EIBA-zine - Issue No. 5 - November 2008

1. Letter of the President, Enn Listra

   1. From the EIBA President 2008 

      Enn Listra
      EIBA President 2008

      Dear Colleagues,

      It is a great pleasure to announce that the 34th EIBA Annual Conference will be hosted by the Tallinn School of Economics and Business Administration of Tallinn University of Technology and by the Tartu University and will be held at conference center Olümpia in Tallinn, Estonia from the 11th to the 13th of December 2008.
      
      The EIBA 2008 Annual Conference offers all participants an opportunity for presenting on-going research work on this year’s conference theme: “International Business and Catching up Economies: Challenges and Opportunities” with the aim to facilitate scientific discussion on a wide variety of changes that are taking place in the catching up economies and its consequences for the international business. In addition, all papers on main topics of IB are welcome.
      
      Catching-up is not a new phenomenon: the rapid economic development of Asian, Latin American and some Western European countries (for instance, Ireland) has been attracting research attention for decades. In the 1990s, the research focus has also turned towards Central and Eastern Europe. Several of these economies have experienced rapid economic growth and fast structural changes. The catching up process is not only important for economists, but business people as well. It creates several new growth possibilities, but also challenges that international companies have not faced before. On the other hand, the catching up economies, also present many new business opportunities for companies from other regions. These opportunities can be fully captured only when they take the rapid changes and economic, political, cultural and social differences of these economies and international business environment into account.
      
      The conference will pay attention to these issues from various perspectives. It invites to discuss the subject from the perspectives of economics and business as well as within different functional areas, including human resource management, marketing, knowledge management, finance and accounting. The conference offers an opportunity to discuss theoretical and methodological challenges in contemporary international business research.
      
      During the first day of the conference we will have the doctoral tutorial and the plenary session where the main topics of the conference are discussed together with business people.
      
      The most important discussions of the conference will be held during sessions under eleven track headings. We have received approximately 230 paper submissions. Very special thanks go to track leaders Matija Rojec (University of Ljubljana), Niina Nummela (Turku School of Economics), Torben Pedersen (Copenhagen Business School), Jorma Larimo (University of Vaasa), Heinz Hollenstein (Austrian Institute of Economic Research (WIFO)), Vesa Suutari (University of Vaasa), Arnold Schuh (Vienna University of Economics and Business Administration), Lars Oxelheim (The Research Institute of Industrial Economics, IFN, Lund University), Rebecca Piekkari (Helsinki School of Economics), Christian Bellak (Vienna University of Economics and Business Administration), and Rob van Tulder (RSM Erasmus University).
      
      As in previous years we will host publishers who will exhibit international business books and journals. The conference will be held in Olümpia Conference Centre which is part of the main conference hotel Olümpia, which is within walking distance of the Old Town. For information about the conference, please visit the conference web page at http://eiba2008.ttu.ee/ .
      
      I hope that you will find the EIBA 2008 Conference an intellectually stimulating and friendly experience. I am looking forward to seeing you in Tallinn on 11 December 2008.

      Kindest regards,
      
      Enn Listra
      EIBA President 2008
      Dean of the School of Economics and Business Administration
      Tallinn Uninverstiy of Technology
      

2. Letter of the Chairman, Danny Van Den Bulcke

   1. From the EIBA Chairman 

      Danny Van Den Bulcke
      EIBA Chairman

      Dear Colleagues,

      This will be the first time that the EIBA Conference will be held in the Baltics. It will be a real pleasure to meet in the capital city of Estonia. The capital of the most Nordic country of the Baltics has many faces and presents a mixture of medieval memories and modern hip, as well as post-communist and new capitalist characteristics. The conference hotel, the Olümpia, was built in 1980 for the Olympics, as Tallinn - as part of Russia at that time - hosted the sailing events. Since then the hotel, which is within walking distance from the city’s historic medieval centre, has been renovated four times and offers all the facilities required for an excellent meeting.
      
      While the growth of the Estonian economy was a success story during the last few years, to the extent that it made a number of other new members of the European Union jealous, the economy started to slow down at the end of 2007, a few months before the Board of EIBA met in Tallinn for its interim (Spring-) meeting. This economic downturn even had an effect on the plans of the local organizing committee, as some sponsors decided to back off. Although this loss of sponsorship will make it difficult to make Tallinn into ‘T(he) all in(n)’ conference that EIBA members would love, the local organizers succeeded in coping with these unexpected challenges, even though their problems were exacerbated by the world financial crisis of the Summer 2008 and its repercussions, also in the so-called real economy.

      

      The Tallinn Conference Organisers: Enn Listra, Urmas Varblane, Marianne Kallaste and Jorma Larimo

      That the 34th Annual conference of EIBA takes place in Estonia is illustrative of the attempt by the Board to try to integrate international business scholars from the new EU members, especially because they were more or less isolated during many years. Estonia joined the EU in 1997 and became part of the Schengen zone at the end of 2007, thereby facilitating travel to its new EU funded airport where most of the EIBA members will arrive.
      
      The initiative to bring EIBA to the Baltics and Tallinn was taken by Jorma Larimo, our National Representative from Finland and goes back four years ago. When the Board approved the proposal of the Tallinn University of Technology (TUT) it suggested to Enn Listra that Jorma should remain involved in the preparation of the conference, together with Urmas Varblane of Tartu University, who had supported this initiative from the very beginning. It is this ‘troika’ of representatives of those three universities, together with Marianne Kalaste as the secretary, who worked out the scientific programme and the logistics of the conference and submitted this to the EIBA Board meeting last May.

      

      Over the years the Spring Board has become the most important meeting to discuss the strategies necessary to further develop EIBA. Contrary to the two hour meetings during the hectic conference days, the interim meetings in April or May allow for a more elaborate discussion of all relevant items and better decision making. However, because the General Assembly can only be programmed during the conference week in December, certain decisions have to wait for the approval by the Assembly.
      
      The Interim Board meeting in Tallinn in May was well attended as 17 out of the 22 national representatives came to Estonia. During a whole day of deliberations at the Tallinn University of Technology, a long list of issues was discussed. One of the major topics concerned the possible venues for the future conferences. José Pla Barber, who will host EIBA in 2009 in Valencia, presented already a detailed picture of the city, the university and the conference site (see further).
      
      Most important was the fact that, in the immediate aftermath of the Spring Board meeting, Ana Teresa Tavares was able to confirm that she is willing to welcome EIBA in Porto in 2010 and that Liviu Voinea (SNSPA/GEA) agreed to host the annual conference in Bucharest in 2011. Both the University of Porto and the University of Bucharest gave their support to these proposals in a written statement to the EIBA chairman.
      
      

3. EIBA's 22nd Doctoral Tutorial

   1. EIBA's Doctoral Tutorial: An Increasingly International Event 

      Danny Van Den Bulcke
      EIBA Chairman

      The forty submissions for EIBA’s 21st Doctoral Tutorial show that it has become an increasingly international event, both in terms of the interested Ph.D students as to the subjects they have chosen to work on for their theses. Based on the location of the universities where they were preparing their dissertations, the students came from 15 different countries. The UK universities dominated this ranking with 12 students, compared to 6 from Germany, 4 from Finland and 3 from Italy. Denmark, The Netherlands, Norway and Switzerland sent each 2 doctoral students to the Catania Tutorial, compared to one each for Australia, Canada, Ireland, Israel, Lithuania, Portugal and Sweden.

      
      
      

      The students participating of the 2007 Doctoral Tutorial in Catania

      This picture of the applicants for the Doctoral Tutorial looks quite different if one takes into account the nationality of the students, i.e. their country of origin instead of the country of study, because it increases the number of countries to 23. The British universities clearly remain a preferred destination for students from other countries, as 10 out of the 12 are Non-British. The German, Italian and Finnish institutions recruit mainly Ph.D students from the home country as they count 7 and the two latter countries 4 students each among the Catania applicants. No less than 19, i.e. practically half, come from other countries to carry out their research at European universities. Five students are EU nationals from 4 different countries (Slovakia, Romania, Poland, and Greece), while two are Russian. Nine students have their roots in Asia, i.e. 3 in China and one each in Vietnam, Korea, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Iran and Australia. One student came respectively from Latin America (Uruguay) and Africa (Ghana).
      
      The emerging countries also came to the fore in the topics studied by the students who applied for participation in the Tutorial. Seven studied inward and outward FDI of emerging economies, while another 7 focused on issues of technology transfer and spillovers, often from the point of view of emerging, transition or developing countries. Six students were intrigued by the cultural dimensions of international business, while 4 each had a preference for SMEs and internationalization and performance of foreign subsidiaries. Topics such as international joint ventures and alliances, R&D and service multinationals drew much less adherents than a few years ago, while newer themes like environmental and intellectual property protection have not yet found too many interested students, as in all these cases only one or two students was tackling these subjects.
      
