The Political Economy of Globalization – Revisiting Stephen Hymer 50 Years On

Dunning, John and Pitelis, Christos (2009): The Political Economy of Globalization – Revisiting Stephen Hymer 50 Years On.

Abstract

We discuss issues pertaining to the political economy of “globalization”, in the context of the seminal contribution by Stephen Hymer. While Hymer’s contribution to the theory of the multinational enterprise (MNE) and foreign direct investment (FDI) is widely recognized, his contribution to the political economy of what he called “multinational corporate capital” has received less attention. In this paper we revisit some of the issues he raised, notably uneven development, global governance and central planning in the context of post-Hymer scholarly thinking and the shifting global landscape. In so doing we also speculate on the challenges and future of globalization.

• Item Type: MPRA Paper
• Language: English
• Keywords: Stephen Hymer, International Political Economy, Institutions, Globalization,Sustainability
• Subjects: F - International Economics > F2 - International Factor Movements and International Business > F23 - Multinational Firms ; International Business; F - International Economics > F0 - General > F02 - International Economic Order and Integration; F - International Economics > F2 - International Factor Movements and International Business > F21 - International Investment ; Long-Term Capital Movements

References

Argitis, G. and Pitelis, C. 2001. Monetary policy and the distribution of income: Evidence for the United States and the United Kingdom. Journal of Post-Keynesian Economics, vol. 23, no. 4, pp. 617-638

Bain, J.S. 1956 Barriers to New Competition: Their Character and Consequences for Manufacturing Industries, Boston, Harvard University Press

Baran, P. and Sweezy, P. 1966. Monopoly Capital, Harmondsworth, Penguin

Bartlett, C. A. and Ghoshal, S. 1989. Managing Across Borders: The Transnational Solution, Boston, Harvard Business School Press

Baumol, W. J. 1991. Perfect Markets and Easy Virtue - Business Ethics and the Invisible Hand, Cambridge, Blackwell

Birkinshaw, J. and Hood, N., eds. 1998. Multinational Corporate Evolution and Subsidiary Development, London, Macmillan

Bianchi, P. and Labory, S. 2006. International Handbook on Industrial Policy, Cheltenham, Edward Elgar

Best, Michael. 1990. The new competition: institutions of industrial restructuring, Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press.

Boddewyn, D. J. 2003. Understanding and advancing the concept of 'Nonmarket', Business & Society, vol. 42, no. 3, pp. 297-327

Boddewyn, D.J. and Brewer L.T. 1994. International-business political behavior: new theoretical directions, Academy of Management Review, vol. 19, pp. 119-143

Buckley, P. J. and Casson, M.C. 1976. The Future of Multinational Enterprise, London, Macmillan

Buckley, P. J. and Casson, M.C. 2007. Edith Penrose’s theory of the growth of the firm and the strategic management of multinational enterprises’, Management International Review, vol. 47, no. 2, pp. 151-174

Cantwell, J. 1991. Theories of international production’, in C. N. Pitelis and R. Sugden, eds. The Nature of the Transnational Firm, London, Routledge

Cantwell, J. and Narula, R., eds. 2003. International Business and the Eclectic Paradigm: Developing the OLI Framework, London and New York, Routledge

Casson, M., ed. 1990. Multinational Corporations, Hants, Edward Elgar

Caves, R. E. 1982. Multinational Enterprise and Economic Analysis, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press

Chandler, A. D. 1962. Strategy and Structure: Chapters in the History of the Industrial Enterprise, Cambridge, MIT Press

Chandler, A.D. and Redlich, F. 1961. Recent developments in American business administration and their conceptualisation, Business History Review, vol. 35, pp.1-27

Chang, H-J. 1994. The Political Economy of Industrial Policy, London and Basingstoke, Macmillan.

Chang, H-J. 2002. Kicking away the ladder - an unofficial history of capitalism, especially in Britain and the United States, Challenge, vol. 45, no. 5

Coase, R. H. 1937. The nature of the firm, Economica , vol. 4, pp. 386-405

Cohen, R. B., Felton, N. et al., eds. 1979. The Multinational Corporation: a Radical Approach. Papers by Stephen Herbert Hymer, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press

Cowling, K. and Waterson, M. 1976. Price-cost margins and market structure, Economica, vol. 43, no. 171, pp. 267-274

Driffield, N. L. and Love, J.H. 2005. Intra-industry foreign direct investment, uneven development and globalization, Contributions to Political Economy, vol. 24, no. 1, pp. 55-78

