作者: 赖小琪
今天下午终于把Researching International Business 课上布置的小组presentation圆满完成, 真的感到很高兴. 我想今天是我从开学以来最高兴的日子, 因为我对我们组以及我自己的表现非常满意. 这听起来好像有点自大, 可是我是发自内心地赞美我们组的每一个成员, 当然包括自己, 因为这次的任务的圆满完成对我来讲是一个很好的鼓励!
我们组一共有四个, 包括马瑾, Sarah, Amaury 还有我. 马瑾不用说是中国人, Sarah是爱尔兰人, Amaury是法国人. 上一周上课时, 老师让我们自由组合, 三个或者四个人一组. 以后每一周都会有三组做一个关于调查关于国际贸易相关问题的报告, 每一组的报告是不同的, 报告的话题已经列出来了, 先到先选. 马瑾和三Sarah之前已经认识, 我在上次爱尔兰农场游中认识了Amaury, 所以我们四个人就组成一队了. 可是当我们去选题目时, 发现后边时间段的话题都被选完了, 我们只能选第二周的话题, 时间相当紧. 不过老师鼓励我们说, 下周讲的组会有额外的加分, 所以我们就硬着头皮上了.
接下来是无休止的准备. 先是看相关的文献资料, 二十几页的英文资料, 看得我头都晕了. 这次的话题是关于公司所有权优势和跨国创业的内在联系的. 文章里面有好多生词, 我必须对着网上词典来看, 一边看一边查一边记, 一看就是一个上午或者晚上. 后来我们又开了好几次小组会议, 分配每个人的任务,做好PPT, 最后进行演练. 短短一周里, 我真是度日如年, 感觉相当压抑. 这边的学习强度比国内学校大很多, 主要一个原因是我们仍然存在着语言的困难, 再厉害的英语高手来了这边也只能算是个小学生.
下午我们组排在演讲的最后一位. 好不容易到了我们组了,我们四个人都上了讲台, 由Sarah揭开序幕. 她讲完以后轮到我了. 我深呼吸了一下, 便走到电脑前控制PPT, 然后开始了我 “激情洋溢”的演讲. 由于之前我准备得很充分, 也练了好几次, 再加上以前在深大主持英语角时丰富的上台经验. 所以我并不紧张. 虽然在这边我的听力不太好, 可是口语自信还是相当过关的. 我是所有演讲的人中没有带稿上去, 直接对着全班人讲的. 我负责的内容是解释邓宁的垄断优势理论及其与其他国际直接投资理论的比较. 这我大四时曾经学过, 只是现在要用英语来解释罢了. 说了大概三分钟, 我的任务终于完成. 之前有点替马瑾担心, 可是看了她的表现以后我们也都非常满意.
下课以后, 在课室里等一个同学去做小组讨论, 讨论下周的negotiation的话题. 当时很多同学走过来和我聊天, 大家都竖起拇指说: “Well done! You can do the presentation without taking any notes!” 当地的学生还问我: “ English is just your second language, but how can you speak so fluently like natives?” 这真的让我有一种 ＂受宠若惊＂的感觉．同时我也感到很安慰，因为一直以来的努力没有白费．我会继续加油的！
总之这周的演讲经历让我重新捡起学习的信心．之前都一直很压抑，觉得自己哪方面都不行，都比不上当地的学生，课也听不懂．现在一切都好起来了，我也深刻地懂得了以后做演讲报告时准备的方法和程序，以及如果安排材料等等，收获挺多的．一年很快就过的，我一定要坚持到最后．下面是我的演讲部分的草稿，把它放到空间，以作纪念．
Good afternoon everyone, now it is my turn to elaborate on the past literature on FDI( foreign direct investment). The past literature on foreign direct investment generally supports an economics perspective that there is a direct relationship between firm-specific ownership advantages and international expansion. There are a group of experts who have devoted themselves to this field and fulfilled some significant achievements. As time is limited, here I would like to select the theories of a prominent expert in this field to address you all. His name is Dunning
The predominant theoretical view of FDI in the literature is an asset-exploitation perspective that conceptualizes international expansion as occurring when firms seeks to leverage their firm-specific ownership advantages in new settings, which in turn allows them to obtain a competitive advantage over indigenous firms in the host country. This led Dunning to identify ownership, location and internalization (OLI) advantages as the drivers of firm’s international expansion. Ownership advantage means the company has advantages in its asset, tangible and intangible as well as its scale. Location advantage here means the host country can provide plenty of needed resources and favorable policies for the company to engage into FDI. Internalization advantage means the company can utilize the internal markets to coordinate its resources so as to lower the transaction cost. Dunning thinks that only by owning these three advantages can the company begin its FDI.
But at that time, with the rise of the Asian multinational companies, some experts believed that firms engaged in FDI for enhancing their competitiveness rather than exploiting their existing set of advantages. Many multinational companies conduct FDI just to augment their asset instead of making use of their firm-specific advantage. We call this asset-augmentation perspective. But Dunning does not think that the asset –augmentation perspective conflicts with the OLI framework, because he thinks the investing company has to possess certain technique and at least some sustainable advantages before they do FDI. So Dunning’s exploitative view does not conflict with the augmenting view.
The past literature has highlighted the fact that firms in emerging economies are constrained by an institutional environment with lower environmental munificence. According to Dunning, the institutional content should be included in analyzing internationalization activities.
Overall, the literature to date on FDI of firms from emerging economies is at an infant stage. The focus is on either a direct application of the asset exploitation and internalization view of FDI, or efforts seeking to refute the mainstream FDI theory and explore asset augmentation. However, these two views do not have to be mutually exclusive and can be viewed as complementary. |