      While it is very much regretted that only between 10 and 12 Ph.D students are selected to participate in the Tutorial, this characteristic (or weakness) constitutes, at the same time the strength of EIBA’s Tutorial. To accept more students would not allow for such a thorough discussion of the projects by the Faculty. It is indeed the unanimous opinion of the students who went through the Tutorial that both the comments from the Faculty members and the possibility to attend the EIBA conference and exchange views with their fellow Ph.D students during three days is an enormously useful experience for their doctoral work and their future career.
      
      The eleven students who were invited to come to Catania to present their thesis proposal studied at universities in seven different European universities (UK: 3, Germany and Italy: 2 and Ireland, The Netherlands, Sweden, and Denmark each 1). With regard to the nationality of their home country 4 of the ‘chosen eleven’ came from outside of the European Union (Russia, Korea, China and Vietnam). And as indicated in the list of the awards the joint winners of the Best Doctoral Thesis Proposal studied in The Netherlands and the UK and had the Russian and Greek nationality.
      
      To conclude this report on the Doctoral Tutorial 2007, it should be recalled that the Faculty consisted of John Cantwell (Rutgers University) and Udo Zander (Stockholm School of Economics) as co-chairs and Peter Buckley (Leeds University), Jean François Hennart (Tilburg University), Lucia Piscitello (Politecnico di Milano) and Francesca Sanna-Randaccio (University of Rome ‘La Sapienza’) as other members. The administrative preparation of the Tutorial was handled perfectly by Nicole Coopman and Marion Hebbelynck from EIASM.

      

      The Faculty of the Doctoral 2007 with 'founding father' Danny Van Den Bulcke
      
      

   2. Impressions from the Doctoral Thesis Proposal Award Winner 2007 

      Sergey Filippov
      Co-winner Best Thesis Proposal 2007
      UNU-MERIT (United Nations University & University of Maastricht)

      Catania, the gorgeous island of Sicily! When people hear the word “Sicily”, they think of different things. As for me, I think of the 21st EIBA Doctoral Tutorial, held on the 13th of December 2007. It was my great pleasure and honour to be there and to become a winner of the Award, so hereby I would like to share my personal impressions from participation in this event.
      
      In fact, the Tutorial kicked off informally on my birthday, the 12th of December 2007. It was my privilege to celebrate this day in the company of all the members of the Tutorial Faculty, organisers of the Tutorial and PhD candidates at an informal dinner in a restaurant with a magnificent view on Etna volcano. It was an excellent commencement of the Tutorial since it allowed “to break the ice” before its formal opening.
      
      Next day, the official opening followed. The Doctoral Tutorial was a tremendous opportunity to receive comments from distinguished scholars. It was noticeable that Faculty members were very serious about their task; they carefully read the papers and gave very detailed feedback. Not only did they give critical comments, but more importantly the discussants made suggestions how to improve the research projects. Moreover, apart from the formal Tutorial, a lunch break and coffee-breaks were a good occasion to discuss with the Faculty members various issues or elaborate more on their feedback (which wouldn’t have been always possible at the Tutorial due to natural limitations in time). I would like to take this opportunity to deeply thank my main discussants – Prof. Udo Zander and Prof. Francesca Sanna-Randaccio. I greatly appreciate comments and suggestions by the rest of the Tutorial Faculty – Professors Peter Buckley, John Cantwell, Jean-Francois Hennart and Lucia Piscitello.
      
      Moreover, I was pleased to meet my colleagues, PhD candidates from renowned European universities. I was pleasantly surprised by the variety of research topics and the degree of sophistication of the research proposals presented at the Tutorial. Although, formally speaking, we all were competitors for the Prize, in reality we became friends, and spent much time together at the Conference after the Tutorial.
      
      The 33rd EIBA conference itself was a fantastic event too! Many interesting papers were presented and a lot of novel ideas were expressed. In fact, up to 11 sessions were running simultaneously, so I often had to make a difficult choice. It is gratifying to note that the conference was a gathering of young researchers (PhD candidates), senior scholars and the most eminent academics, such as Professor John H. Dunning (an entire plenary session was dedicated to his Magnum Opus), as well as senior managers of a business community and representatives of international organisations (UNCTAD), who provided practitioners’ view on academic topics.
      
      The Gala Dinner on the last day of the Conference was an official closure, and several prizes were awarded at this ceremony, including the Award for the Best Doctoral Proposal. It was an amazing experience! After my name was announced, I stood up and proceeded to the scene. I was walking through the entire hall, and all the conference participants were clapping and cheering me up. I was feeling blessed beyond measure! I hope that this Award is “a proof of admittance” into a large community of European and international IB scholars.
      
      The Award is not only an asset, it is also a liability. Rephrasing a popular saying, I would argue that “with a great prize also comes great responsibility”. Indeed, once the expectations for my doctoral thesis have been set so high, it is my moral obligation to complete it within the due time as outlined in the Proposal.
      
      I am proud that for a second year in a row the Award goes to the Netherlands, which is a mark of quality of the Dutch research and education. Needless to say, this victory would not be possible without strong support back at home in Holland, particularly, from my academic supervisors Professor Geert Duysters and Dr. Ionara Costa and the Dean of the PhD programme Professor Robin Cowan.
      
      My thesis is about multinational companies and the European integration. And it is not by chance. I strongly believe in Europe and its knowledge-based economy. In this respect, definitely, EIBA and EIASM are doing a great job to advance European academic research in international business. I am grateful to Professor Danny Van Den Bulcke and his colleagues from these organisations for their efforts to establish and organise the Doctoral Tutorials. I have no hesitation in encouraging PhD candidates from all across Europe conducting IB research to apply for the EIBA/EIASM Doctoral Tutorial in the coming years.
      

4. Looking back at the Catania Conference 2007

   1. Report on the 33rd EIBA Annual Conference in Catania  

      Grazia Santangelo
      EIBA President 2007

      CONFERENCE THEME, PROGRAMME, PAPERS
      
      The 2007 conference theme was “International Business, Local Development and Science-Technology Relationships”. This theme invited reflection on the opportunities these linkages may offer to both multinationals and local governments in the context of globalisation of productions and R&D.
      
      The conference was organized during 3 full days. The first day, Thursday December 13, the EIBA Doctoral Tutorial was held.
      
      The opening plenary session, scheduled on Thursday, December 13, addressed the main conference theme in the presence of Maryann Feldman Miller Distinguished Professor of Higher Education at the University of Georgia (USA) and Gaetano Casalaina (Public Affairs Director – Indesit Company).
      
      The first plenary session, chaired by Danny Van Den Bulcke (University of Antwerp - Belgium), was dedicated to “The Eclectic Theory, the Multinational Enterprise and the Global Economy: John Dunning’s Magnum Opus” counting on the participation of Farok Contractor (University of Rutgers – USA), John Dunning (Universities of Reading – UK – and Rutgers – USA), Sarianna Lundan (Maastricht University – The Netherlands), Robert Pearce (University of Reading – UK) and Alain Verbeke (University of Calgary - Canada).
      
      The second plenary session was the EIBA Fellows session chaired by Klaus Macharzina (University of Hohenheim – Germany) on International Corporate Governance with the participation of Shirley Daniel (University of Hawaii – USA), Lars Oxelheim (Lund University – Sweden) and Marjan Svetlicic (University of Ljubljana - Slovenia).
      
      In the third plenary session, the four finalists of the Gunnar Hedlund Award, Seiko Arai, Chris Changwha Chung (The University of Western Ontario, USA - Now at Florida International University), Alex Eapen (Tilburg Univesity, The Netherlands) and Sabina Tacheva (Sabina Tacheva, University of St. Gallen, Switzerland - Now at Copenhagen Business School) presented their work.
      
      Two special panel sessions were also organized by UNCTAD on the World Investment Report 2007: Transnational Corporations, Extractive Industries and Development (including Ernst Christophe, Peter Buckley, Danny Van Den Bulcke and Robert Pearce) and on The World Investment Report: A critical assessment of the data and statistics (including Masataka Fujita, John Dunning, Axele Giroud, Roger Strange, Ana Teresa Tavares). A further special panel session was organized and chaired by Karl P. Sauvant on Is a backlash against FDI in the making?, with the participation of Peter J. Buckley, John Dunning and DeAnne Julius.
      
      A total of 301 panels and papers were submitted divided in 10 tracks of which 239 were accepted after a peer review process (see Table 1). The track that was most successful in attracting papers was on “International Corporate Strategies” with 69 papers followed by the track on “Management, Organisation and Cultural Issues” with 55 submitted papers. These two tracks had respectively 55 and 44 accepted papers. A less attended track was on “International business and finance” for which only 8 papers were submitted.
      
