Revisiting The Impact Of Multinational Enterprises On Economic Development

摘要

In recent years the issues around impact of MNE activities on economic development has moved to a more central position within IB scholarship. This is a significant development in the IB literature, and constitutes an extension and enriching of the domain of international business as a field of study. In the past, international business scholarship was not particularly concerned with the development issue, probably reflecting the notion that inquiries beyond the firm as unit of analysis are not in the domain of international business (Nehrt, Truitt, & Wright, 1970; Ricks, 1985). The developmental impact of IB activity has not been totally ignored in earlier literature as is witnessed by the numerous studies on the incidence of spillover and technology transfer. However, these studies mostly focused on FDI flows at a fairly aggregate level and did not address, in a central way, the effect of MNE strategies and their internal structures on spillover or technology transfer processes. Thus developmental issues occupied a fairly marginal position within the broad field of international business, and the general consensus was that the developmental impact of MNE activity was overwhelmingly positive.