This book examines foreign direct investment in a changing world economy. It offers case-studies of this investment in different national and industrial contexts. Firms and countries have encountered mixed results in using this investment to further their foreign leverage. Conversely, potential host countries have faced different opportunities and constraints in attracting or utilizing foreign capital for their development. Although some countries have been relatively successful, most do not appear to be well positioned to take advantage of the ongoing processes of globalization of national economies.
Pinto develops a partisan theory of foreign direct investment (FDI) arguing that left-wing governments choose policies that allow easier entry by foreign investors more than right-wing governments, and that foreign investors prefer to invest in countries governed by the left. To reach this determination, the book derives the conditions under which investment flows should be expected to affect the relative demand for the services supplied by economic actors in host countries. Based on these expected distributive consequences, a political economy model of the regulation of FDI and changes in investment performance within countries and over time is developed. The theory is tested using both cross-national statistical analysis and two case studies exploring the development of the foreign investment regimes and their performance over the past century in Argentina and South Korea.
This book addresses two of the most important trends in political economy during the last two decades - globalization and decentralization - in the context of the world's most rapidly growing economic power, China. The intent is to provide a better understanding of how local political and economic institutions shape the ability of Chinese state-owned firms to utilize foreign direct investment (FDI) to remake themselves in the transition from inefficient and technologically backward firms into powerful national champions. In a global economy, the author argues, local governments are increasingly the agents of industrial transformation at the level of the firm. Local institutions are durable over time, and they have important economic consequences. Through an analysis of five Chinese regions, the treatment seeks to specify the opportunities and constraints that alternative institutional structures create, how they change over time, and ultimately, how they prepare Chinese firms for the challenge of global competition.
Multinationals in the Global Political Economy looks at the new diplomacy between the multinational firm and the nation-state, focusing on the interdependencies, conflictual and co-operative, between the two primary actors in the global economy. An international group of scholars (the United Kingdom, the United States, Canada and Sweden) from a variety of disciplines (international relations, political science, public policy, economics and business studies) discuss the theory and practice of MNE-state relations in the 1990s.
This book examines the politics of technology, and provides a detailed analysis of developments and debates within the European Union, international trade and governance. An important empirical contribution to the literature on the relations between politics and technology, this volume contains empirical statistical studies based on a wide variety of different types of data, and includes expert contributions from different academic disciplines. With a selection of detailed case studies, this book is divided into three main sections: The first part presents contributions on the role of domestic national policies for innovation and idea diffusion, including studies on Japan and the European Union. The second part takes a critical look at how the international system of intellectual property rights access to knowledge, opportunities for development and health improvement, examining the TRIPS agreement and the European patent system. The third part focuses on the role of foreign direct investment in innovation and idea diffusion, with studies on a wide range of cases using different, novel data material. Governance and Knowledge will be of interest to students, scholars and policy-makers of European politics, political economy, international trade, governance and economics.
The effects of globalization on economy and society are highly contested subjects in academic and political arenas. This study brings an empirical perspective to the crucially important arguments that encapsulate the major debates in this area. Using quantitative data, this book addresses the shape and degree of internationalisation by focussing on
The second edition of International Political Economy and Globalization is completely revised and updated to include new material on trade, monetary, and environmental issues. It provides a comprehensive treatment of major developments in the global economy and is suitable for adoption as a primer in undergraduate courses in international political economy. The author takes a stand that is supportive of globalization in principle, while acknowledging that there are many areas of inequity that disadvantage developing countries. This is explored in chapters that deal with trade, debt crises, and the environment. Students will find that the material is presented in a readable format that does not presuppose prior familiarity with economics.
For decades, free trade was advocated as the vehicle for peace, prosperity, and democracy in an increasingly globalized market. More recently, the proliferation of foreign direct investment has raised questions about its impact upon local economies and politics. Here, seven scholars bring together their wide-ranging expertise to investigate the factors that determine the attractiveness of a locale to investors and the extent of their political power. Multinational corporations prefer to invest where legal and political institutions support the rule of law, protections for property rights, and democratic processes. Corporate influence on local institutions, in turn, depends upon the relative power of other players and the types of policies at issue.
This book examines how new flows of foreign direct investments from autocracies are framed, their effects, and the policy responses to them, within the context of challenges to the international liberal order. Chapters address thematic and regional issues, from national investment controls and threat perceptions to China and Russia’s responses. Collectively, they explore a new dynamic in international politics: the securitization of money crossing borders. Historically, foreign investments operated under minimal global regulation, based on the assumption that they were beneficial, and profit driven. However, the past decade has witnessed a radical shift in approaches to foreign investments due to changing investment patterns and the entry of state-sponsored actors into this traditionally unregulated realm. China and Russia are seen to leverage foreign investments to advance their long-term economic and political objectives. The book comprehensively examines the subsequent repositioning of foreign investment policy and its consequences for national and international politics.
What makes a country attractive to foreign investors? To what extent do conditions of governance and politics matter? This book provides the most systematic exploration to date of these crucial questions at the nexus of politics and economics. Using quantitative data and interviews with investment promotion agencies, investment location consultants, political risk insurers, and decision makers at multinational corporations, Nathan Jensen arrives at a surprising conclusion: Countries may be competing for international capital, but government fiscal policy--both taxation and spending--has little impact on multinationals' investment decisions. Although government policy has a limited ability to determine patterns of foreign direct investment (FDI) inflows, political institutions are central to explaining why some countries are more successful in attracting international capital. First, democratic institutions lower political risks for multinational corporations. Indeed, they lead to massive amounts of foreign direct investment. Second, politically federal institutions, in contrast to fiscally federal institutions, lower political risks for multinationals and allow host countries to attract higher levels of FDI inflows. Third, the International Monetary Fund, often cited as a catalyst for promoting foreign investment, actually deters multinationals from investment in countries under IMF programs. Even after controlling for the factors that lead countries to seek IMF support, IMF agreements are associated with much lower levels of FDI inflows.