      For the first time, panel proposals had to undergo a review process like the papers. All submitted panels were encouraged to be organized with two panellists arguing for one viewpoint on the proposed theme and two other panellists arguing for the opposite viewpoint, and with the Panel Chair acting as the moderator.
      
      The submission and review process was facilitated once again by the electronic system used already in Oslo and Fribourg. 240 colleagues signed up as reviewers, all of them using the electronic system.
      
      Table 1: Distribution of the accepted papers (Catania 2007)

      Tracks *	Nr Competitive	Nr Workshop	Total per track
      Track 1	4	5	11
      Track 2	21	11	32
      Track 3	14	4	18
      Track 4	13	15	44
      Track 5	27	23	55
      Track 6	10	8	18
      Track 7	8	11	21
      Track 8	3	1	6
      Track 9	7	9	16
      Track 10	11	4	18
      Total	118	91	239

      
      * Track 1: International Business and Science-Technology Relationships; Track 2: International Business and Local Development; Track 3: Theory of MNCs; Track 4: Management, Organisation and Cultural Issues; Track 5: International Corporate Strategies; Track 6: Corporate R&D and Knowledge Transfer; Track 7: Corporate R&D and Knowledge Transfer; Track 8: Corporate Governance, Ethics and Sustainable Development; Track 9: Economic Policy Issues; Track 10: International Business and International Marketing.
      
      SOCIAL EVENTS
      Thursday, December 13: Welcome buffet at the Faculty of Political Science Library; Friday, December 14: Lunch at the Faculty of Political Science Library; dinner at Grand Hotel Excelsior; Saturday, December 15: Lunch at the Faculty of Political Science Library; Gala dinner at Palazzo Biscari.
      
      ACCOMPANYING PERSONS PROGRAMME
      A programme for the accompanying persons was also offered for December 14 and 15, 2007. The first day two walking tours were organized in Catania’s historical city centre, while on the second day a trip to the city of Taormina was organized, which is best known for its Greek Roman theatre.
      
      PARTICIPANTS
      The total number of participants was of 321, of which 296 were registered participants, the remaining were accompanying persons and conference guests. This number does not include the organizers and local staff. The geographical distribution of the registered participants is shown in Table 2. Registration was handled through EIASM.
      
      Table 2: Distribution of registered participants per country

      Country	Nr registered participants	Country	Nr registered participants
      Australia	5	Israel	4
      Austria	10	Italy	18
      Belgium	5	Japan	3
      Brazil	5	Netherlands	13
      Canada	2	New Zealand	4
      Czech Republic	4	Norway	18
      Denmark	14	Poland	9
      Estonia	3	Portugal	8
      Finland	22	Slovenia	3
      France	7	Spain	11
      Germany	26	Sweden	16
      Greece	4	Switzerland	5
      Hungary	1	United Kingdom	55
      Iceland	1	United States	16
      Ireland	4
      Nr countries represented			29
      Total nr registered participants			296

      
      
      Given the rather severe reviewing process, the conference was well attended with almost 300 participants.
      
      PUBLISHERS
      Seven publishers exhibited their most recent books and journals during the conference: i.e. Copenhagen Business School Press, Edward Elgar Publishing Ltd, Elsevier B.V., Oxford University Press (only stand), Palgrave Macmillan, SAGE Publications, and Routledge/Taylor & Francis Group.
      
      PRIZES
      Seven prizes were awarded during the Gala dinner on Saturday, December 15 as summarized in the table in the list of the awards under the item Catania Awards 2007 in this newsletter (see further).
      
      DISSEMINATION/ADVERTISEMENT
      The conference was advertised in academic fora, such as the AIB Newsletter and several national and international mailing lists. it was also posted in several web sites.
      The Conference was well covered by the media: articles were published in daily newspapers and the University bulletin, dispatches were sent to several press agencies and an interview on the opening day of the conference was shown on the local TV news.
      
      POST-CONFERENCE
      After the conference, a photo-gallery was created on line as a special section of the conference website, where pictures of the 3 day event were posted on. (http://www.fscpo.unict.it/eiba2007/gallery.htm)
      
      

5. Future Conferences: From the Baltics to the Iberian Peninsula

   1. The 35th EIBA Valencia Conference 2009 

      José Plà Barber
      President Elect
      
      During the Board  meeting in Tallinn in May, José Pla Barber, EIBA’s President-Elect,  presented  the city of Valencia - the third largest in Spain with a population of 800,000  and 1.5 million people in the metropolitan area - with a historic past that goes back to two thousands years when it was founded by the Romans. Valencia is also known as a first-class cultural city with 35 museums, 66 art galleries and 19 theatres.  Its gastronomic reputation is much broader than the famous paella and can be tested in nearly 1500 restaurants and more than 400 cafetarias. With  more than 300 days of sunshine in the year, its 16 ‘blue flag’ beaches draw large crowds.

      Valencia is also known as the city of  Arts and Science and the largest cultural educational complex in Europe with its Science Museum “Principe Felipe”, L’Hemisféric, L’Oceanografik - The largest marine park in Europe, etc. Valencia hosted the 32nd America’s Cup in 2007 and has been selected as host city for the 33rd edition in 2009. The Formula 1 “Grand Prix of Europe” will be held there from 2008 to 2015.

      The University of Valencia started in 1499 as the “Estudi General de València”, initially dedicated to the studies of medicine, humanities, theology and law; Today it has become a modern European university and covers almost every branch of teaching and  research. It has about 45,000 students on three campuses and a teaching staff of about 3,500. The Faculty of Economics counts  8,800 students and delivers 6 Official Degrees, i.e. in Economics, Business Administration, Actuarial Sciences, Marketing, Tourism and Business Science, together with a double Degree in Business and Law, an International Master in Business Administration and 3 International Double Degrees: GEE / GEDE / IB&M.

      For the venue of the conference Joé Pla Barber has opted for the Fundación Universidad-Empresa, which is located in the historical city centre, close to the historic buildings and monuments, such as the University of Valencia itself. The facilities have modern technical equipment with 22 lecture rooms, 2 computers rooms, a library, an assembly hall and conference room, a hemi-circular room and open-air spaces.

      Valencia is
      HISTORY, AVANT-GUARDE, TRADITION, GASTRONOMY, NATURE,  NIGHTLIFE and (International Business) KNOWLEDGE.

      The meeting of EIBA-35 is planned for December 13-15, 2009.
      

   2. EIBA 2010 in Porto and Ana Teresa Tavares 

      Danny Van Den Bulcke

      EIBA Chairman

      
      Although more information will be provided about the Porto 2010 Conference  in Tallinn and the next EIBA-zine, it may be useful to tell something more about Dr. Ana Teresa Tavares who has kindly accepted to host the EIBA conference, eleven years after she was one of the ten Ph.D students who were selected for the Doctoral Tutorial of the European International Business Academy (EIBA) at the University of Manchester in 1999. 
      
      Over the years she presented numerous papers at conferences of EIBA and the Academy of International Business (AIB), several of which were later published in refereed journals and special edited volumes. Ana Tavares’ publications and activities are highly appreciated in her field and she is regarded as a respected and influential colleague. That she is following the most recent developments very closely is reflected in her papers about the roles of multinational subsidiaries, the impact of FDI on technology, competitiveness and clusters.
      
      

      Apart from her publications Dr. Ana Tavares has been very active as an organizer of conferences (EUNIP in 2003, the Iberian IB Conference in 2005), as a reviewer for a high number of important journals, and as a consultant for organizations such as UNCTAD. Her role as the National Representative of Portugal in EIBA and her work as track chair at the EIBA conference in Fribourg, Switzerland in December 2006 was much appreciated. Clearly the EIBA members can be more than confident that the Porto Conference will be another highlight in EIBA’s almost 40 years of activities. The older EIBA members will certainly recall the 19th EIBA conference organized in 1993 by Vitor Corado Simoes in Lisbon and will be thrilled to go back to such a hospitable country as Portugal.
      

6. The EIBA Fellows

   1. News from the EIBA Fellows 

      Vitor Corado Simoes
      Secretary/Treasurer EIBA Fellows

      During 2007 the EIBA Fellows have pursued their activity with a view to encourage the development of international business research, especially in the context of EIBA. In Catania, the EIBA Fellows Plenary Session was convened and chaired by the EIBA Fellows Dean, Professor Klaus Macharzina, and focussed on ‘International Corporate Governance’. The panelists were Shirley Daniel (University of Hawaii), Lars Oxelheim (Lund University), and Marjan Svetliciæ (University of Ljubljana). The diversity of perspectives and the quality of the speakers contributed to provide a very accurate picture about the key corporate governance issues, from an international perspective.

