A Wider-Aperture Lens for Global Strategic Management: The Multinational Enterprise in a Bifurcated Global Economy
Abstract
The growth of China and President Xi’s policies have transformed the global economy in ways that global strategy and international business (IB) scholars have yet to reflect fully in their research. The global economy is increasingly bifurcated between a China-centered authoritarian system and a market-oriented democratic system, generating complications and perils largely unknown since the end of the Cold War. The global business environment now bears faint resemblance to existing models in IB. To properly analyze the new reality, global strategy and IB scholars need to adopt a wider-aperture, systems-theoretic view that will require the cross-fertilization of ideas and collaboration with other disciplines such as international political economy. This engagement will allow the development of more broadly based frameworks, theories, and models that can assist decision makers in the private and public sectors.