Browsing by Author "Wad, Peter"
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Trade Unions in the Korean and Malaysian Auto IndustriesWad, Peter (København, 2005)[More information][Less information]
Abstract: The paper aims to address the question whether the dynamic of autoworker unionism in South Korea and Malaysia was conditioned by, and eventually also influenced the globalization processes in the local auto industry? The conclusion is a contextualized "yes", and the core argument is the following: The financial crisis in 1997 was the dramatic peak of financial globalization in East Asia in the 1990s, and it did accelerate the existing trend in Korea towards centralized unionism in the auto industry, while it suspended the trend in the Malaysian auto industry towards decentralized unionism. Although the Korean and Malaysian unions were affected by the financial crisis from different structural and strategic positions, and were exposed to different national policies and corporate strategies of crisis management, the Korean unions and Malaysian unions generally followed, respectively, a more radical and militant and a more pragmatic and moderate strategy. In the global-local perspective we face two paradoxes. The first paradox is that in spite of the difference in union ideology, the outcome in terms of industrial relations (IR) institutions was rather similar in the sense that the auto industry contained a mixture of industrial and enterprise unions and formal or informal federations of these unions, and that collective bargaining was by and large undertaken bilaterally at the enterprise level. This situation was generated by a dynamic, which took the Malaysian system down from a centralized IR system within the low technology assembly industry (the globally subordinated local OEMs) to a rather decentralized IR system within the SOE-MNC controlled industry. The Korean system became more centralized through the confrontations between radical enterprise unions and authoritarian employers and authorities within an auto industry, which over time become much more indigenized, technologically advanced, export-oriented and diversified into multiple auto manufacturers and an under-wood of component suppliers. Yet, in both auto industries the large enterprise unions resisted organizational centralization, which could impede their autonomy. Due to the strength of unions of the market leading firms a breakthrough did happen neither in Korea nor in Malaysia, although the Koreans were a step ahead of the Malaysians having established a federation of metalworkers unions, including the important autoworkers unions. The second paradox is that the radicalism of the Korean autoworker unions was maintained during 1990s globalization of the auto industry, while radicalism was abandoned by the Malaysian autoworker unions in favor of union pragmatism, when the indigenization of the Malaysian auto industry unfolded since the early 1980s and a local auto supplier industry had been formed. This cross-country difference is partly explained by the different position held by the Korean and Malaysian auto companies in the global and local auto value chain. The radicalism and effectiveness of Korean autoworker unions sustained the development of dynamic efficiency among Korean auto manufacturing firms. In the same way, the intra-industry differences in wages and working conditions among auto manufacturing firms and components supplier firms were also related to the stratification of the domestic auto value chain, and this uneven distribution of benefits created obstacles of centralized unionization and collective bargaining. The centralized IR system in Malaysia evolved in an auto industry composed primarily of firms assembling imported CKD kits of components. The inequality of employment conditions between auto manufacturers and component suppliers was a driver of the strategy of centralized unionism and collective bargaining in Korea, while the inequality was not perceived as that significant by the Malaysian industrial union, since they had been dealing with these problems by the early 1990s. Keywords: Globalisation, trade unions, automobile industry, global value chain theory, East Asia, Malaysia, South Korea. URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10398/7410 Files in this item: 1
cdp2005-03wad samlet.pdf (172.8Kb) -
The Impact of the Global Economic and Financial Crises over Developing Countries' Automobile IndustryWad, Peter (Frederiksberg, 2010)[More information][Less information]
Abstract: In the Global South automobile production evolved behind protectionist walls and was promoted by infant industry policies and outright national automotive projects from the 1950s. In recent decades, many developing countries have liberalized their automotive markets and allowed automobile TNCs to take majority control over joint ventures, transforming domestic automotive industries into foreign controlled sectors while leaving a few national automakers in India, Malaysia and China. Decomposing and reorganizing the national value chain into regional and global automobile value chains OEMs and TNC original equipment suppliers (OESs) have off-shored and outsourced component and parts production to developing countries. Again, local auto suppliers have been acquired or relegated to lower 'tier' positions if not forced out of the market. However, with economic growth and development in the Global South during the 1990s and 2000s automobile sales have boomed, and the automobile sectors in