      

      The EIBA Fellows at the 33rd EIBA Conference

      At the Conference Gala Dinner, Klaus Macharzina, on behalf of the EIBA Fellows, presented a plaque to Dr. DeAnne Julius in acknowledgement of the award as Distinguished Honorary EIBA Fellow of 2007, and another plaque to John Dunning in recognition of his outstanding service as the first Dean of the EIBA Fellows.
      
      In 2007, two new EIBA Fellows were elected: Jean-François Hennart and Marjan Svetlicic. They attended the EIBA Fellows Board Meeting for the first time, and were welcomed by the other Fellows. The Board Meeting held in Catania gathered 13 out of the then 16 EIBA Fellows. Klaus Macharzina thanked John Cantwell for his contribution and “enthusiastic professionalism” during his service as Secretary/Treasurer to the Fellows. He warmly acknowledged the efficiency and effectiveness of John Cantwell. On behalf of the Fellows, Klaus Macharzina handed a gift to John in recognition of his outstanding contribution to the EIBA Fellows.
      
      Other issues addressed in the Catania Board Meeting included the possibility of convening a doctoral tutorial for beginners, the profile of nominees for Honorary EIBA Fellows, the election of new Fellows, and the EIBA Fellows Session in Tallinn.

      This will be organised by Seev Hirsch, and will address the topic of ‘Nation States and Global Corporations’. The changing interaction patterns between MNEs and Nation States, particularly those of smaller size, as well as corporate social responsibility and environmental protection issues will be on the agenda of this panel. The EIBA Fellows Plenary Session in the EIBA 2008 is expected to be an excellent opportunity for the EIBA community to exchange views on the recent developments and future issues of the complex relationships between corporations and states in a global world.
      
      An important feature of EIBA Fellows activities is the granting of the Award to a Promising Young Researcher, sponsored by the Wandel & Goltermann Foundation (WGF). The purpose of this Award is to help to broaden the research programme of promising young scholars, to widen their network of research contacts and open opportunities to engage in research collaboration at an early stage of their academic careers. For 2008 there were five applications. The second EIBA Fellows-WGF Award was granted to Jonas Puck, who holds a PhD in International Management from the Friedrich-Alexander-University Erlangen-Nuremberg. It is hoped that the EIBA Fellows Award will become firmly established as a key tool to promote the career of excellent young researchers in international business, and that the Wandel &Golterman Foundation will continue to sponsor this Fellowship in the coming years.
      
      The Catania Board meeting took also the decision to start the election process for two new EIBA Fellows. In accordance with the rules defined, a ballot process was launched. As a result of this process, two new Fellows were elected: Örjan Solvell and Pervez Ghauri. Both have been with EIBA for a long time, and have significantly contributed to the success of the Academy.
      
      Örjan Sölvell, who is professor of International Business and Director of the Center for Strategy and Competitiveness at the Stockholm School of Economics, was actively involved in the organisation of the 22nd EIBA Conference held in 1996 in Stockholm. He is also behind one of the main initiatives of EIBA: the Gunnar Hedlund Award, organized by the Institute of International Business (IIB) in collaboration with EIBA.
      
      Pervez Ghauri, who has recently moved to the King’s College London, is the editor of IBR, the International Business Review, the official journal of EIBA. On behalf of the EIBA Fellows and the EIBA community I am glad to be able to congratulate them with their election as EIBA Fellows.
      
      The EIBA Fellows are active and engaged in fostering the development of international business research, and in contributing towards the strengthening of EIBA. In order to forge the links between EIBA and AIB, it was also decided that the EIBA Fellows would hold a panel at the AIB Annual Conference at Bocconio University in Milan on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the Treaty of Rome (March, 25, 1957), which allowed the European Union to get started on January 1, 1958. Danny Van Den Bulcke was asked to organize this panel session (see further in this Newsletter).
      
      I am confident that the upcoming Conference in Tallinn will become a landmark in the consolidation of EIBA as a key organization for encouraging the gathering, the exchange of views and the quality of research of international business scholars from both European and non European countries and will enlarge the EIBA community with scholars from the Baltic and from East Europe.
      

   2. Dr DeAnne Julius: The Third EIBA Fellows Distinguished Honorary Fellow 

      Klaus Macharzina
      Dean EIBA Fellows

      In 2007 the EIBA Fellows awarded the Distinguished Honorary Fellow to Dr DeAnne Julius by unanimous vote. She was inducted by Klaus Macharzina at the Gala Dinner of the Catania Annual Conference where she also participated in a Special Panel.
      
      On behalf of the Fellows Klaus Macharzina presented her with a plaque in acknowledgment of the award. He stressed that since Dr Julius has written extensively on IB issues she is by no means a stranger to our field. Hence he welcomed her as "one of ours" and expressed the hope that she would be proud of the plaque that was presented to her. In her charming words of thanks DeAnne assured us that this was indeed the case. She intended to place it in the bay window of her countryside mansion outside London which allows for a nice view of the beautiful landscape, and on the inside of all the other trophies and signs of the many credentials of her impressive career.
      
      Until recently Dr DeAnne Julius served as Chairman of Chatham House and a non-executive director of four major companies (British Petrol, Roche, Lloyds TSB and Serco). She also has served on the advisory boards of UK and US hedge funds and as Vice President of the Society of Business Economists in the UK.
      
      From 1997-2001 Dr Julius was a founding member of the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) of the Bank of England. From 2001-2004 she served on the Court of the Bank. Prior to joining MPC, she held a number of positions in the private sector including Chief Economist at British Airways and Shell. She has been senior economic advisor at the World Bank and a consultant to the IMF and UNCTAD. For the British government she chaired the Banking Services Consumer Codes Review Group and served on the Policy Commission for the Future of Farming and Food and the National Learning & Skills Council.
      
      A dual US/UK citizen she holds a BSc from Iowa State University and a PhD in Economics from the University of California. She has written five books and numerous papers on subjects ranging from foreign direct investment to strategic planning and corporate governance. She holds four honorary doctorates and was awarded the "Commander of the British Empire" in 2002.
      
      In Catania I had the privilege of talking to her at length during the Fellows Wine, Dine and Chat and the Gala Dinner getting to know an extremely bright, candid and enjoyable woman. She recalled that in a ‘New Statesman’ article, published during her time with the Bank of England she was once called the "odd one out" at the MPC because she was not shy of voting against the majority in the monthly interest decisions. When asking her about the courage of withstanding the pressure one faces in such a prominent committee to get in line with the other members, she explained that even in a group of respected economists she would form her own judgement "through the eyes of how it´s likely to affect businesses".
      
      The EIBA Fellows proudly welcome Dr DeAnne Julius as their 2007 Distinguished Honorary Fellow.
      

7. EIBA Awards

   1. Overview of the Awards and Sponsors 

      While the number of awards presented during the EIBA Conferences has increased over the years, it also became apparent that the universities, faculties and departments to which the winners belong attach more importance to them. The EIBA Secretariat received several requests from university officials in which more information was asked about the award, because they wanted to mention this in their newsletter or put it on their website. Quite often a photo was requested from the award granting ceremony in which their staff member was honoured, which regretfully was not always available.
      
      A list with some more information about the awards is shown in the table below. More information will be provided on the EIBA website.

      1. The Gunnar Hedlund Award granted by
         IIB - Institute of International Business
         Stockholm School of Economics
         Contact: Örjan Sölvell
         Prize: Stipend to partly cover travel expenses for the finalists and a prize of € 10,000 for the winner
          
      2. Copenhagen Prize granted by
         Copenhagen Business School
         Contact: Torben Pedersen
         Prize: 3.000 €
          
      3. IMR International Marketing Award granted by
         International Marketing Review
         Publisher: Emerald
         Contact: Martyn Lawrence
         Prize: 500 € (proposal for 2008)
          
      4. IJoEM Best Paper Award on Emerging Markets International Journal of Emerging Markets granted by
         Publisher: Emerald
         Contact: Martyn Lawrence
         Prize: 500 € (proposal for 2008)
          
      5. IBR Best Paper of the Year Award International Business Review granted by
         Publisher: Elsevier
         Contact: Pervez Ghauri, Editor IBR
         Prize: 1.000 €
          
      6. EIBA Best Doctoral Thesis Proposal Award granted by
         EIBA
         Contact: John Cantwell and Ivo Zander, EIBA Doctoral Tutorial Co-Chairs
         Prize: 1.000 €
          
      7. EIBA Fellows Research Award granted by
         EIBA Fellows
         Contact: Klaus Macharzina, EIBA Fellows Chair
         Prize: 15.000 €
          
      8. Distinguished EIBA Honorary Fellow Award granted by
         EIBA Fellows
         Contact: Klaus Macharzina, EIBA Fellows Chair
         Plaque
          
