human resources and international joint venture performance a system perspective building on general systems theory we argue that the multi system nature of the international joint venture ijv drives two distinct but inter related sets of human resource hr issues a set whose core is mainly within the venture subsystem within ijv hr set producing a detrimental impact on venture performance and a set associated mainly with the relational tension along the interface between the parent and the venture subsystem relational interface hr set the relational set is detrimental at the system level but actually has a positive performance impact at the venture subsystem level hierarchical regression results from a sample of 265 china based ijvs offer support for the above hypotheses developed around the two sets of hr issues we discuss implications for ijv theory research and practice

control and performance of international joint ventures control is a critical concept for successful management and performance of international joint ventures ijvs this paper reviews and synthesizes prior studies addressing the conceptualization and operationalization of control within ijvs as well as the ijv control performance relationship the paper also presents a new conceptualization of ijv control as well as a conceptual frame work for studying control of ijvs

partner nationality and the structure performance relationship in strategic alliances the dramatic growth of global strategic alliances between firms is fundamentally reshaping the nature of international business indeed interfirm cooperation has become a crucial component of the pursuit of global competitive advantage yet such alliances are enormously complex to manage successfully in part because of the opportunity and incentive to cheat and profit at the partner s expense that is an inescapable part of these relationships consequently strategic alliances are frequently subject to high instability poor performance and premature dissolution thus an important question arises is it possible to promote more stable cooperation and higher alliance performance through a realignment of companies incentives this question is addressed empirically in the present paper using recent work in game theory which suggests that high performance is linked to specific elements of the alliance structure further this study applies insights from international business literature suggesting th

national and organizational culture differences and international joint venture performance this study examines the effect of dimensions of national and organizational culture differences on international joint venture ijv performance based on data from a survey of executives from joint ventures between indian partners and partners from other countries we found that the presumed negative effect from culture distance on ijv performance originates more from differences in organizational culture than from differences in national culture

japanese and local partners commitment to ijvs psychological consequences of outcomes and investments in the ijv relationships this study investigated the antecedents of commitment in ijvs from the major partners perspective data were gathered from japanese and local partners in ijvs located in eleven countries and analyzed in structural equations models results indicated that commitment is largely a function of the perceived benefits of the relationship i e satisfaction and economic performance however exploration analyses of differences between local partners and the japanese suggest that the effects of psychological antecedents might be contingent on the strategic intent of the relationship

patterns of control in u s uk and european multinational corporations this paper examines the type and level of control exercised by the parent headquarters of 50 u s uk and european multinational corporations over their foreign subsidiaries patterns of control in the 3 national groups differ in significant ways and these differences seem to have important implications for other characteristics of a company s organization design and managerial style

control and coordination in multinational corporations the integration of french and british subsidiaries into u s based multinationals is examined a theory linking the use of control and coordination mechanisms to the need for predictability flexibility and the cost of achieving them is investigated by relating organizational structure technology foreign commitment financial performance and nationality to the use of coordination and control

responding to public disclosure of corporate social irresponsibility in host countries information control and ownership control we extend the internalization literature by theorizing on how public disclosure of corporate social irresponsibility csi can damage reputation based firm specific advantages of multinational companies mncs and how foreign subsidiary governance can subsequently be used as strategic responses specifically we distinguish between two foreign subsidiary governance mechanisms information control and ownership control that the prior literature has often assumed operate in parallel and posit that they function in divergent directions in this context furthermore we explain how two host country characteristics press freedom and regulatory quality amplify the need for mncs to utilize different governance mechanisms as responses to csi disclosure

optimal allocation of ownership rights in dynamic r d alliances we explore the dynamic evolution of property rights regimes in r d alliances using the incomplete contract approach pioneered by grossman hart and moore in contrast to the standard analysis the productive asset is an excludable public good such as a patent moreover both firms can decide whether to disclose their know how and invest effort know how that has once been released cannot be concealed later we characterize different scenarios in which the optimal ownership structure may change over time due to a trade off between inducing know how disclosure and ensuring maximum effort

legitimacy and multi level institutional environments implications for foreign subsidiary ownership structure in this study we examine from an institutional perspective the legitimacy rationale behind the choice of subsidiary ownership structure among multinational corporations mncs we suggest that when under a strong pressure to conform at the host country and local industry levels of their institutional environment mncs are likely to take a lower ownership stake in exchange for external legitimacy in the host country or local industry that their foreign subsidiaries are entering we also suggest that mncs are likely to take a higher ownership stake in response to strong internal pressure to sustain their internal legitimacy at the corporate level of their institutional environment we also propose that mncs are more likely to exchange ownership for legitimacy in local industries than in host countries and in local markets with a high level of political instability than in those with a low level of political instability these propositions are generally supported by our analysis of 4451 subsidiaries established by 898 japanese mncs that operated in 39 countries across 52 industries two digit sic between 1988 and 1999

the influence of parent control structure on parent conflict in vietnamese international joint ventures an organizational justice based contingency approach there has been significant interest in understanding how the distribution of parental control over international joint ventures ijv influences ijv outcomes e g parent conflict survival performance yet the accumulation of research on the relationship between control structure and ijv outcomes has been somewhat inconclusive and even contradictory we contribute to this research stream by developing an organizational justice based contingency model relating parental control structure to parent conflict we suggest that the level of conflict between ijv parents will depend on the consistencies between the control structure and parents contribution of proprietary resources and between control structure and the parents abilities to effectively monitor operations our analysis of vietnamese joint ventures provides some support for our model and suggests that the relationship between parent control structure and ijv outcomes is perhaps more complex than previously thought

