CALL FOR PAPERS: 'GLOBALIZATION, TNCs AND INDUSTRIAL POLICIES IN DEVELOPING AND TRANSITION COUNTRIES'

EADI SYMPOSIUM

Friday 15 June 2007

Venue: Strasbourg, Pôle Européen de Gestion et d'Economie (PEGE) – Research center: BETA
http://cournot2.u-strasbg.fr/users/beta/index.php

An Event of the EADI Transnational Corporation Working Group

Updates will be posted at www.eadi.org and http://cournot2.u-strasbg.fr/users/beta/index.php

Background and purpose

At the EADI symposium in London, June 2006, the EADI TNC WG proposed a meeting for June 2007. The purpose for the meeting is to review the state of understanding in the area 'TNCs and development' and to set a future research agenda.

Areas of interest/Call for Papers

Five areas were identified by the EADI TNC WG. These were:

1) TNCs and industrial policy
While the earlier explanations of the East Asian miracle tend towards a 'free-market story', most economists agree now that the rapid development of the Asian countries has been encouraged by the utilization of a vast range of industrial policy measures. China's development is due to good fundamentals, the export orientation, the large market size but also to a government determined to acquire domestic capabilities and to build a modern industry. Rapid-growing developing countries have been especially successful by preventing the TNCs from constituting "enclaves". Papers will explore both the successful and failed experiences of certain countries. The question of industrial policy is of particular interest for countries that have massively attracted export- oriented TNCs thanks to liberal FDI-regimes, and lack the instruments to stimulate the interaction of the TNCs with indigenous firms. In this panel, papers will also explore the new policies adopted by some South-American countries aiming to increase the rent they get from TNCs in the resource-based sectors.

2) TNCs and industrial linkages
Traditionally, industrial linkages have been seen as a way for developing countries and transition countries to counter the forces of globalization and compensate for some of the resource and structural disadvantages that local industries have vis-à-vis global markets. More recently growing attention has been devoted to the interplay between foreign direct investment (FDI) by TNCs and industrial clustering in developing countries and transition countries. On the one hand, FDI is attracted by the existence of linkages and may directly and through spillovers contribute to the building and deepening of these linkages. On the other hand, FDI may undermine industrial linkages in developing and transition countries through competition effects and by introducing vertical modes of organization that is at odds with the horizontal and nation-based organization of local industrial linkages. Papers on TNCs and industrial linkages will explore these and other dilemmas associated with FDI and cluster-based economic development strategies.

TNCs and poverty and Inequality
Few issues in the development process raise as much heat as the relationship between TNCs and poverty and inequality. The linkages between TNCs and both income and non-income poverty and inequality are neither conceptually nor empirically clear. Recent FDI expansion in water, sanitation, electricity and other utilities, interest in health and education delivery and social security have further raised the question of the impact of TNCs on multi-dimensional poverty in particular. Additionally, shifts over the last twenty years towards more FDI in services, more South-South FDI and in general more liberal FDI regimes may all have various impacts on poverty and inequality. Papers will explore these and other related issues.

4) South-South FDI
FDI from developing countries or from transition countries to other developing or transition countries have developed rapidly in the last decade. Developing and transition economies have emerged as significant outward investors (see the UNCTAD's World investment report, 2006). The emergence of Chinese and Russian TNCs may modify the rules of the game in the world market. These new investments have raised the question of their determinants and their impacts on host economies. Of particular interest are the following questions: Do these TNCs have something special to offer? Do they have the same impacts as TNCs from developed countries or are the benefits for the host country different?

5) New Issues
There will be a session on 'new issues' or 'hot topics' not included in the above to accommodate additional papers.

Paper submission

The aim is to end up with workshop papers which are no more than 7500 words long including references/footnotes. Presentations will be 20 minutes followed by 10 minutes discussion.
The papers may be published in book-form or in a special issue of a review.

Deadlines

Abstracts: Friday 16th February 2007
Papers: Friday 4th June 2007

Papers on:

  • TNCs and industrial policy
  • TNCs and industrial linkages
  • New Issues

To send to:

Michael Hansen: mwh.ikl(AT)cbs.dk and
Eric Rugraff: eric.rugraff(AT)urs.u-strasbg.fr

Papers on:

  • TNCs and poverty and Inequality
  • South-South FDIs

To send to:

Diego Sanchez: diego.sanchez(AT)sas.ac.uk and
Claire Mainguy: claire.mainguy(AT)urs.u-strasbg.fr