      9. Lifetime Achievement Award in IB granted by
         EIBA
         Contact: Danny Van Den Bulcke, EIBA Chairman
         Plaque

       

   2. Awards granted during the Catania Conference 2007 

      Awards granted during the Catania Conference 2007:

      1. BEST DOCTORAL THESIS PROPOSAL AWARD
         
         Multinational Subsidiary Evolution: Host Country Impact
         by Sergey FILIPPOV, Maastricht University (UNU-MERIT)
         
         Towards an International Intellectual Property Rights Protection and Enforcement Index
         by Nikolas PAPAGEORGIADIS, Leeds University
          
      2. GUNNAR HEDLUND AWARD
         
         The Evolution of International Joint Ventures: Multiple Waves of Structural Change, Performance, and Survival
         by Chris CHANGWHA CHUNG, The University of Western Ontario (now at Florida International University)
          
      3. COPENHAGEN PRIZE
         
         Organizational Learning Capability, Innovation and Export Intensity: Evidence from Italian and Spanish Ceramic Tiles Producers
         by Joaquin ALEGRE, University of Valencia, José PLA-BARBER, University of Valencia & Ricardo CHIVA, University Jaume I
         
         
         
         
         The Winners of the Copenhagen Prize 2007
         
      4. INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF EMERGING MARKETS (IJOEM) BEST PAPER AWARD
         
         The Co-Evolution of Charters, Capabilities and Structures in the Internationalization Process
         by Tina AMBOS, Bodo B. SCHLEGELMILCH, Björn AMBOS & Barbara BRENNER, Vienna University Of Economics and Business Administration
         
         
         

         The Winners of Emerald's IJoEM Best Paper Award 2007
         

      5. INTERNATIONAL MARKETING REVIEW (IMR) BEST PAPER AWARD
         
         Exploring Product and Cultural Contingencies in Exporter-Intermediary Relationships
         by Carl Arthur SOLBERG, BI Norwegian School of Management, Oslo 
         
         
         

         Carl Solberg, Winner of the IMR Best Paper Award 2007
         

      6. IBR BEST PAPER OF THE YEAR AWARD
         
         Motives and Partner Selection Criteria in International Strategic Alliances: Perspective of Chinese firms
         IBR, 15(6): 577-600
         by Li DONG & Keith GLAISTER
          
      7. DISTINGUISHED EIBA HONORARY FELLOW OF THE YEAR AWARD
         
         DeAnne JULIUS, Chatham House (UK)
         
         

   3. 1997-2007: Ten Years of the Gunnar Hedlund Award 

      Örjan Sölvell & Danny Van Den Bulcke

      Ten years after its inception the Gunnar Hedlund Award has become the leading scholarly award for the best Ph.D dissertation in the field of international business in the world. The ‘Institute of International Business Award in Memory of Gunnar Hedlund’, as the award is formally named, was initiated in 1997, the year when Professor Gunnar Hedlund, former director of the Institute of International Business (IIB) and renowned IB scholar, passed away.
      
      Gunnar Hedlund studied at the Stockholm School of Economics (SSE), where he received the BSc degree in 1972 and obtained his Ph.D four years later, at the age of 27. When in 1975, the new institute IIB was founded; he was hired right away and became its director in 1980. He would develop the Centre into a leading position among the most recognized international business research centers in the world. Gunnar was an outstanding scholar, who was continuously looking for new perspectives. He had a unique ability to cross over disciplines and opening up new research avenues. His most quoted works: ‘The Hypermodern MNC. A Heterarchy’ (Human Resource Management, 1986) and ‘A Model of Knowledge Management and the N-Form Organization’ (Strategic Management Journal, 1994) have become classic readings within organization studies and international business.
      
      The Gunnar Hedlund Award, launched in 1997, by the Boards of SSE-IIB and EIBA, was based on the idea that it should act as a vehicle to stimulate good scholarly work by Ph.D candidates from around the world in the field of IB, while at the same time commemorating Gunnar’s work. The amount of the prize, i.e. € 10,000 is quite substantial.
      
      During the first ten years of the existence of the Hedlund Award, 151 Ph.D students have sent in their dissertations. Out of these candidacies 33 finalists (3 to 4 per year) were invited to the annual EIBA conference to defend their thesis in a special session. The finalists are chosen on the basis of a ten page summaries, which are submitted to a blind refereeing process by the faculty members of IIB. Finally, the winner is chosen on the basis of the full open theses of the finalists by an international jury.
      
      More than a quarter of the total submissions originated from the US, compared to about one fifth from the UK and almost one tenth from Sweden. The dominance of the US even increases to 45 per cent of the total finalists, with the UK coming in as second with 18 per cent. If one includes Canada, North America can claim 54 per cent of the finalists, compared to 24 per cent for Continental Europe. No less than six of the nine winners (the prize was not granted in 2004) during the first decade of the Hedlund Award studied in North America, as five came from the US and one from Canada. The only European winners came from Germany (2001), the UK (2003) and Norway (2006). It has to be stressed that these figures register the country of study, and not the nationality of the finalists or winners. For instance, two of the North American winners were Asian.
      
      With regard to the themes that were developed in the submitted theses, FDI and foreign market entry, headquarter-subsidiary organization and control, and SME internationalization and born globals were most represented with more than 10 submissions out of the 26 categories that were distinguished in this classification. With nearly ten entries: MNC and external network relationships, internationalization of services, and international alliances and joint ventures made up a second group of subjects dealt with in the dissertations that were sent in for the Hedlund Award.
      
      (Danny Van Den Bulcke, based on information provided by Örjan Sôlvell)
      

   4. The Hedlund Prize: Personal Impressions of the Gunnar Hedlund Best Dissertation Competition and the EIBA Conference 

      Chris Changwa Chung
      University of Western Ontario
      Winner Hedlund Award 2007

      I’d like to share my thoughts of and experiences at the Gunnar Hedlund Best Dissertation competition (held in Catania, Italy in December, 2007) and the European International Business Academy (EIBA) conference. The first Hedlund Award was given at the 24th annual EIBA conference in 1998 by the competition jury chairman, Örjan Sölvell. The idea behind the award is to stimulate good scholarly work by Ph.D. candidates around the world in the field of International Business, and—as the name suggests—commemorating Gunnar Hedlund’s important work.
      
      To enter the competition, I submitted a full copy of my dissertation along with a 10 page unsigned abstract in July of 2007. Three-to-four finalists are nominated each year for the Hedlund prize. I felt a mix of excitement and tremendous stress, since I knew I was sending my dissertation to renowned scholars whom I had always admired. I didn’t know who the jurors were for the 2007 competition, but the list of previous jurors was intimidating enough: John Dunning, Daniel van den Bulcke, Julian Birkinshaw, Peter Buckley, Eleanor Westney, Don Lessard, Nakiye Boyacigller, and jury chairman Örjan Sölvell.
      
      Not knowing the identities of this year’s five jury members gave me butterflies—what sort of feedback would I receive from scholars at that level? I had always admired and respected their work, so their words meant a lot to me. That made sending an email with my thesis attached a big deal for me. Remembering words of encouragement by my thesis advisor, Paul Beamish, I closed my eyes, took a deep yoga inhalation, and clicked the “send” button; the following morning I sent the hard copies. It had long been my dream to be selected as a finalist, and perhaps as the award-winner, so I had been preparing for that moment from the beginning of my Ph.D. study. I am not exaggerating when I say that sending my submission was an intense and dramatic highlight in my just-starting academic career.
      
      Preparing and sending copies of my dissertation was hard enough, but nothing compared to the adrenaline-draining time of waiting for the jury’s decision. The stress was somewhat relieved when I was named the winner of the Barry Richman Best Dissertation Award at the 2007 Academy of Management meetings, but I still did a lot of pacing while waiting for notification of my selection as one of four finalists in the Gunnar Hedlund contest. I remember when I got a personal email from Eleanor Westney acknowledging her receipt of my dissertation. It felt as though I had just gotten a response to a fan letter sent to a rock star!
      
      Regarding the EIBA conference, Catania, Italy, a major center of Sicilian baroque architecture wast a wonderful choice of location. I had a lot of expectations about the beauty of this city, and I was not disappointed. Everything I gazed at expressed beauty and history, and the residents showed genuine warmth and pride in their cultural history. I spent time visiting 18th century architectural jewels: Palazzo degli Elefanti (City Hall), Palazzo dei Chierici, and Duomo di Sant’Agata. I’ll never forget the magical moment of opening my hotel room balcony door and looking down at the Elephant Fountain in Piazza Duomo. The moment I opened that door, a dove flew off the balcony. It was just like a scene from one of those romantic films my wife loves to watch.
      