Latin America and Asia have become „brown sunrise‟ industries generating investment, technological upgrading and employment. The present global financial and economic crisis has not profoundly changed this trajectory. The global crisis did not impact automotive markets in developing countries severely, except for automotive exporting countries like Mexico, Thailand and South Africa. Only in 2009 automotive sales and production declined across the board in the Global South, but key markets turned around in the end of the year. Thus, the automobile crisis is a downward business cycle, not a structural crisis of the industry. Companies in the automotive industry responded with traditional crisis management (temporary downsizing, cost reductions, retraining, consolidation, innovation), and governments launched traditional stimuli packages (cash-for-clunkers, tax reductions on smaller and/or cleaner cars etc). Strategic initiatives were taken to improve the competitiveness of the domestic industry (consolidation, liberalization) on the one hand and to transform it from a brown industry to a „greener‟ industry on the other hand (tightening environmental regulations, fuel efficiency and emission standards, subsidizing purchases of smaller and „greener‟ cars, investing in appropriate infrastructure and green technology R&D). Thereby, some developing countries and their surviving local automakers and parts makers are leapfrogging into „clean‟ technology frontiers competing head-to-head with global automakers or partnering with foreign firms in their common endeavor to manufacture green automobiles. URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10398/8180 Files in this item: 1
Wad-Green sunrise or brown.pdf (408.6Kb) -
Chandran, V G R; Rasiah, Rajah; Wad, Peter (Frederiksberg, 2009)[More information][Less information]
Abstract: The study of innovation and technological upgrading experienced a significant interest in the academic literature, especially within the developing countries (Lall, 1998, 2001; Kim and Nelson, 2000; Ariffin and Figueiredo, 2004). The lack of involvement by developing countries in radical innovative capabilities (Rasiah, 1994; Hobday, 2005) and the interest of scholars in learning technological capability building and technological catch up processes has directed researchers to analyze various mechanisms or drivers that contribute to technological upgrading, especially in developing countries, more so in the manufacturing sector. This study aims to investigate the R&D activities and the internationalization of these activities undertaken by foreign firms within the Malaysian manufacturing sector. The study aims to provide answers to the following questions: 1. What is the status of the systems of innovation within the Malaysian manufacturing sector? 2. What is the role played by the agents of innovation, in particular TNCs or MNCs, in relation to R&D activities and its internationalization? and, 3. How is the Malaysian manufacturing (local and foreign) technological and R&D progress to date? This study confirms that the Malaysian manufacturing systems of innovation is weakly positioned but shows limited evidence of process innovation and not product innovation. However, evidence of innovation differs among states and sectors owing to differences in the systems of innovation. Although, Malaysia has not been chosen as a site for offshoring or outsorcing of R&D activities to a significant degree, it is found that one very important driver of innovation is the central role that multinational enterprises play in the Malaysian manufacturing systems of innovation. Process innovation is conducted by foreign subsidiaries and is on the rise in key the electronics industry. It is also found that technological learning by local firms is mainly through linkages, sub-contracting and technological transfer. URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10398/7972 Files in this item: 1
MSI_and_internationalization_of_R&D.pdf (282.8Kb) -
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Chong, Sabrina; Wad, Peter (København, 2008)[More information][Less information]
Abstract: Offshore outsourcing of business activities from the Global North to the Global South does not only relocate investments and jobs, but has also brought about new business demands on suppliers activities and their social and environmental impact. The article explores whether, how and why offshore outsourcing transactions between foreign firms and Malaysian firms affect the upgrading of the CSR activities of Malaysia incorporated firms, taking the particular institutional context of Malaysia into consideration. The focus is on recipient country vendors, contract manufacturers or subcontractors and their reception of and strategising about corporate social responsibility. The findings of the study indicate, firstly, that the amount of foreign (sub)contracting influences the CSR strategising of domestic firms while the global value chain position is only conditioning the offshore outsourcing portfolio. Secondly, both the corporate governance of Malaysian affiliate and the Malaysian government play an important role shaping the perception, rhetoric and organisation of CSR activities by firms in Malaysia with a domestic value chain position. Hence, firms in Malaysia are squeezed by international business linkages and the local institutional context. URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10398/6757 Files in this item: 1
wps-2007_no.7.pdf (420.9Kb)
Now showing items 1-6 of 6