modeling foreign equity control in sino foreign joint ventures with neural networks abstract equity control is one of the key areas of research in international business this study employs artificial neural networks anns to model foreign equity control comparisons are made with traditional statistical modeling approaches it was found that anns produce a more parsimonious set of independent variables that yield higher classification rates than logistic regression thus it can be concluded that anns with their complex nonlinear structure are able to model the relationship between transaction cost factors and majority minority ownership and percent equity ownership more accurately than the linear statistical approaches

power in firm networks what it means for regional innovation systems christopherson s clark j 2007 power in firm networks what it means for regional innovation systems regional studies 41 1223 1236 the role of power within regional firm networks is noted in empirical studies but insufficiently theorized it is suggested that network functioning is conflictual and that more powerful network members particularly transnational corporations tncs leverage regional resources to advance their sustainable competitive advantage the agendas and power exercised by tncs within regionalized firm networks have significant implications for regional policy and the uneven allocation of resources and capacities within and among regions the findings indicate that transnational firm access to resources that are critical to innovation including university research and skilled labour negatively affects the potential for innovation by small and medium size firms christopherson s et clark j 2007 le pouvoir au sein des reseaux d entreprise son importance pour les systemes d

phasing the operation mode of foreign subsidiaries reaping the benefits of multinationality through internal capital markets the lifetime of foreign equity partnerships is often limited research suggests that mncs abandon their local partners when the need for sharing ownership in foreign subsidiaries has diminished this study shows that mncs may abandon their local equity partners to reap the benefits of multinationality as mncs gain a competitive advantage from leveraging resources across borders they will initially benefit from sharing ownership with a local firm to embed their foreign subsidiaries in the local environment and access local resources more effectively later they will benefit from taking over the local partner s equity share to better embed their subsidiaries in the parent organization and transfer locally accessed resources to the mnc s other locations moderated mediation regressions provide evidence of such practice in the context of cross border transfers of capital resources this strategy seems to work as a corollary of our model panel regressions suggest that sharing ownership with local firms in a host country with a capital resource advantage is associated with appropriating more capital resources from the local debt market while abandoning these partner firms later is associated with transferring more capital resources from this host country via internal capital markets to other parts of the mnc

modal choice in a world of alliances analyzing organizational forms in the international hotel sector in the new management landscape where interfirm collaborations are common international companies today have fully owned operations and equity joint ventures as well as non equity alliances which in the service sector include franchising and management service agreements what determines the optimum choice of organizational mode the new syncretic theory developed in this paper combines concepts from transaction costs theory agency theory corporate knowledge and organizational capability theories to answer this question the paper then tests these concepts to explain the incidence of these modes in the international hotel business using canonical discriminant analysis as well as logistical regression using a generalized logit model the choice of entry mode is shown to be determined by both country or environmental variables as well as firm specific variables

industrial districts old wine in new bottles harrison b 1992 industrial districts old wine in new bottles reg studies 26 469 483 according to the theory of industrial districts a new wave of economic growth is being led in a number of regions in europe north america and east asia by spatially concentrated networks of mostly small and medium sized enterprises often using flexible production technology and characterized by extensive local interfirm linkages does this amount to a re emergence of the dominance of what urban and regional economists call agglomeration economies over the well known pressures on business to spatially disperse its operations neoclassical economic theorizing from marshall to perroux provides one perspective on the contemporary industrial district phenomenon another is afforded by granovetter s more recent elaboration of the ideas of embedding under and over socialization confronting each of these theoretical approaches with the other leads me to conclude that the industrial district prototypes involv

trust and performance in cross border marketing partnerships a behavioral approach existing research on international partnerships focuses primarily on the ex ante structuring of interorganizational relationships this study departs from this research by taking a behavioral approach to understand the ex post maintenance of cross border marketing partnerships a conceptual model is developed by identifying the antecedents of trust and performance in such partnerships the model is empirically tested on a sample of u s firms having distributor and licensing relationships with firms from asia europe and central south america findings support the importance of bilateral relational norms and informal monitoring mechanism in building interorganizational trust and improving market performance of international partnerships

r d cooperation and failures in innovation projects empirical evidence from french cis data the second french community innovation survey cis indicates that 14 of rd collaborating firms had to abandon or delay their innovation projects due to difficulties in their partnerships an outcome which we term cooperation failures controlling for sample selection on the cooperation decision our estimates show that firms collaborating with competitors and public research organizations pros especially when they are foreign are more likely to delay or stop an innovation project because of difficulties encountered in their rd partnerships more surprisingly firms collaborating with their suppliers also face a higher risk of cooperation failures at least for pros firms can reduce the risk of cooperation failures through previous experiences in partnerships larger firms and group subsidiaries are less likely to face cooperation failures and so do firms in industries with a strong appropriability regime

