‘Globalization’ and the Convergence of National Business Systems

Abstract

Recent debates about globalization have raised a wide range of fundamental issues about the contemporary world economy. The main purpose of this chapter is to examine the question of whether or not, among the advanced industrial countries, the various national political economies, or ‘business systems’, are becoming more alike through a process of convergence.² Broadly speaking, we can identify a ‘strong’ thesis of homogenization, according to which the irresistible social forces summarized in the term ‘globalization’ are breaking down national differences in economic institutions, practices and policies.³ Against this stands the view that economic life remains firmly embedded in distinct national systems, and these will persist because either globalization is not happening, or, if it is, it has no necessary effect on national differences.

An earlier version of this paper was presented to a workshop held in Malaga, Spain in January 1997 on Globalization and Industrial Transformation in Europe, part of a series on ‘European Management and Organizations in Transition’ funded by the European Science Foundation. I am grateful to participants in that workshop, as well as those at the 1997 UK AIB conference, and to the editors of the present volume, for their comments.