Cases from the Italian Port System

Cristian Luise, Peter J. Buckley, Hinrich Voss, Emmanuella Plakoyiannaki, and Elisa Barbieri

Drawing upon the bargaining power literature and property rights economics, this article explores how and why host country actors at different levels of governance influence foreign direct investment (FDI). Exploiting these analytical tools, it conducts a comparative case study analyzing four Chinese company attempts to enter Italian seaports. It finds there must be consistency in the distribution of rights among the various participants in the property relationship for a Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) port investment to occur.

Bibliometric Review on FDI Attractiveness Factors

Vanessa P.G. Bretas, Ilan Alon, Andrea Paltrinieri and Kavilash Chawla

This article reviews the literature on the attractiveness of foreign direct investment (FDI) through bibliometric and content analysis. It combined co-citation, bibliographic coupling, and keyword co-occurrence time analysis with content analysis of the most cited articles by using the Bibliometrix R-package and VOSviewer software. A study of 499 articles extracted from the Web of Science database reveals five main research categories: FDI structure, market conditions, entry conditions, institutional framework, and resource availability.

Reassessing RCEP’s Implications for Digital Trade and E-Commerce

Jean-Marc F. Blanchard and Wei Liang

In this piece, Dr. Jean-Marc F. Blanchard, Executive Director of the Mr. & Mrs. S.H. Wong Center for the Study of Multinational Corporations, and Professor Wei Liang (Middlebury Institute for International Studies at Monterey) review and critique optimistic and pessimistic perspectives about the digital trade and e-commerce provisions (Chapter 12) of the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) Agreement.

Global Business Strategy: Asian Perspective (Second Edition)

Hwy-chang Moon

This book aims to bridge Western and Asian perspectives about how companies can develop successful approaches to global business. The second edition has been updated to include the latest business theory, techniques, and case studies in the field of global business strategy. It presents new theories and techniques such as creating shared value (CSV), global value chains, platform strategies, and business ecosystems.

The Role of Outward FDI in Creating Korean Global Factories

Peter J. Buckley, Nigel Driffield, and Jae-Yeon Kim

This article researches foreign direct investment (FDI) from South Korea in the context of the organization and development of local businesses into global factories. It analyzes the relationship between FDI decisions and the nature of Korean imports and exports. It contends that the mechanism by which FDI leads to technological upgrading can be explained by the global factory approach. This study employed a unique dataset containing information from South Korea on FDI motives and the unit value of traded goods within particular sectors.

Emerging Market Multinationals Report 2021: Building the Future on ESG Excellence

Lourdes Casanova and Anne Miroux

This report provides data on emerging market multinational corporations (MNCs) in the new stage of globalization, highlighting the special features of Chinese MNCs. In addition, it discusses environment, society, and governance (ESG) in emerging economies, the ESG performance of emerging MNCs (EMNCs), and supplies case studies on countries like China, Thailand, and India. It adds to our knowledge about sustainability and ESG in emerging markets and ways to improve it. The report further analyzes the changing logic of EMNC in corporate social performance.

Governance, Foreign Aid, and Chinese Foreign Direct Investment

Roger Fon and Ilan Alon

This article explores the interaction between Chinese foreign aid in shaping Chinese state-owned enterprises’ (CSOE’s) foreign direct investment (FDI) in Africa and the quality of host country’s governance. It finds the quality of governance in the host country has a negative impact on CSOEs’ FDI and official aid and loans from China are detrimental to the relationship between the quality of host country governance and CSOE FDI. In short, CSOE FDI in locations with weak governance increases when it is integrated with less concessional Chinese foreign aid.

The EU-China comprehensive agreement on investment: Between strategic opportunity and strategic autonomy

Henry Gao

This article critically analyzes the EU-China Comprehensive Agreement on Investment (CAI) concluded in principle between the European Union (EU) and China in December 2020. The EU previously hailed the CAI as “the most ambitious agreement China has reached with a third country.” However, this article argues the CAI does not add much in substance and that the key factor in understanding the agreement lies in the larger strategic and geopolitical rather than economic interests of the EU and China.

FDI Activities and Integration in ASEAN and East Asia

Shandre Mugan Thangavelu, Shujiro Urata, and Dessie Tarko Ambaw

This chapter examines foreign direct investment (FDI) activities and investment integration in Asia, focusing on Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) countries. To do so, it makes use of the FDI literature on linkages, spillovers, the global value chain, the network economy, and FDI’s impact on economic growth. The chapter also discusses the development of ASEAN’s investment institutions such as the ASEAN Comprehensive Investment Area, which builds upon frameworks adopted in the 1980s and 1990s, and falls within ASEAN’s larger ASEAN Economic Community endeavor.

MNEs and the Practice of International Business Diplomacy

Jonathan P. Doh, Nicolas M. Dahan, and Michelle Casario

This article develops a clearer conceptualization of International Business Diplomacy (IBD) as a set of practices that multinational enterprises (MNEs) use to implement their non-market strategy (NMS). Scholars have long documented IBD as a practice of multinational enterprises (MNEs). The article contends IBD constitutes a set of practices in the implementation of global NMS and that the most appropriate practices depend upon two key dimensions of the global institutional governance regime confronting MNEs: the governance level and the degree of rule formality.

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