policy review section in this policy review section gerry stoker of the institute of local government studies presents a critical review of the role of urban development corporations udcs in comparing the experience of the udcs consideration is given to the varying nature of the land and property market in each udc area to the relationship with local authorities and other local bodies and the regeneration strategies pursued by the udcs this is followed by an assessment of the impact of the udcs in economic social and political terms in the second article john britton of the university of toronto examines the theoretical case for interventionist public policies to assist the innovation process in small and medium sized enterprises these arguments are supported by a review of the experience of various national support programmes introduced in the uk in particular the manufacturing advisory service introduced in 1978 and the design advisory service launched in 1982

determinants of governance structure in alliances the role of strategic task and partner uncertainties research in transaction cost economics and structural sociology has emphasized the role of opportunism and trust in the choice between equity and non equity governance forms in alliances this paper suggests that the uncertainty surrounding partner cooperation is not straightforwardly predictive of governance structure in alliances instead task uncertainty and strategic uncertainty associated with the activities performed within alliances induce coordination and adaptation requirements that are important determinants of alliance governance independently of partner uncertainty support for this view is provided based on a 12 year panel of alliances formed in the us telecommunications entertainment and computer industries

industrial districts and regional economic development a regulation approach digiovanna s 1996 industrial districts and regional economic developoment a regulation approach reg studies 30 373 386 this paper examines the regulatory underpinnings of industrial districts as many regional governments have been forced to accept greater responsibility for their own economic futures the industrial district model has been presented as an attractive path to economic development the underlying assumption among many policy makers is that all industrial districts are based on similar models of production organization and labour relations nevertheless the comparative approach illustrates that districts which appear similar on the surface are often quite distinct particularly when the experience of workers is considered by applying the concepts of regulation theory to the experiences of emilia romagna baden wurttemberg and silicon valley this paper illustrates that flexibly specialized districts can result in a variety of social outcomes this paper concludes that the success o

will a second mouse get the cheese learning from early entrants failures in a foreign market we examine the conditions that can facilitate or hinder the effectiveness with which a new entrant learns from the failures of prior entrants by analyzing the experiences of 822 japanese subsidiaries in china founded between 1979 and 2000 our conceptual arguments and empirical findings demonstrate that learning from the failure experiences of prior entrants increases a new entrant s survival chances when entering china further we find that the value of this learning is less effective when there is a greater level of heterogeneity in the causes of these failures however this learning is more effective when a new entrant s parent firm has ownership ties with investors who had ventures that failed previously in china

heterogeneous income profiles and lifecycle bias in intergenerational mobility estimation using short snapshots of income in intergenerational mobility estimation causes lifecycle bias if the snapshots cannot mimic lifetime outcomes we use uniquely long series of swedish income data to show that this bias is large and to examine current strategies to reduce it we confirm that lifecycle bias is smallest when incomes are measured around midlife a central implication from a widely adopted generalization of the classical errors in variables model however the model cannot predict the ideal age of measurement or eliminate lifecycle bias at other ages we illustrate how extensions of this model can reduce the bias further

a model of cultural differences and international alliance performance we propose a model of cultural differences and international alliance performance to explain the ambiguous findings regarding the influence of national culture differences on alliance performance building on research on national organizational and professional cultures we argue that the closer the domain of a social group is to the value creating activities of an alliance the more disruptive cultural differences between the partners members of that social group will be organizational culture differences will tend to be more disruptive than national culture differences and differences in the professional culture most relevant to alliance value creation typically will be the most disruptive implications for research and managerial practice are discussed and the model s relevance for international r d alliances is highlighted

dual career expatriates expectations adjustment and satisfaction with international relocation dual career expatriate couples present a challenging set of problems for international human resource managers the results of a survey of husbands and wives in expatriate dual career couples are analyzed relative to 1 differences between the expatriates and their trailing spouses 2 differences between male and female led dual career couples 3 differences between dual career couples opinions prior to expatriation and upon repatriation the results of the study indicate dual career couples have relatively consistent concerns and expectations prior to expatriation and upon repatriation to their home country the significant differences observed were between male led dual career couples prior to expatriation when compared to male led dual career couples upon repatriation in addition the dual career expatriate respondents did not feel the mnc that transferred them overseas provided adequate training or social support during the international assignment

explaining ijv survival in a transitional economy through social exchange and knowledge based perspectives in this study we combine social exchange and knowledge based perspectives to develop a general path model of ijv survival we further refine our expectations by considering the transitional economic context of our study and the somewhat unique managerial values resulting from the legacy of marxist ideology results from structural equation modeling suggest that an imbalance in the management control structure between the parents leads to parental conflict and an increased likelihood of ijv failure an imbalance in the ownership control structure however had no influence on conflict or survival in general support from the foreign parent is positively related to ijv learning and ijv survival however higher levels of technical support provided by the foreign parent to the ijv reduced the level of parental conflict whereas management support had no effect on conflict our results suggest some dilemmas for firms pursuing ijvs in transitional economies although the foreign parent often contributes critical resources to the ijv providing it with bargaining power and a high level of influence an imbalance in management control between the partners may ultimately be detrimental to ijv survival copyright 2000 john wiley sons ltd

