Business Commons^™

A Community Of Practice For Chinese Ngos, Reza Hasmath, Jennifer Yj Hsu

Reza Hasmath

A community of practice represents an important resource for the sharing of sector-specific knowledge. It is a mechanism for Chinese NGOs to learn from each other, and collaborate. Drawing upon original data elicited from over 100 NGOs, this article examines the organizational capacity for Chinese NGOs to cultivate a mature community of practice. We find that there are inherent headwinds that Chinese NGOs will have to navigate to accomplish this goal. On the one hand, the majority of NGOs in our sample do not see themselves as part of a community of experts, which presents a huge challenge for the …

Getting Through The Hard Times Together? Chinese Workers And Unions Respond To The Economic Crisis, Eli D. Friedman

Eli D Friedman

How do post-socialist unions respond to market crisis? And what are the implications of this response for labor representation? Drawing on literature on post-socialist labor and union democracy, I argue that economic crisis affects not just labor – capital and labor – state relations, but also the relationship between union representatives and workers. Such a dynamic is highlighted by an empirical account of the divergent activities of workers and All-China Federation of Trade Unions (ACFTU) unions in China following the economic crisis of 2008. While the union responded to mass unemployment with an administrative and policy-oriented strategy, workers took to …

Technology Transfer Into China: Preparing For A New Era, Arnoud De Meyer

Arnoud DE MEYER

Currently, there are three forces creating a more favourable background for western multinational companies to do new business in China by transferring new technology. First, growing overcapacity means China requires not traditional turnkey factories, but instead, technology which leads to innovation and improvement. Second, a changing attitude by all levels of Chinese government to demanding state-of-the-art technology including software instead of previous generation technology, and to technology management and commercial implementation more. Third, intellectual property rights are becoming better respected. The author makes suggestions to best manage technology transfer into China, with this changed background. Based on six case studies …

Technology Strategy And China's Technology Capacity Building, Arnoud De Meyer

Arnoud DE MEYER

China has the potential to become a major source of innovation for the world. The scientific investment is in place and rapidly growing. But in order to reap the benefits of this investment its organisations will have to become better at managing innovation. One of the key elements of innovation management is the determination and implementation of a sound technology strategy. The purpose of this paper is to offer a framework and a detailed overview of what it entails to develop and implement a technology strategy. The paper emphasizes the alignment of the strategy with the organisational competencies and the …

Effects Of Cultural Ethnicity, Firm Size, And Firm Age On Senior Executives’ Trust In Their Overseas Business Partners: Evidence From China, Crystal X. Jiang, Roy Y. J. Chua, Masaaki Kotabe, Janet Y. Murray

Roy Chua

We investigate trust relationships between senior business executives and their overseas partners. Drawing on the similarity-attraction paradigm, social categorization theory, and the distinction between cognition- and affect-based trust, we argue that executives trust their overseas partners differently, depending on the partners’ cultural ethnicity. In a field survey of 108 Chinese senior executives, we found that these executives have higher affect-based trust in overseas partners of the same cultural ethnicity as themselves; cognition-based trust is associated with affect-based trust differently when overseas partners are of the same or different cultural ethnicity. We also examine the role of relative firm size and …

Multinational R&D In China: Differentiation And Integration Of Global R&D Networks, Jian Wang, Zheng Liang, Lan Xue

Jian Wang

Regionalisation And Singapore's Transborder Industrialisation: A New Perspective On Suzhou Industrial Park, Xun Cai, Lu Gao, Caroline Yeoh

Caroline Yeoh

The dynamics of international economic competition have prompted governments to re-examine accustomed policies, and search for alternative strategies, in order to re-position their economies for the future. This paper takes a look at Singapore’s search for a competitive positioning in the global marketplace, and focuses on the city-state’s much-publicized, and controversial, flagship project in China, viz, the Suzhou Industrial Park (SIP). This strategic initiative is premised on the perceptions that Singapore’s positive reputation with multinational corporations, and ‘guanxi’ (or connections) with regional governments, will give the regional sites a strategic advantage in the competition for foreign investments. Earlier studies have …

Tourism, Development And Poverty Reduction In Guizhou And Yunnan, John A. Donaldson

John Donaldson

How did the differing strategies adopted to develop tourism in Guizhou and Yunnan affect patterns of economic development and poverty reduction? The answer is paradoxical. Both provincial governments incorporated tourism as part of their overall development strategies, but their tourism sites were distributed and structured strikingly differently. In Yunnan, although tourism contributed to rapid economic growth, it did not reduce rural poverty as much as might be expected from a large rural-based industry. By contrast, Guizhou's relatively small-scale tourism industry, although not contributing significantly to growth, was distributed largely in poor areas and was structured to allow poor people to …

The Rise Of Agrarian Capitalism With Chinese Characteristics: Agricultural Modernization, Agribusiness And Collective Land Rights, Qian Forrest Zhang, John Andrew Donaldson

John Donaldson

The article discusses the agricultural transformation taking place in the rural areas of China. Details about the Chinese laws regarding rural reform and the effect they have had on rural Chinese farmers and families are included. The authors examine the expansion of agrarian capitalism in China and describe the rise of agribusiness in rural Chinese areas. The practices of Chinese agribusinesses and the Chinese land rights laws are explored. The relationships between individual farmers and agribusinesses is also examined.

The Rise Of Agrarian Capitalism With Chinese Characteristics: Agricultural Modernization, Agribusiness And Collective Land Rights, Qian Forrest Zhang, John Andrew Donaldson

Qian Forrest ZHANG

The article discusses the agricultural transformation taking place in the rural areas of China. Details about the Chinese laws regarding rural reform and the effect they have had on rural Chinese farmers and families are included. The authors examine the expansion of agrarian capitalism in China and describe the rise of agribusiness in rural Chinese areas. The practices of Chinese agribusinesses and the Chinese land rights laws are explored. The relationships between individual farmers and agribusinesses is also examined.

The Transformation Of Urban Vegetable Retail In China: Wet Markets, Supermarkets, And Informal Markets In Shanghai, Qian Forrest Zhang, Zi Pan

Qian Forrest ZHANG

The state-monopolised system of vegetable retail in socialist urban China has transformed into a market-based system run by profit-driven actors. Publicly owned wet markets not only declined in number after the state relegated its construction to market forces, but were also thoroughly privatised, becoming venues of capital accumulation for the market operators now controlling these properties. Self-employed migrant families replaced salaried state employees in the labour force. Governments’ increased control over urban public space reduced the room for informal markets, exacerbating the scarcity of vegetable retail space. Fragmentation in the production and wholesale systems restricted modern supermarkets’ ability to establish …