Dunning, J. H. 1958. American Investment in British Manufacturing Industry, London, Allen and Unwin

Dunning, J. H. 1977. Trade, location of economic activity and the MNE: a search for an eclectic approach, in B. Ohlin, P.O. Hesselborn and P.M. Wijkman, eds. The International Allocation of Economic Activity, London and Basingstoke, Macmillan

Dunning, J. H. 2001. The key literature on IB activities: 1960-2000, in A.C. Rugman and T.L. Brewer, eds. Oxford Handbook of International Business, Oxford, Oxford University Press

Dunning, J. H. 2003. An evolving paradigm of the economic determinants of international business activity’, in J. Cheng and M. Hitt, eds. Managing Multinationals in a Knowledge Economy, Oxford, Elsevier, vol.15, pp. 3-27

Dunning, J. H., ed. 2005. Making Globalisation Good: The Moral Challenges of Global Capitalism, Oxford, Oxford University Press

Dunning, J. H. 2006. When I met Hymer: some personal recollections, International Business Review, vol. 15, no. 2, pp. 115-123

Dunning, J. H. 2006. Towards a new paradigm of development: implications for the determinants of international business activity, Transnational Corporations , vol. 15, no. 1, pp. 173-228

Dunning, J. H. and Lundan, S. M. 2006. The MNE as a creator, fashioner and respondent to institutional change, Mimeo, University of Rutgers and University of Maastricht

Dunning, J. H. and Pitelis, C. N. 2008. Stephen Hymer’s contribution to international business scholarship: an assessment and extension, Journal of International Business Studies, vol. 39, pp. 167-176.

Dunning, J. H. and Rugman, A. 1985. The influence of Hymer’s dissertation of the theory of foreign direct investment, American Economic Review, vol. 75, pp. 228-39

Eden, L. 2003. A Critical Reflection and Some Conclusions on OLI, in John Cantwell and Rajneesh Narula, eds. International Business and the Eclectic Paradigm: Developing the OLI Framework, London and New York, Routledge

Eden, L. and Lenway S. 2001. Multinationals: the Janus face of globalization’, Journal of International Business, vol. 32, no. 3, pp. 383–400

Graham, E.M . 1990. Exchange of threat between multinational firms as an infinitely repealed non cooperative game, International Trade Journal, vol. 4, no. 3, pp. 259-277

Hayek, F.A. 1945. The use of knowledge in society, American Economic Review, vol. 35, pp. 519-30

Hennart, J. F. 1982. A Theory of Multinational Enterprise, University of Michigan Press, Ann Arbor

Hill, C. 2009. International Business, McGraw Hill, 7th Edition

Hymer, S. H. 1960/1976. The International Operations of National Firms: a Study of Direct Foreign Investment, Cambridge, MIT Press

Hymer, S. H. 1968. The large multinational 'corporation', in M. Casson, ed. 1990. Multinational Corporations, London, Edward Elgar

Hymer, S. H. 1970A. The efficiency (contradictions) of multinational corporations, American Economic Review. Papers and Proceedings, vol. 60, no. 2, pp. 441-448

Hymer, S. H. 1970B. The multinational corporation and the law of uneven development, in J. N. Bhagwati, ed. Economics and World Order, London, Macmillan

Hymer, S. H and Resnick, S. 1969. A model of an agrarian economy with non agricultural activities, The American Economic Review vol. 59, no. 4, pp. 493-506

Hymer, S. and Rowthorn, R. 1970. Multinational corporations and international oligopoly: the non-American challenge, in C. Kindleberger, ed. The International Corporation: A Symposium, Cambridge, MIT Press, pp. 57-91

International Business Review. 2006. Special Issue: Stephen Hymer and International Business Strategy, International Business Review, vol. 15, no. 2, pp. 103–193

Kindleberger, C. P. 1984. Plus ça change – A Look at the New Literature, in Contributions to Political Economy (2002) 21, 5–7 37

Kindleberger, C.P., ed. 1984. Multinational Excursions, Cambridge, MIT Press, pp.180-88

Kindleberger, C. P. 2002. Stephen Hymer and the Multinational Corporation, Contributions to Political Economy, vol. 21, pp. 5-7

Kogut, B. and Zander, U. 1993. Knowledge of the Firm and the Evolutionary Theory of the Multinational Corporation, Journal of International Business Studies, vol. 24, no. 4, pp. 625- 645

Lange, O. 1936. On the Economic Theory of Socialism, The Review of Economic Studies , vol. 4, no. 1, pp. 53-71