transactional characteristics institutional environment and joint venture contracts this study examines how transactional characteristics and the institutional environment influence contractual governance for international joint ventures ijvs unlike previous studies that view joint venture contractual governance as a unidimensional construct clause specificity thus causing a debate upon whether ijv contracts should be more specific contractual governance herein is defined as a three dimensional construct that includes the extent to which contractual terms are clearly specified term specificity possible contingencies are accounted for contingency adaptability and joint venture parties are legally bound to the contract contractual obligatoriness our analysis of ijvs in china suggests that term specificity and contractual obligatoriness increase when the proprietariness of resources to be invested in the ijv or the incompleteness of the host country s legal system increase contractual obligatoriness appears to be an increasing function of economic exposure and environmental volatility whereas contingency adaptability in a contract rises when interparty dependency investment uncertainty and knowledge proprietariness intensify or when environmental hazards escalate these results suggest that an ijv contract if structured multidimensionally as above can curtail opportunism and guide venture evolution at the same time these contractual dimensions should not be prefixed but properly aligned with transactional and institutional characteristics this alignment has strong implications in reducing transaction costs and spurring ijv evolution in the complex and volatile institutional environment

host country policies and mne management control in ijvs evidence from china in international joint ventures ijvs partner firms exert three types of management control output process and social since management control critically influences ijv success it is essential to understand what factors drive the development of the control system prior studies have focused mainly on ijvs internal conditions and have largely neglected external institutional influences on ijv control in this study we explore how host country policies affect mne partners control over their ijvs using a sample of ijvs in china we find that mne partners tend to exercise less output and process control when minority equity restriction is present greater process control when they receive government incentives and less social control when they are required to partner with state owned enterprises in contrast the results of a post hoc analysis show that local partners control activities are not significantly influenced by these policies our findings provide new insights into ijv management by demonstrating the impacts of regulatory institutions on partners control activities

outsourcing r d and the pattern of intra metropolitan location the electronics industries of madrid the relationship between intra metropolitan location research and development r d and the outsourcing of production is analysed to determine differences in and the supportive character of intra metropolitan areas for high technology production madrid s electronics industries have shown a remarkable resilience in the face of extensive economic restructuring and the change in trade regimes that has accompanied continental integration much of the strength of the electronics sector may have been due to the metropolitan area s support for outsourcing and the creative specialisation that it facilitated the distribution of manufacturing establishments their local sourcing characteristics industrial district or agglomeration effects and the role of r d are evaluated to determine the intra metropolitan context of production extensive statistical analyses of the relationship between r d and productive performance with various indicators of capital costs revenues and scale are undertaken with estab

strategic determinants of partner selection criteria in international joint ventures prior studies are vague regarding determinants of criteria for selecting complementary partners for international joint ventures ijvs this paper first distinguishes task and partner related dimensions of selection criteria the paper then argues that relative importance of task related selection criteria is determined by the strategic context of the proposed ijv and the parent firm specifically the critical success factors of the venture s competitive environment and the parent s static and dynamic position vis a vis these factors

the characteristics and performance of korean joint ventures in ldcs little has been reported on joint ventures between firms from newly industrialized countries and developing countries this paper examines twelve characteristics of a sample of korean firms with partners in developing countries ldcs and contrasts them with existing research where a developed country firms have linked with firms in other developed countries and b developed country firms have linked with local firms in developing countries as part of the analysis ten hypotheses were formulated and tested

the triple c approach to local industrial policy abstract in both developed and developing countries there is mounting evidence that clustering and networking help small and medium sized manufacturers to raise their competitiveness the role of public policy in this process is less clear the european experience suggests that local and regional government can play an important role equally if not more interesting experiences can be found in developing countries their analysis constitutes the core of this paper the lessons can be summarized as the triple c which stands for customer oriented collective and cumulative

a comparison of intergenerational mobility curves in germany norway sweden and the us we examine intergenerational mobility differences between germany norway sweden and the us using ranks we find that the us is substantially less intergenerationally mobile than the three european countries and that the most mobile region of the us is less mobile than the least mobile regions of norway and sweden using a linear estimator of income share mobility we find that the four countries have very similar rates of intergenerational mobility however when we use non parametric versions of rank and income share mobility we find that the us tends to experience lower upward mobility at the bottom of the income distribution than norway and sweden

an integrated anti opportunism system in international exchange building on economic and social exchange theories this study develops an integrated model in which curtailing opportunism in international joint ventures ijvs requires four interrelated sets of suppressing forces 1 contractual ordering contractual inclusiveness and contractual obligatoriness 2 structural ordering managerial governance and equity captiveness 3 relational ordering interparty attachment and boundary spanner ties and 4 justice ordering procedural justice and distributive justice using a sample of 192 ijvs in an emerging market this study finds general support for our theoretical model our research validates that countering opportunism involves a system wide effort that integrates economic and social mandates unifies ex ante and ex post mechanisms controls both egoistic and non egoistic motivations and combines organizational level and individual level forces for partners from individualist cultures economic ordering forces contractual and structural are stronger than social ordering forces relational and justice in relation to opportunism resistance whereas for partners from a collectivistic culture social ordering forces are relatively stronger than economic ordering forces for this end

control and performance in international joint ventures the authors examine the meaning of control in international joint ventures ijvs and the relationships of potential means of control in such organizations to the performance satisfaction of the foreign partner they propose a conceptual model that provides both a traditional ownership focused internalization perspective on those issues and an integrated approach combining a broader transaction cost interpretation of control with a resource input based bargaining power model a set of simultaneous structural equations with endogenous explanatory variables provides multiple possible paths from various resource and power inputs through different means of control to perceived performance satisfaction in such a model intermediate variables act both as dependent and independent variables thus the complex theoretical interactions of the variables are modeled more comprehensively and realistically than in single equation models to test the model and compare the theoretical relationships the authors used dat