      After absorbing Catania’s beauty, I registered at the conference and did what all academics do at such meetings: network, debate, and listen. Fortunately, I was able to have my nervousness sidetracked by conference business, but at one point the anxiety came back in a rush as the time for the Hedlund plenary session approached. That anxiety was put at ease when I met the other finalists: Alex Eapen, Seiko Arai, and Sabina Tacheva’s husband, Bo Nielsen. Their genuine enthusiasm, openness, and friendliness made me realize that these people were to become my friends, colleagues, and supporters. Moreover, all three were familiar to me from previous meetings. I had met Alex Eapen at the junior faculty consortium during the 2006 Academy of International Business conference in Beijing. At that same conference I had shared the podium with Seiko Arai while presenting our closely related papers. Bo Nielsen and I had shared our common research interest in international joint ventures at other conferences, and Sabina Tacheva was one of the four finalists for the 2007 Barry Richman award. Sabina couldn’t attend this year’s EIBA meeting because she had given birth to a baby girl two weeks previous—congratulations, Sabina! As the dutiful husband, Bo would give a presentation on her behalf. Three of us were on the same page in terms of baby news: Alex became a father in October, and my wife had given birth to our first child (a boy) in March. We joked that recent parenthood was a major qualification for Hedlund finalists.
      
      The big “button-pressing moment” came after the four of us gave our individual presentations. In past years, awards were presented at the gala dinner, but this time the announcement was made at the Hedlund plenary session. I may have been the only one hearing a drum roll in my mind as the big moment arrived, but I doubt it. John Dunning pressed the button and WOW!—there was my name on the huge screen behind us, as well as on screens in other rooms that received a broadcast feed of the plenary session. John Dunning and Örjan Sölvell presented me with a medal, a certificate, and a check for €10,000.
      
      I’ll keep using the rock star analogy here—it was as if the stars who had inspired me to become a musician had given me the “new artist award” for my debut single. I noticed Daniel van den Bulcke taking pictures of that moment. That was especially memorable because I usually observe doctoral students and staff members taking pictures, and there was Danny taking conference pictures himself. He’s perfect for the job, the kind of person who genuinely enjoys making people around him feel happy and welcomed.
      
      What a wonderful experience! I would like to express my sincere thanks to the EIBA community for inviting me to attend the 2007 Catania conference. I also want to convey my sincere appreciation to the Institute of International Business, Stockholm School of Economics for presenting me with its Hedlund award. This is a fond memory that I’m sure will never fade.
      
      

      

8. Events/Publications

   1. New Perspectives in IB Research 

      New Perspectives in IB Research. Culture, Governance, Entrepreneurship and International Expansion.
      Volume 3, Progress in International Business Research Series EIBA, Emerald Publishing Ltd, London 2008
      Maryann P. Feldmann and Grazia D. Santangelo (eds.)
      
      Contents of the book

      1. New Perspectives in IB Research
         by Maryann P. Feldman, University of North Carolina and Grazia D. Santangelo, University of Catania
         
         MANAGING CULTURAL DIFFERENCES ACROSS COUNTRIES
         
      2. Headquarters-subsidiary Relationships and the Country-of-origin Effect
         by Anne-Wil Harzing, University of Melbourne and Niels Noorderhaven, Tilburg University
         
      3. An Exploratory Study of Cultural Differences and Perceptions of Relational Risk
         by Susana Costa e Silva, Universidade Católica Portuguesa and Luciara Nardon, Vlerick Leuven Gent Management School
         
      4. Drivers of Interpersonal and Inter-unit Trust in Multinational Corporations
         by Kristiina Mäkelä, Wilhelm Barner-Rasmussen & Ingmar Björkman, Hanken Swedish School of Economics and Business Administration
         
         GOVERNANCE
         
      5. Normative Control in MNEs: A Micro-political Conflict Perspective
         by Susanne Blazejewski, European University Viadrina
         
      6. Exploring Antecedents of Relationship Commitment in an Import-Export Dyad
         by Diana Debora Welch & Abraham Carmeli, Bar-Ilan University
         
      7. Constructing Jurisdictional Advantage
         by Maryann Feldman, University of North Carolina & Roger Martin, University of Toronto
         
         THE GENESIS OF INTERNATIONAL ENTERPRENEURS
         
      8. Comparative International Entrepreneurship: The Software Industry in the Indian Sub-Continent
         by Shameen Prashantham, University of Glasgow, Amer Qureshi, Q Consulting and Training & Stephen Young, University of Glasgow
         
      9. Reinterpreting a ‘Prime Example’ of a Born Global: Cochlear’s International Launch
         by Lisa Hewerdine, University of Adelaide & Catherine Welch, University of Sydney
         
      10. Myths in Microfinance
          by Roy Mersland, University of Agder & Oystein Strom, Ostfold University College
          
          TECHNOLOGY AND INERNATIONAL EXPANSION
          
      11. R&D and Foreign Direct Investment with Asymmetries in Knowledge Transmission
          by Maria Luisa Petit, Francesca Sanna Randaccio, & Roberta Sestini, University of Rome "La Sapienza"
          
      12. FDI and Spillovers in the Swiss Manufacturing Industry: Interaction Effects between Spillover Mechanisms and Domestic Absorptive Capacities
          by Lamia Ben Hamida & Philippe Gugler, University of Fribourg and World Trade Institute Berne
          
      13. Market and Technology Access in European Firm Acquisitions: Beyond One Size Fits All
          by Christoph Grimpe & Katrin Hussinger, University of Maastricht, Catholic University of Leuven and Centre for European Economic Research (ZEW)

      Aim of the volume
      
      This third volume in the Annual book Series of EIBA is the outcome of the 33rd European International Business Academy (EIBA) conference held at the Faculty of Political Science of the University of Catania (Italy). The conference brought together about 300 scholars from around the world to discuss theoretical and empirical issues in international business (IB), as well as their consequences and challenges to IB scholars and policy-makers. Organized around 10 thematic tracks, the conference is the annual forum for discussing major research issues in the IB realm. The volume is a collection of the best papers, which, selected through a blind refereeing process for presentation at the conference, make significant contributions by providing fresh new perspectives on a variety of relevant topics.
      
      After thirty-three years, the IB field is maturing to consider new issues related to culture, governance and entrepreneurship. Besides the traditional topics of multinationals’ investment decisions and FDI spillovers, this collection of papers mirrors the recent evolution in the field by considering cultural differences in headquarter-subsidiaries relationships, perception differences of relational risk, and determinants of trust in interpersonal and inter-unit relationships. In addition, the governance of relationships within firms as in conflicts between parent-subsidiaries, between firms as in import-export dyads, and within locations as concerned the construction of jurisdictional advantage. Also considered are the genesis of international entrepreneurs in the context of the software industry in India, the related debate on the definition of ‘born global’ firms and the controversies about the efficacy of microfinance to support third world development.
      
      Although these are just a few of the new perspectives rising within the IB realm, these chapters were selected to provide a coherent collection that demonstrates the vitality of research conducting in the field, IB’s responsiveness to new emerging topics in related areas and the fruitful incorporation of new ideas.
      
      Volume organization
      
      The edited volume is organized in four main parts. The first addressing the Management of Cultural Differences across Countries, the second dealing with questions about the Governance of multinationals and places, the third part focusing on the Genesis of International Entrepreneurs and the fourth on Technology and International Expansion.
      
      The first section, Managing Cultural Differences Across Countries, has three chapters that address the lasting effects of country of origin influences on the transfer of organizational practices, the cultural perceptions of relational risk and the determinants of trust, at both the individual and organizational unit. In Chapter 2, the headquarter subsidiary relationship is examined, more specifically the effects of the country of origin on the transfer of management practices. The fact that multinational corporations are rooted in a cultural context that is specific to their countries of origin is often ignored. For example, U.S. multinationals will have a different cultural orientation than UK, German or Japanese multinationals and this will affect their relationships with subsidiaries. Chapter 3 contends that an important component of cultural differences relates to receptions of risk. In this chapter the role of cultural differences and perception of relational risk in foreign partnerships are studied, based on an exploratory study of Portuguese managers doing business internationally. Chapter 4 analyses trust in multinational corporations, and examins the drivers at both the interpersonal and inter-unit level.
      
      Governance is the focus of the second part of the volume. An actor-centred conflict perspective is proposed in Chapter 5 which accounts for corporate coordination instruments as well as individual actors’ reactions on the local level of the MNE subsidiaries. The governance of firms market relationships is investigated in Chapter 6 and explores high-quality relationships, manifested by trust, respectful engagement and vitality, augment relationship commitment between importer and exporter.. The presence of product substitutes also seems to have a significant impact on relationship commitment. Chapter 7 aims to advance economic development theory through the concept of jurisdictional advantage by demonstrating how places might strategically position themselves to gain economic advantage and then considering how this place-specific advantage might be constructed.
      
