The Strategic Roles of MNE Subsidiaries and the Positioning of China in the Global Economy: Integration or Isolation?

Abstract

As the previous chapter has indicated the first stage in attempting to document and evaluate MNEs’ participation in Chinese industrialisation will be through the differentiation and dynamics of their subsidiaries. We have noted how MNEs’ overarching global strategies need to address the complementary aims of securing the most effective application of their existing sources of competitiveness and of renewing these core competences through innovation and R&D. How the strategic positioning of MNE subsidiaries in China relates to these priorities will then also feed into two central concerns of our analysis.