social knowledge as a control system a proposition and evidence from the japanese fdi behavior building upon the concept of clans this paper introduces the value of social knowledge as a control mechanism available for an mnc to manage its foreign subsidiaries social knowledge is defined as one s ability to understand and predict others general patterns of behavior the hypotheses are empirically tested with japanese fdi data into four host countries the united states singapore taiwan and korea the results offer broad support for the proposition that for mncs with social knowledge the need to resort to ownership for control purposes is reduced

the economics of organization the transaction cost approach the transaction cost approach to the study of economic organization regards the transaction as the basic unit of analysis and holds that an understanding of transaction cost economizing is central to the study of organizations applications of this approach require that transactions be dimensionalized and that alternative governance structures be described economizing is accomplished by assigning transactions to governance structures in a discriminating way the approach applies both to the determination of efficient boundaries as between firms and markets and to the organization of internal transactions including the design of employment relations the approach is compared and contrasted with selected parts of the organization theory literature

collective efficiency growth path for small scale industry this study is concerned with the growth of small local industry in developing countries and explores one particular route for understanding and fostering such growth it focuses on the clustering of firms and the competitive advantage which they derive from local external economies and joint action captured in the concept of collective efficiency following a conceptual discussion the article explores the economic and institutional conditions which enhance or hinder collective efficiency this includes a case study which suggests that responding to opportunity and crisis requires shifting from mere reliance on external economies to joint action and from ascribed to earned trust

fit misfit and beyond fit relational metaphors and semantic fit in international joint ventures we propose that metaphorical descriptions of newly formed international joint ventures ijvs contain important diagnostic information regarding the way these cross border alliances are managed and perform in three studies we examine how relational metaphors reflect semantic fit or the ijv partners cognitive match of managerial schemas and their capability to recontextualize communications regarding alliance operations we find ijv partners that share relational metaphors achieve superior outcomes reflecting aligned managerial approaches to controlling shared resources and joint activities further formal ownership as equity share moderates the impact managerial schemas implied by metaphors have on subjective time lagged performance of ijvs our analysis of metaphorical language not only reveals the way newly formed ijvs are managed but also highlights performance variations associated with complex patterns of ijv controls

on the future of international joint venture research international joint ventures ijvs are an important type of international strategic alliance isa and have been studied by scholars for decades resulting in a plethora of empirical studies publications and reviews yet an inadequate accumulation of knowledge exists as a closer look reveals much more than providing a summary and critical assessment of past contributions this paper develops an expansive research agenda based upon a deep understanding of past research and comprehensive frameworks that distill this research we identify a number of research opportunities that would not only advance ijv research but also closely related literatures and disciplines such as isas theories of the multinational firm international business research and strategic management

when competition eclipses cooperation an event history analysis of joint venture failure why do so many joint ventures fail despite the fact that their success is the exception rather than the rule the literature on why joint venture performance has been so poor remains fragmentary we address this issue adopting a transaction cost economics perspective and modeling joint ventures as governance structures that blend the advantages and drawbacks of both markets and hierarchies using a data base on electronics industry ventures and event history analysis we identify several predictors of joint venture failure and test for their influences a key finding is that the presence of competition between joint venture partners outside of the agreement significantly impairs chances for the operation s chance of survival we also find clear evidence that the failure rate of joint ventures is nonmonotonic rising to a peak in the middle term and then declining finally we compare and contrast predictors of terminations due to failure to those due to acquisition of the joint venture by one of its partners our overall conclusions highlight implications for strategic choice theory building and the management of joint ventures

inter partner credible threat in international joint ventures an infinitely repeated prisoner s dilemma model we use an infinitely repeated prisoner s dilemma model to examine the role of inter partner credible threat in international joint ventures ijvs inter partner credible threat refers to the certainty of either partner s retaliation given the other partner s earlier cheating we argue that inter partner credible threat represents the first order determinant and partners management control represents the second order determinant of partner payoffs when inter partner credible threat is present both partners achieve balanced payoffs whereas when it is absent partners relative control will determine their relative payoffs in depth interview data from four ijvs in china provide preliminary support for our theoretical arguments

control cooperation interfaces in global strategic alliances a situational typology and strategic responses this article applies the dialectical logic of loose coupling to interpartner exchanges in order to analyze the dynamics of global strategic alliances we develop a typology of control and cooperation that defines alliance states or situations according to their level of cooperation under private and collective control in the private control cooperation interplay contending honeymoon and coopetition situations arise depending on the levels of private control and cooperation in the collective control cooperation interplay the loosely connected the equity hostage the tightly integrated and the trusting states emerge according to the levels of collective control and cooperation we illustrate how an individual partner strategically responds to the control cooperation interplay under each situation or state and develop hypotheses explicating how these strategic responses are influenced by relational characteristics such as goal congruity resource complementarity and bargaining asymmetry between foreign and local partners