      The third part of the volume deals with the Genesis of International Entrepreneurs. In Chapter 8, it is attempted to extend the understanding of the ‘international’ dimension of comparative international entrepreneurship within a global industry viz. the software industry. More specifically, the chapter focuses on two local ecologies, namely a regional agglomeration (Bangalore, India) and less developed (and known) niche (Lahore, Pakistan). In Chapter 9 the case of Cochlear (an Australian company that produces hearing implants for the deaf), is re-examined, challenging the classification of the firm as ‘a prime example of a company that was “born global”. In Chapter 10, in which the myths about microfinance are disentangled, it is concluded that microfinance – the provision of financial services to the poor – is a viable business model.
      
      In the fourth part of the volume, Technology and International Expansion are investigated. More specifically, the first two chapters deal with the issue of spillovers and absorptive capacity within the context of FDI inflows. In Chapter 11it is studied how the firms’ R&D investment decisions are affected by asymmetries in knowledge transmission, taking into account different sources of asymmetry such as unequal know-how management capabilities and spillovers localization within an international oligopoly. In Chapter 12 the intra-industry spillover effects from inward FDI in Swiss manufacturing firms are analyzed by accounting for the mechanisms by which spillovers occur (viz. the increase of competition, demonstration effects, and worker mobility), and the interaction between such mechanisms and the levels of domestic absorptive capacity. Motivations of external corporate expansion are addressed in Chapter 13, where it is shown how the importance of different takeover motivations changes along the deal value distribution.
      

   2. The Third Iberian International Business Conference 

      Celeste Amorim Varum
      IIBC Conference Chair 2007

      The Third Iberian International Business Conference (IIBC) took place in Aveiro, Portugal, on the 19th and 20th of October 2007. The venue was the Department of Economics, Management and Industrial Engineering of the Universidade de Aveiro. The conference was chaired by Celeste Amorim Varum, working closely with Joaquim da Costa Leite (DEGEI/ UA), Ana Teresa Tavares (CEMPRE/FEP), Juan José Durán Herrera (Universidad Autónoma de Madrid) and Vítor Corado Simões (ISEG-Universidade Técnica de Lisboa).
      
      The conference aimed to provide an opportunity so that people working in the field in Portugal and Spain to get to know better each other, to share and get feedback on their recent work, to stimulate Ph.D. students and recent graduates to present their research, and to increase awareness of EIBA among Iberian IB scholars.
      
      Over 50 delegates attended the conference, from 9 universities in Portugal, 11 in Spain, 9 in other European Countries, as well as managers from 5 enterprises highly involved in international business.
      
      Thirty four papers were presented in parallel sessions on themes such as: FDI and economic growth; Determinants of firms’ internationalisation; Spillovers; Linkages and Networks; FDI and Trade; Management and Multinationals.

      Due to the good results that were achieved, it was agreed to organise the 4th IIBC conference, this time in Spain. We expect that this event will contribute to bring more Iberian researchers to EIBA, as well as to increase the commitment of the current members.
      

   3. The 7th OECD Global Forum on International Investment (GFI-7) 

      Philippe Gugler
      Faculty of Economics and Social Sciences of the University of Fribourg (Switzerland)
      and Member of the GFI Advisory Expert Group

      The OECD Global Forum on International Investment (GFI) is the annual meeting of a global network of policy makers, academics, business leaders, labour representatives, and members of civil society dealing with the policy challenges of international investment. The GFI has been organised by the OECD’s investment Committee since 2001.
      
      The 2008 theme of GFI-7 concerned best practice in promoting investment for development. The relationship between investment and development was a key them during the 2007 G-8 Summit, which called upon “UNCTAD and the OECD to jointly engage industrialized countries, emerging economies and developing countries in the development of best practices for creating an institutional environment conducive to increased foreign investment and sustainable development”. In response to that call, the GFI-7 has been organised by the OECD in close cooperation with UNCTAD.  This two-days meeting, organized perfectly by Michael Gestrin, contained numerous interesting sessions comprising scholars, developed and developing countries representatives, as well as international organisations’ officers. Several sessions have been organized on the basis of the OECD Policy Framework for Investment (PFI). The PFI User’s toolkit is being developed by the OECD to provide practical policy guidance to governments who are using the PFI to increase private sector investment. Due to the quality of the programme and of the participants, the GFI tends to be one of the major world’s events in the field of policy issues regarding FDI in developed and less developed countries. For more Information regarding this forum please check www.oecd.org/investment/gfi-7
      

9. Personalia/Careers

   1. Dr Karl Sauvant: A New Career for the Second Distinguished Honorary EIBA Fellow 

      Danny Van Den Bulcke
      EIBA Chairman

      Until July 2005, Dr Karl P. Sauvant was director of UNCTAD’s Division on Investment, Technology and Enterprise Development (DITE), the focal point in the UN system for matters related to FDI and technology as well as the major interface with the private sector.

      In 1991, Karl Sauvant started the well known annual World Investment Reports (WIR), which is continued until today and brings IB scholars up to date on the worldwide and regional trends and policies with regard to FDI, together with a more detailed analysis of a particular theme. The last of the 15 reports Karl was responsible for was WIR-2005, which dealt with ‘Transnational Corporations and the Internationalization of R&D’.  In 1992 he launched the journal ‘Transnational Corporations’ another outlet for academic and policy oriented studies about the strategies of transnational corporations and the policy issues governments and international organizations are confronted with. Together with John Dunning he edited the 20 volume Library on Transnational Corporations (published by Routledge). While managing DITE he contributed to a large number of initiatives that promoted international consensus building in the areas of FDI and the activities of TNCs.

      Apart from his work in the United Nations Dr Karl Sauvant has published widely on issues related to economic development, FDI in services and international investment agreements.

      Since his retirement from the UN in 2006, Karl Sauvant became Executive Director of the Columbia program on International Investment, and lecturer in Law at Columbia Law School and Special Advisor to the UN Millennium Project of Columbia University.

      Back in New York after many years, Karl Sauvant has organized several conferences at Columbia University on TNCs. The papers of the first one of the conferences on TNCs have been published in a book he edited.                        

      Starting with 2008-2009 three fellowships are granted to candidates who intend to focus on FDI while studying at the Columbia Law School. The fellowships are in the form of partial tuition waivers for one academic year. There also are the so-called Appel Fellowship  and the Appel Research Scholarship on the Regulation of Multinational Enterprise for a student who intends to concentrate the research at Columbia Law School on regulatory or policy issues emerging from the trans-boundary operations of transnational corporations.

      His edited volume ‘The Rise of Transnational Corporations from Emerging Markets. Threat of Opportunity?’ was published by Edward Elgar at the beginning of 2008, and is the first in a new series on ‘Studies in International Investment.’ It is composed of 17 chapters divided in 5 Parts. Part 1 consists of two overview chapters by Karl Sauvant and Jeffrey Sachs. Part 2 explores the growth and pattern of outward FDI from developing countries and has among its best known authors, John Cantwell, Alan Rugman, Peter Buckley and John Dunning. Part 3 tries to anwer the question what is in it for host countries, with chapters by Andrea Goldstein, Rainer Gaiger and Carrie Hall. Part 4 poses the same question as to what is in it for home countries and international organizations, with contributions from Steve Globerman, Theodore Moran, Edward Graham, and Joseph Stiglitz. In the final part Lorraine Eden and Zenaida Hernandez draw some conclusions. As this volume bundled the papers of a first conference, and Karl Sauvant has since then organized two more conferences about related topics since then, more edited volumes can be expected to come out of the recently renamed: Vale Columbia Center on Sustainable International Investment.
      

   2. John H. Dunning: EIBA's Lifetime Achievement Award - Follow up 

      Danny Van Den Bulcke
      EIBA Chairman

      In 2004 during the annual EIBA Conference in Ljubljana, the EIBA Fellows and the whole EIBA community decided to award John Dunning, Emeritus Professor of the Universities of Reading and Rutgers, its first and only Lifetime Achievement Award in International Business.
      
      Following this decision, EIBA-zine devoted two articles to John Dunning’s career. In fact the first two parts were an abbreviated and slightly adapted version of his own description of the different stages in his career, as originally published in the Journal of International Business Studies JIBS), 20024, No 4, entitled ‘Perspectives on International Business Research: A professional Biography. Fifty Years of Researching and Teaching International Business’. The first part published in EIBA-zine covered the decennia from the 1950s to the 1970s and appeared in the 2006 October issue, while the 1980s and 1990s were dealt with in the second part (EIBA-zine October 2007). In the introduction to the latter issue I wrote ‘It is hoped that he will accept to write out his experiences during the first decennium of the new millennium and update the conclusions of his JIBS article as a third part of the next issue of EIBA-zine’.
      
