The role of MNCs in China and Brazil's foreign policy towards developing states in Africa

[摘要] ENGLISH ABSTRACT: While most international political economy (IPE) literature has been concerned with therelations between multinational corporations (MNCs) and the host states in which they operate,this study sought to contribute to general state-MNC relations by looking at the otherdimension, namely home state-MNC relations. In addition, while home state-MNC literaturemostly focuses on how this relationship plays out in the domestic realm; this study focused onhome state-MNC relations in foreign policy. A further limitation was to only look at homestate-MNC relations in the developing world by using China and Brazil as the main casestudies, and their interaction with MNCs in foreign policy towards developing states fromAfrica.The research design was comparative, using the most similar system case selections. The cases(China and Brazil) were selected based on several similarity indicators: a history of a strongstate apparatus and a history of dirigisme in relation to the economy. This implies the pivotalrole of the state not only in domestic but also international relations, particularly regardingMNCs internationalisation. In addition, China and Brazil's similarities in other respects:emerging power status, internationalisation of MNCs and economic expansion from 1990onwards (particularly in Africa), move towards capitalist economy and aspects of lateindustrialisation; provided for interesting contextualisations. Given China and Brazil's historyof state control over all aspect of society, politics and economics, this study wanted toinvestigate how the home state interacts with its MNCs in foreign policy, based on theassumption that globalisation forces have caused the state's role to decline as outlined byStopford and Strange (1991).This was done through the application of the theoretical framework derived from (mainly) theworks of Strange (1988, 1996) and Weiss (1998), which stipulates that the locus of power inhome state-MNC relations is dependent on the control of four pillars of structural power (credit,security, production, and knowledge). In other words, whoever controls majority of the pillarshas the leverage to ask certain favours from the other. This extends to the attribution of specificroles to MNCs by their home state in its foreign policy. In the case of equal control of thepillars, it is argued that the relationship will be one of governed interdependence. Based onChina's political and institutional background of being a communist state, it was expected thatthe locus of control, despite the forces of globalisation and increasing move towards openmarket principles, will remain in the hands of the home state. For Brazil, the assumption wasthat the home state-MNC relationship will be one of interdependence, based on the history ofprotectionism. However, the findings of this study are counterintuitive, as it was found that inthe case of China, the home state-MNC relationship is one of conditioned governedinterdependence; and in the case of Brazil, it is one of dependence of MNCs on the home state.In relation to roles attributed to MNCs in the home states foreign policy, it was found that thetypes of roles in the case of China and Brazil are the same: national champion, wealth creator,market access pioneer, and positive image creator through the performance of South-SouthDevelopment Cooperation activities.In the case of China, it was found that the home state can attach a certain role to its MNCswhich is furthermore dependent on five indicators of MNC importance: time, sector, region,events around region, and MNC ownership structure. However, based on the MNCs control oftwo of the four pillars of structural power (production and knowledge) they have operationalflexibility in deciding if they want to adhere to the attributed role, therefore the home state-MNC relation is one of conditioned governed interdependence. In the case of Brazil, it wasfound that the role attributed to MNCs by their home state depends on one indicator: thepolitical or economic importance of the region/country of MNCs operation for Brazil's foreignpolicy. In addition, based on the dependence of MNCs on their home state, Brazilian MNCsare more likely to adhere to that role than their Chinese counterparts, indicating that they havelimited operational flexibility as their relationship towards the home state is one of dependence.

[发布机构] Stellenbosch University