The Hidden Cost of Ubiquity: Globalisation and Terrorism

Terrorism is not a natural hazard outside the range of corporate decision-making. Simple micro-economic analysis shows how globalisation changed the supply of terrorist attacks and the costs for tolerating terrorist hazard. Approaches developed in organizational strategy help to single out three strategic decisions directly affecting the vulnerability of firms in a globalised world: exposure, geographical spread, and organisational form. The analysis suggests that the gains from ubiquity, leanness in production, and long-term commitment need to be adjusted for the terrorist hazard involved

Historical Attitudes and Implications for path dependence: FDI development and Institutional changes in China

This paper attempts to explain how institutions in the reform era of China have evolved by looking into the FDI policies and regulations. As history matters, we don’t look solely into the previous direct stage to the reform era, and rather look into a longer history starting from prior to the 14th century. The study shows that a dimension of time is crucial to understand institutional change in China. Though the initiation of the open-door policy in the reform era is commonly regarded as path-break event, we claim that this institutional change is a path dependent event from a longer historical view. The path takes a zigzag that is shaped by interaction among interested parties: the central government, local governments and economic agents (foreign investors in terms of the open-door policies). The historical study shows that mutual needs and their behaviours influence their attitudes which further influence institutional building. This also further implies how Chinese institutions may evolve in the future and what we should concern more about institutional changes in transitional economies

Open-system orchestration as a relational source of sensing capabilities: Evidence from a venture association

Research on innovation networks has highlighted the pivotal role that actors with more prominence and power, such as hub firms, may play in orchestrating the activities of other network members along a collective innovation effort. Our study examined the undertheorized, but no less important, type of orchestration that characterizes other organizations, such as business incubators and venture associations, who seek to support the dispersed entrepreneurial efforts of network members. We refer to this type as ‘open-system’ orchestration, as opposed to the commonly studied ‘closed-system’ type performed by hub firms. Our findings reveal how the processes of open-system orchestration differ markedly from those of closed-system orchestration, and detail how these processes influence the micro-foundations of network members’ sensing capabilities. By doing so, we also offer empirical substantiation and theoretical elaboration to the idea that dynamic capabilities might not reside exclusively inside firms, but could be co-created relationally with other parties in the business ecosystem

Towards intercultural competency in multicultural marketplaces

Intercultural competency plays a pivotal role in creating a more equitable and just marketplace where situations of marketplace vulnerability are minimized and resiliency is enhanced. Intercultural competency is the ability to understand, adapt, and accommodate another’s culture. In this essay, a framework of intercultural competency development in multicultural marketplaces is presented. Resilience building actions for multicultural marketplace actors, specifically, consumers, businesses/marketers, community groups and NGOs, and policy makers, are discussed for three phases of intercultural competency development

The influence of firm, industry and network on the corporate social performance of Japanese firms

We develop and test the thesis that corporate social performance (CSP) constitutes a socially constructed and shared strategic asset, which is not only influenced by factors specific to a firm, but also by the social performance of firms in its industry and inter-corporate network. Using variance decomposition, we analyze data from 130 large Japanese firms and find that both firm-specific and industry-level factors account for significant variance in CSP, but network-level factors do not. Copyright Springer Science+Business Media, LLC 2007Corporate social performance, Japan, Variance decomposition, Keiretsu , Networks, Industry-effects, Resource based view,