'Business Networks and Strategic Alliances in China' addresses how knowledge transfer and innovation are interwoven within complex networks and how social capital contributes to the acquisition of crucial resources and business success in multi-type enterprises in China.

The degree to which the extensive business networks of ethnic Chinese in Asia succeed because of ethnic characteristics, or simply because of the sound application of good business practice, is a key question of great current concern to those interested in business, management and economic development in Asia. This book brings together a range of leading experts who present original new research findings and important new thinking on this vital subject. Based on rich empirical research data and a multidisciplinary explanatory framework, this book assesses the role, characteristics and challenges of Chinese entrepreneurship and business networks in various East and Southeast Asian countries: the People's Republic of China, Vietnam, Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, and Australia. Chinese Entrepreneurship and Asian Business Networks demonstrates that Chinese network capitalism is contingent upon, for example, time, place, institutional frameworks, and that explanatory approaches of Chinese economic behaviour which stress culture and ethnicity are too simplistic.

Strategic Alliances for Innovation and R&D is a volume in the book series Research in Strategic Alliances that focuses on providing a robust and comprehensive forum for new scholarship in the field of strategic alliances. In particular, the books in the series cover new views of interdisciplinary theoretical frameworks and models, significant practical problems of alliance organization and management, and emerging areas of inquiry. The series also includes comprehensive empirical studies of selected segments of business, economic, industrial, government, and non-profit activities with wide prevalence of strategic alliances. Through the ongoing release of focused topical titles, this book series seeks to disseminate theoretical insights and practical management information that should enable interested professionals to gain a rigorous and comprehensive understanding of the field of strategic alliances. Strategic Alliances for Innovation and R&D contains contributions by leading scholars in the field of strategic alliance research. The 11 chapters in this volume cover a number of significant topics that encompass innovation and R&D through strategic alliances. The chapter topics cover both the broader issues, such as the governance of high-tech alliances, knowledge flows in innovation clusters, co-innovation, and incomplete contracting, and the more focused problems of inexperienced firms in R&D consortia, new product development, and managing alliance portfolio evolution in service innovation. The chapters include empirical as well as conceptual treatments of the selected topics, and collectively present a wide-ranging review of the noteworthy research perspectives on the role of strategic alliances in the pursuit of innovation and R&D.

Describing the field, spanning individual, organisation societal and cultural perspectives in a cross-disciplinary manner, this is the premier reference tool for students lecturers, academics and practitioners to gather knowledge about a range of important topics from the perspective of organisation studies.

The analysis is notable for its insistence that, for a corporate governance system to work, the principles and practicalities of that system must be derived from customary cultural norms. Experience shows that imported models, although they may be enshrined in law, lead to economic stagnation unless actual practice is monitored and reformed and the laws change to reflect these necessary adjustments. Thus the model proposed here begins with the Company Law of 1994, and proceeds to show how practical experience is already providing valuable data for the task of improving the law.

The emergence of China as a future major participant in international aviation raises some interesting questions, especially from a strategic policy perspective. The progressive shift from a command to a mixed market economy under the central leadership of the Beijing administration now finds itself faced with the needs to balance a strategic duality in the context of the role of China's civil aviation industry. In a very real sense this situation requires the design and accommodation of a growing role for China's mainstream carriers within the operational context of the need to meet the complex challenges from increasing international market competition. In parallel with such major external pressures, central government must also accommodate domestic priorities with regard to internal economic development. The fruits of economic progress as a function of market reform are commonly understood to have positively reshaped the live of only a proportion of the national population to date. The need to create greater access to economic growth for the more remote western and northern provinces has required that the rapid development of airports become a factor in the planning and allocation of developmental priorities. To complicate matters further, prevailing requirements of airspace defence remain a major parameter within the larger context of national aviation policy. This book explores the political, economic and strategic issues raised by the inevitable tension between the domestic and international aspects of Beijing's current civil aviation strategy. It also seeks to identify some of the problems that face the industry as a key sector in the larger context of macroeconomic reform and the further pressures now being exerted by China's membership of the WTO.

Strategic Business Alliances examines key issues in the analysis, management and performance of international joint ventures using a sample of UK European equity joint ventures. The authors consider the viewpoint of all configurations of the international joint venture UK parent, European parent and joint venture management. Factors discussed include motives for formation, partner selection criteria, joint venture management, and control and performance, all of which have been identified in the literature as the core dimensions of joint venture activity. The book also explores the emerging issue of learning in strategic alliances, as well as the sensitive question of cultural differences in the mix of factors that surround the complexities of modern international joint ventures. Empirical evidence examined by the authors suggests that learning and cultural differences are vital elements in the operation and performance of these ventures. Given that inter-firm collaborative activity in an increasingly globalised world economy is a crucial aspect of the strategy of many firms, this book will be invaluable to students, researchers and academics with an interest in international business and strategic management. Managers and practitioners who require insight into the core dimensions of international joint venture activity will also find this book very useful.

As China began its economic reforms in the late 1970s and made a transition from planned to a market economy, corporate governance of the banking sector became an increasingly pressing issue. Further, in the aftermath of the Asian Financial Crises in the late 1990s, Chinese authorities became acutely aware of the importance of corporate governance to ensure that their banking system would not suffer similar fates to those of other Asian countries. This book examines corporate governance in city commercial banks, which are the main source of loans to the dynamic small and medium enterprises that are crucial to the development of China’s economy. By the end of 2008, there were 136 city commercial banks in China, 13 of which had foreign partners, and this book clearly demonstrates the positive effect of these foreign partnerships on corporate governance practices, in addition to financial performance. With evidence from extensive interviews with 10 city commercial banks in China, Michael Tan explores the different models of corporate governance, and in turn, asks which model is most suitable to China, how are Chinese authorities overcoming problems with corporate governance, and how do these problems compare with those in other transition economies? Whilst the primary focus of this study is on China's city commercial banks, there are lessons that apply much more broadly to the industry and it therefore will be invaluable to foreign banking institutions wishing to invest in China. This book will also be of great appeal to students and scholars of Chinese business and economics, corporate governance and banking.

This book addresses the fundamental issue: does the Chinese strategic mind have its own idiosyncrasies which differ considerably from those of the Western mind? It expounds and unravels the particular characteristics of the Chinese strategic mind: what they are, how they are evolved and what strategic implications they have. This book adopts a holistic approach to an analysis of Chinese strategic thinking, drawing upon the fields of literature (including the sources of both the Chinese and English languages), military studies, political science, history, sociology, psychology, philosophy, linguistics and business strategy. It combines a detailed consideration of these disciplines with a series of case studies to elucidate the formation, nature and crucial managerial implications of the idiosyncratic Chinese strategic mind.

This book reports on foreign investments in transitional economies and the corporate governance of international strategic alliances in China. It throws new light on the relationship between ownership, corporate governance, international technology transfer, organizational learning and the performance of such alliances. The book reviews the problems encountered by these international strategic alliances, provides significant empirical evidence of foreign investment decisions and profiles corporate governance and organizational learning in strategic alliances. Based on research into 1000 firms in China, it draws important conclusions for theory and practice.