the effects of exposure to better neighborhoods on children new evidence from the moving to opportunity experiment the moving to opportunity mto experiment offered randomly selected families housing vouchers to move from high poverty housing projects to lower poverty neighborhoods we analyze mto s impacts on children s long term outcomes using tax data we find that moving to a lower poverty neighborhood when young before age 13 increases college attendance and earnings and reduces single parenthood rates moving as an adolescent has slightly negative impacts perhaps because of disruption effects the decline in the gains from moving with the age when children move suggests that the duration of exposure to better environments during childhood is an important determinant of children s long term outcomes jel i31 i38 j13 r23 r38

the design of coordination and control mechanisms for managing joint venture parent relationships joint ventures jvs defined as independent organizations formed by the pooling of resources and sharing of equity by two or more firms are being formed at an increasingly rapid pace while much empirical research has examined the conditions which favor the formation of jvs less attention has been paid to the equally important issues of control and implementation which are the focus of interest in this study we identify two factors which are expected to influence the design of control mechanisms i e 1 the strategic interdependence between the jv and each parent and 2 the environmental uncertainty faced by the jv our empirical examination confirms the importance of the degree of strategic interdependence and the moderating role of environmental uncertainty in explaining the design of control mechanisms 1998 john wiley sons ltd

equity joint ventures and the theory of the multinational enterprise this paper extends the internalization approach to the theory of the multinational enterprise mne to include an expanded role for equity joint ventures using the transaction cost paradigm of williamson this paper explains why joint ventures may sometimes be preferred over wholly owned subsidiaries also presented is empirical work on joint venture performance in developing countries which demonstrates that under certain conditions joint ventures can be the optimal mode of foreign direct investment

multinational corporations control systems and delegation issues the paper has 2 major objectives first to identify control and delegation issues confronting multinational corporation managers second to develop a conceptual model to assist multinational corporation managers in selecting appropriate control systems and determining the extent of delegation to be provided to subsidiary managers finally the paper suggests directions for future research

learning from competing partners outcomes and durations of scale and link alliances in europe north america and asia this paper investigates the outcomes and durations of strategic alliances among competing firms using alliance outcomes as indicators of learning by partner firms we show that alliance outcomes vary systematically across link and scale alliances link alliances are interfirm partnerships to which partners contribute different capabilities while scale alliances are partnerships to which partners contribute similar capabilities we find that partners are more likely to reorganize or take over link alliances than scale alliances by contrast scale alliances are more likely to continue without material changes the two types of alliances are equally likely to shut down at similar ages these results support the view that link alliances lead to greater levels of learning and capability acquisition between the partners than do scale alliances copyright 2000 john wiley sons ltd

translating theoretical logics across borders organizational characteristics structural mechanisms and contextual factors in international alliances in this essay i critically review the 2006 jibs decade award article by lyles and salk knowledge acquisition from foreign parents in international joint ventures ijvs an empirical examination in the hungarian context this article develops theoretical arguments and empirically tests a two stage research question 1 what are the organizational characteristics and structural mechanisms between ijv parents that influence knowledge acquisition from the foreign parent and 2 what is the relationship between knowledge acquisition and performance in hungarian ijvs the most important contribution is the focus on both the antecedents and the consequences of knowledge acquisition in ijvs i also discuss subsequent research that draws heavily on the conceptual or empirical findings of the 2006 jibs decade award paper i conclude by suggesting areas of future research in the field of knowledge transfer organizational learning and international strategic alliances

the role of large producers in industrial districts a case study of high technology systems houses in southern california scott a j 1992 the role of large producers in industrial districts a case study of high technology systems houses in southern california reg studies 26 265 275 a generalized concept of industrial districts is proposed the concept hinges on the intertwined notions of the social division of labour external economies and locational agglomeration it is argued that large production units often play an important part in sustaining the growth and development of industrial districts and that such districts need not be composed solely of small production units the argument is illustrated by means of a case study of the role of large systems houses within the high technology industrial districts of southern california it is concluded that neither large establishments nor the internationalization of the economy necessarily threaten the continued viability of industrial districts it is also suggested that industrial districts represent a very widely developed phenomenon in time and space scott a j

cultural differences in conducting intra and inter cultural negotiations a sino canadian comparison a study on conflict resolution strategies of canadian and chinese peoples republic of china executives was conducted responses to two types of joint project conflicts task related and person related with potential partners from their own culture or from the other culture were examined neither group of executives altered its strategy when negotiating across cultures chinese executives were more likely to avoid conflicts but recommended more negative strategies discontinue negotiation withdraw negotiation when conflict emerged person related conflicts were found to generate more negative responses than task related conflicts especially for chinese executives both canadian and chinese executives preferred to negotiate with canadians than with chinese

measuring performance of international joint ventures international joint ventures ijvs are increasing in frequency and strategic importance however efforts to identify variables associated with ijv performance have been constrained by disagreements regarding the comparability and reliability of alternative performance measures and methods this study tests several hypotheses regarding the reliability and comparability of a range of objective and subjective measures of ijv performance as well as evaluating the relative utility of different data collection approaches

international joint venture partner selection the role of the host country legal environment this study attempts to enhance our understanding of how a host country s legal environment influences international joint venture ijv partner selection criteria empirical results based on survey data collected on 169 ijvs revealed that host country rule of law perceptions negatively influence appropriation and coordination cost concerns which positively influence partner related criteria furthermore these concerns mediate the relationship between perceptions of host country rule of law and partner related criteria