Madhok, A. and Phene, A. 2001. The Co-evolutional Advantage: Strategic Management Theory and Eclectic Paradigm, International Journal of the Economics of Business, vol. 8, no. 2, pp. 243-256

Mahoney, J. T. 2005. Economic Foundations of Strategy, London and New York, SAGE Publications

Mahoney, J. T., McGahan, A. and Pitelis C. N. 2009. The Interdependence of Private and Public Interests, Organization Science, forthcoming

Marx, K. 1959. Capital, Vol. 1-3, London, Lawrence and Wishart

Modigliani, F. 1958. New Developments on the Oligopoly Front, Journal of Political Economy, vol. 66, no. 3, pp. 215-232

Pearce, R. and Papanastassiou, M. 2006. To “Almost See the World”: Hierarchy and Strategy in Hymer’s View of the Multinational, International Business Review, vol. 15, no. 2, pp. 151-165

Penrose, E.T. 1959/1995. The Theory of the Growth of the Firm, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 3rd ed.

Pitelis, C. N. 2004. Edith Penrose and the Resource-based View of (International) Business Strategy’, International Business Review, vol. 13, no. 4, pp. 523-532

Pitelis, C. N. 2007. Edith Penrose and a Learning-Based Perspective on the MNE and the OLI, Management International Review,vol. 47, no. 2, pp. 207-220

Pitelis, C. N. 2009. The Sustainable Competitive Advantage and Catching-up of Nations: Fdi, Clusters, and the Liability (Asset) of Smallness?, Management International Review, vol. 41, no. 1

Pitelis, C. N. and Sugden, R., eds. 1991. The Nature of the Transnational Firm, London, Routledge

Pitelis, C.N. and Sugden, R., eds. 2002. Special issue on Stephen Hymer and international political economy, Contributions to Political Economy, vol. 21, no. 1

Porter, M. E. 1980. Competitive Strategy: Techniques for Analyzing Industries and Competitors, New York, Free Press.

Porter, M.E. 1990. The Competitive Advantage of Nations, New York: Free Press.

Ramamurti, R. 2004. Developing Countries and MNEs: Extending and Enriching the Research Agenda, Journal of International Business Studies, vol. 35, pp. 277-283

Richardson, G. 1972. The Organisation of Industry, Economic Journal, vol. 82, no. 326, pp. 883-896

Rowthorn, R. 2006. Stephen Hymer: An intellectual memoir, International Business Review, vol. 15, pp. 111-114.

Rugman, A. M. 1981. Inside the Multinationals: The Economics of Internal Markets, New York, Columbia University Press.

Rugman, A. M. and Verbeke, A. 2002. Location, competitiveness and the multinational enterprise, in Rugman, A.M. and Brewer, T.L., eds. The Oxford Handbook of International Business, Oxford, Oxford University Press

Sala-i-Martin, X. 2006. The world distribution of income: falling poverty and… convergence, period, The Quarterly Journal of Economics,vol. 121, no. 2, pp. 351-398

Scherer, F. M. and Ross, D. 1990. Industrial Market Structure and Economic Performance, Boston, Houghton and Mifflin Company

Schumpeter, J. A. 1942. Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy, New York, Harper & Row

Solow, R. M. 1956. A Contribution to the theory of economic growth, Quarterly Journal of Economics, vol. 70, pp. 65-95.

Stiglitz, J. 2002. Globalization and its Discontents. London, Allen Lane

Stiglitz, J. 2007. Financial hypocrisy, The Economists’ Voice, vol. 4, no. 6, pp. 1101-4

Teece, D. J. 1977. Technology transfer by multinational firms: the resource cost of transferring technological know-how, The Economic Journal , vol. 87, pp. 242-261

Teece, D. J. 2006. Reflections on the Hymer thesis and the multinational enterprise, International Business Review, vol. 15, no. 2, pp. 124-139

Vernon, R. 1966. International investment and international trade in the product cycle, The Quarterly Journal of Economics, vol. 80, May 1966, pp. 190-207

Yamin, M. and Forsgren, M. 2006. Hymer's analysis of the multinational organization: power retention and the demise of the federative MNE, International Business Review, vol. 15, no. 2, pp. 166-179.

UNCTAD. 2003. World Investment Report: Policies for Development: National and International Perspectives, New York and Geneva, UN

UNCTAD. 2005. World Investment Report: Transnational Corporations and the Internationalization of R&D, New York and Geneva, UN