patterns of strategic control within multinational corporations the management of multinational operations is often required to balance conflicting priorities between responsiveness at the national subsidiary level and central coordination for global competitiveness such balancing requires that relevant data be brought to bear on decisions that consensus be created among key managers and that relative power among them be carefully balanced in large complex mncs the balancing process can be institutionalized through the structuring of relationships between headquarters and subsidiaries

does ownership affect the variability of the production process evidence from international courier services a firm often must ensure that products or services it produces match customer expectations we define variability as any deviation in a production process yielding products or services whose attributes differ from the firm s stated target specifications firms pursuing products marked by low variability are more subject to maladaptation costs if production processes are not adjusted to avoid nonconformities furthermore such adjustments often require idiosyncratic investments e g dedicated information technology systems thereby creating contractual hazards and potential underinvestment we hypothesize that ownership of sequential activities in the value chain helps mitigate problems associated with maladaptation as well as suboptimalities in transaction specific investment thereby resulting in lower variability using data on delivery times from the japanese international courier and small package services industry we assess the variability reducing role of ownership in two complementary ways the first approach is parametric allowing us to assess the impact of ownership on the variance associated with delivery time here we focus on shipments that frequently fail to arrive precisely within the time period initially expected by customers the second approach is more consistent with the notion of reliability or the likelihood that shipments will not arrive later than expected we nonparametrically estimate the distribution of deviations between actual and expected delivery time and verify how distinct organizational choices change the distribution ownership of multiple segments yields a particularly pronounced effect on both variance and reliability ownership bestows variability reducing benefits of ownership especially when ownership is observed in multiple stages of the value chain

revisiting multinational firms tolerance for joint ventures a trust based approach in spite of the increasing popularity of international joint ventures managers express a high level of dissatisfaction with them this paper argues that overemphasis on the outcome has resulted in a neglect of the social processes underlying the outcome the paper elaborates upon the rationale for a cooperative approach towards interorganizational collaborative relationships based on trust and discusses it in the context of joint ventures this is then applied towards understanding multinational ownership preferences and tolerance for joint ventures it is argued that trust centered logic is largely consistent with approaches that emphasize the issue of ownership and deepens and enriches the insights provided by the latter a shift in focus from ownership to relational dynamics is encouraged

how do international joint ventures create shareholder value this study attempts to identify conditions under which announcements of international joint venture jv formation lead to increases in shareholder value of participating u s firms it does so by combining the singular theoretical foci of previous work on the topic and specifying previously unconsidered but conceptually important influences on firms expected jv performance the study s findings indicate support for the hypothesized effect of variables in partners task related competitive and structural context s but not those in these firms partner related and institutional context s specifically partner venture business relatedness the pursuit of r d oriented activity greater equity ownership and large firm size all are found to have a positive impact on firms jv based value creation although this study finds support for the performance impact of firm level competition the direction of this impact is contrary to that hypothesized no support is found for hypothesized effect of partner partner business relatedness previous jv experience partners relative firm size national cultural relatedness and jv host country political risk copyright 2000 john wiley sons ltd

models of the multinational enterprise flexibility is identified as the hallmark of recent modelling of the multinational enterprise the focus on flexibility is a response to the rationalization and restructuring of international business which has occurred since the end of the golden age of western economic growth flexibility has been south in factor markets intermediate product markets and markets for final products it has been sought by both governments and firms flexible firms are attracted to locations with flexible host governments this article contrasts the modern research agenda based on flexibility with the more traditional research agenda which predominates in the literature reviewed by caves 1996

knowledge acquisition from foreign parents in international joint ventures an empirical examination in the hungarian context in this paper we examine organizational characteristics structural mechanisms and contextual factors that influence knowledge acquisition from the foreign parent in international joint ventures ijvs we in turn relate assessments of knowledge acquisition to ijv performance the data come from a survey of ijvs in the hungarian context where learning and knowledge acquisition from the foreign parent is thought to be particularly critical adaptation mechanisms such as capacity to learn articulated goals and structural mechanisms such as the provision of training technology and managerial assistance by foreign parents all were positively associated with the degree to which ijvs reported acquiring knowledge from their foreign parents we also found limited support for the belief that cultural conflicts can impede knowledge acquisition but only for two party joint ventures with 50 50 equity arrangements we also looked at the relationship between knowledge acquisition and different dimensions for evaluating ijv performance the relationship between knowledge acquisition and performance was significant for all indicators of performance through knowledge acquisition from the foreign parent and the organizational characteristics hypothesized to enhance ijv knowledge acquisition affected assessments of some dimensions of performance more than others our findings contribute to advancing knowledge about the relationship between organizational characteristics and organizational knowledge acquisition in ijvs as well as the relationships between knowledge acquisition and different dimensions of ijv performance

global cities and multinational enterprise location strategy we combine the concept of location derived by economic geographers with theories of the multinational enterprise mne and the liability of foreignness developed by international business scholars to examine the factors that propel mnes toward or away from global cities we argue that three distinctive characteristics of global cities global interconnectedness cosmopolitanism and abundance of advanced producer services help mnes overcome the costs of doing business abroad and we identify the contingencies under which these characteristics combine with firm attributes to exert their strongest influence consistent with these arguments our analysis of a large sample of mne location decisions using a multilevel multinomial model suggests not only that mnes have a strong propensity to locate within global cities but also that these choices are associated with a nuanced interplay of firm and subsidiary level factors including investment motives proprietary capabilities and business strategy our study provides important insights for international business scholars by shedding new light on mne location choices and also contributes to our understanding of economic geography by examining the heterogeneous strategies and capabilities of mnes the primary agents of economic globalization that shape the nature of global cities

split management control and international joint venture performance a framework is presented to characterize four different ways in which management control is partitioned between a multinational enterprise mne and local partners within international joint ventures jvs split control management shared management mne partner dominant management and local partner dominant management the framework was tested using a sample of international jvs in korea we found that jvs following the split control management performed better than any other approach no performance differences were found among the remaining three types of management control this suggests that mnes and local partners should split control that is choose the activities to control so that those chosen activities can be matched with their respective firm specific advantages

an economic model of international joint venture strategy the strategic choice between joint ventures licensing agreements and mergers is analysed using eight key factors suggested by internalisation theory the model explains the increasing role of international joint ventures in the 1980s in terms of the accelerating pace of technological innovation and the globalisation of markets it offers a range of predictions about the formation of joint ventures within industries across industries across locations and over time it exploits a powerful modelling technique that has many other applications in international business strategy

modes of foreign entry a transaction cost analysis and propositions a frontier issue in international marketing is the appropriate choice of entry mode in foreign markets the objective of this paper is to offer a transaction cost framework for investigating the entry mode decision this framework provides 1 a theoretical basis for systematically interrelating the literature into propositions 2 propositions about interactions which resolve the apparently contradictory arguments advanced to date specifically the paper illustrates the feasibility of clustering 17 entry modes into the degree of control the mode provides the entrant proposes that the most appropriate i e most efficient entry mode is a function of the tradeoff between control and the cost of resource commitment advances testable propositions delimiting the circumstances under which each mode maximizes long term efficiency

a dual parent perspective on control and performance in international joint ventures lessons from a developing economy this study compares the control performance relationship for foreign versus local parents in international joint ventures in china transaction cost analysis is found more applicable to foreign than to chinese parents both overall and specific controls are associated with performance for foreign parents while only specific control is for chinese parents under goal incongruity chinese parent control is associated with foreign parent dissatisfaction with venture performance but not vice versa having a majority stake improves performance from a foreign parent perspective but not from that of the chinese parent

structural stability and reconfiguration of international joint ventures previous research suggests that international joint ventures ijvs are inherently unstable and fragile this view has failed however to explain why many ijvs have an extended longevity and stability this paper draws on two contrasting perspectives from organization theory structural instability and structural inertia to trace both the destabilizing and stabilizing forces in ijvs and argues that a complete understanding of an ijv s dynamic evolution requires consideration of both forces

market valuation of joint ventures joint venture characteristics and wealth gains abstract along with rd that is the nature of relationship between partners the relatedness and the strategic implication of joint ventures to partners the extent of partners control over joint ventures and the corporate governance in parent firms the data set consists of two party equity joint ventures in the electronics industry that were launched between 1979 and 1988 the unit of analysis is the 174 u s firms out of 158 joint ventures of which 113 were cross border agreements and 45 were between u s firms the study applies the event study method to assess stockholders risk adjusted wealth gains and a cross sectional analysis based on a generalized least squares model to test the hypotheses contrary to popular belief our results show an overall favorable reaction to joint venturing in the stock market even though there is substantial variation according to contextual influences the findings show that stock market valuations reflect the economic potential of joint ventures and are affected by the degree and type of control shareholders and partners can exercise the first key finding in the study is that the valuation effect of joint ventures is multifaceted the market valuation of joint ventures depends on the relationship between partners the nature of partners contributions the extent of partners control over joint ventures and the corporate governance in parent firms our findings also show that partner size which has not been studied in prior studies is a critical variable affecting wealth gains from joint ventures our results certainly shed light on understanding the effect of size on corporate wealth gains from joint ventures the results provide conflicting support for most hypotheses depending on firm size implying that joint ventures have different strategic and managerial implications for the partners depending on size shareholders tend to perceive joint ventures as a risky entrepreneurial operation particularly for the smaller partners it is indeed difficult to protect the smaller partners firm specific know how from being appropriated by the other partners accordingly smaller firms role and degree of control in a joint venture substantially affect wealth gains from their joint venturing with larger corporations shareholders value majority equity sharing by smaller partners as an important governance mechanism to control resource flows and avoid opportunistic behaviors by the larger partners whereas this study extends the previous findings on positive wealth gains of joint ventures by examining contextual influences it also attempts to fill the void in the field of corporate entrepreneurship despite the growing interest in corporate entrepreneurship there has been little attempt to empirically examine its potential association with corporate financial performance in particular with market based performance measures or wealth gains financial theory posits that accounting based performance measures do not properly measure the value of managers entrepreneurial decisions rappaport 1986 argued that the true measure of the long run value of an investment decision is economic value for shareholders as measured by abnormal stock returns i e wealth gains our study is an extension of this fast emerging field of study on the relationship between corporate entrepreneurship and financial performance by focusing on corporate wealth gains from joint venturing with other firms in pursuit of entrepreneurial goals