      Even though he is coping with illness since the beginning of 2008, John Dunning has done much better than expected, as he has written a full fledged biography with the title: ‘Seasons of a Scholar. Some Personal Reflections of an International Business Economist. The Autobiography of John Dunning’. It will be available at the EIBA Conference in Tallinn in a hardback and paperback version (published by Edward Elgar, 192 pages, respectively £ 49.95 and £ 20).
      
      The year 2007, was a hectic year for John Dunning. Wherever he went during that year –and he travelled on all the continents, except Antartica - he was being congratulated on his 80th birthday and had to engage in a lot of birthday cake cutting ceremonies.
      
      The first major event took place at the University of Reading and was organized by Rajneesh Narula of the Centre for International Business and Strategy. The theme of the two-day April conference in Reading was ‘Four Decades of International Business at Reading: Looking to the Future’. During this workshop a scrapbook was presented to John Dunning with the title ‘A Global Celebration. Upon the occasion of John’s 80th birthday’. With warmest regards from his colleagues and friends’. Because his birthday coincided with the annual conference of the Academy of International Business (AIB) in Indianapolis, this meant that John had to deal with a continuous flow of congratulations during the whole conference. In July, in Henley on Thames, family and close friends gathered for another birthday party to which about a hundred guests were invited. Last year in Catania John was honoured again by a plenary panel session, chaired by Danny Van Den Bulcke, in which his first major paper about the eclectic theory (1977) (30 years later) was discussed by Farok Contractor, Alain Verbeke and Sarianna Lundan, together with the completely revised version of his ‘magnum opus’ ‘Multinational Enterprises and the Global Economy’ co-authored by Sarianna Lundan. The session was entitled ’The Eclectic Theory, the Multinational Enterprise , and the Global Economy. John Dunning’s Magnum Opus’ Regretfully, the printed version of the book was not yet available in Catania, in December. However, at the AIB Conference in June 2008 in Milan, John could sign the first copies of this basic treatise of foreign direct investment and multinational enterprises.
      
      

      
      More honours have been bestowed on John Dunning during 2008, the year of the anniversary of the publication of his trendsetting 1958 book on ‘American Investment in the British Manufacturing Industry’. During the AIB conference in Milan in July, the EIBA Fellows organized a session about ‘The European Union at 50. FDI in the EU. Achievements, Challenges, and Corporate Responses’, which took the 1958 book as its starting point (see further in this Newsletter). The session, in which John himself could participate, was chaired by Danny Van Den Bulcke and also included Vitor Corado Simoès, Juan José Duran and Marjan Svetlicic. During the AIB conference he received the JIBS Decade Award for his article about ‘Location and the Multinational Enterprise. A Neglected Factor’ (1998). And that John Dunning’s work was not only appreciated by his fellow academics, was clearly shown when he was honoured with the ‘Order of the British Empire’ (OBE), which he received from the hands of Queen Elizabeth during an impressive ceremony a few weeks ago. Also on December 12 there will be a special ceremony at the University of Reading, where the Centre of International Business will be renamed as the John H. Dunning Centre for International Business.
      
      I herewith include an extract of John Dunning’s autobiography which he forwarded to me in June of this year (pages 248-252 from an early manuscript) and which concentrates on the years 2002- 2007, thereby complementing the JIBS article referred to earlier and used for the parts 1 and 2 which appeared in the two previous EIBA-zines.
      

   3. John H. Dunning: Fifty Years of Research and Teaching - Part 3 

      John H. Dunning
      Emeritus Professor Universities of Reading and Rutgers
      
      “Writings of such scholars as Bertil Ohlin, Stephen Hymer, Harry Johnson, Ray Vernon and Jack Behrman and in the 1970s and 1980 those of Charles Kindleberger, Dick Caves, Mira Wilkins and Peter Gray have certainly had a great impact on my own research. But, I have increasingly become more influenced in my thinking by the work of the younger generation of scholars, and more particularly by that of my colleagues of the Reading School, and latterly my ex-Ph.D. students at Rutgers University.
      
      And it has been in the supervision of more than 50 Ph.D. students and research assistants at Southampton, Reading and Rutgers Universities, and the sharing of the subsequent scholarly success of many of them, together with collaborating with more than 60 colleagues –both senior and junior- in writing monographs and articles and chapters in books; and the friendship and interchange of ideas at many conferences that has given me the most satisfaction in my career.
      
      Of course, I cannot deny that I have enjoyed a comfortable standard of living, travelling to 85 countries in all five continents, of meeting and exchanging views with illustruous political leaders and business executives, and of receiving various accolades, including five honorary doctorates. But, at the end of the day, my real fulfilment has come from any small contribution I have made to the development of international business as a unique field of study; and to the education of at least a few of the future leaders of our profession.
      
      Between the publication of my JIBS contribution in 2002, and the end of 2007, I continued to be actively involved in scholarly research, and attended most IB related conferences. With the most valued help of Sarianna Lundan, a much revised and updated version of the Multinational Enterprise and the Global Economy was completed in 2007, and published by Edward Elgar in May 2008. Sarianna and I also pursued our joint interests in the (changing) role of corporate and national institutions in influencing the level and structure of IB activity in a globalising world economy. Between 2001 and 2007 I collaborated with Tagi Sagi-nejad in a project which aimed to assess the contribution of the UN and its various agencies in the understanding of the impact of MNE activity on economic development and international relations. I also continued my role as Senior Economic Advisor to UNCTAD; and took on a new consultancy assignment for UNIDO which at the time of writing is investigating the impact of inbound FDI on the indigeneous technological and managerial capacity of some 30 sub-Saharan countries.
      
      

      I also continued a busy travel schedule throughout the first decade of the 2000s. Each year I spent some time at Rutgers University giving seminars and talking with Ph.D students; and every other year I visited Georgia Tech in Atlanta as external asessor on their CIBER programme. I also gave keynote addresses on a range of IB topics at several Asian and European universities. In 2004, I was privileged to receive the Distinguished Scholar Award from the International Management Division of the Academy of Management and a Lifetime Award for Scholarly Excellence in IB from the European International Business Academy (EIBA). Then in 2008 I was informed that the Centre of International Business at the University of Reading was to be renamed as the John H. Dunning Centre of International Business. Needless to say, I greatly appreciated these honours and two further honorary doctorates - one from the University of Lund, Sweden and the other from the Chinese Culture University in Taipe, Taiwan which were awarded in 2007.
      
      All in all, the second half of my 70s was one of the most enjoyable and productive parts of my life. At the same time, during these years, my wife and I managed to spend up to three months each year enjoying the delights of the coastal scenery of Cornwall in South West England, where in 1999 we acquired a second home. As long as I am able I shall do everything in my power to promote international business as a rich mosaic of inter-related disciplines, and to give what assistance and encouragement I can to the next generation of scholars to recognise its uniqueness, to enlarge its scope and to upgrade its intellectual prestige.
      
      Since the mid-1990s, the focus of my research has changed. While I have continued to work closely with UNCTAD, UNIDO, the World Investment Promotion Agency (WIPA) and the national investment promotion agencies of China and Korea, an increasing proportion of my scholarly attention is devoted to two topics viz (i) the moral imperatives of global capitalism, and corporate social responsibility and (ii) the role and content of micro and macro institutions in influencing both the determinants and effects of IB activity.
      
      With regard to the second topic, under the stong influence of Douglas North and several IB scholars in the 1990s, Sarianna Lundan and I have summarized some of our views on the interface between institutions and MNEs in the 2008 edition of Multinational Enterprises and the Global Economy. Indeed, apart from updating the data, and extending the analysis and the empirical content contained in the first edition, I would regard our explicit incorporation of country (national) and firm (corporate) specific institutions into mainstream IB research as one of the most valuable scholarly responses to the emergence of the globalization of the world economy over the past 20 years. The essential point here is that globalization and its various attributes have led not only to a much closer economic independence between the wealth creating activities of firms and nations - but also that between widely differing cultural and belief systems. And it is this latter domain where it is much less easy, let alone desirable, to exploit the benefits of economic integration. Moreover, it is only by reconfiguring corporate and/or national institutions that the social and cultural consequences of such integration can be made more inclusive and creditable. In this connection, many IB and other writers have stressed the increasing importance of social capital as a critical competitive advantage of firms and countries in the global economy. And, it is at this juncture where my own interests in the moral imperatives of global capitalism and that of institutions intersect. I hope to continue working in the area of institutions, and the evolutionary theory of economic change, and of how each interacts on a whole variety of IB topics.
      
      Towards the final season and second childhood
      
      From time to time in my 60s and 70s I thought about about what I would like to do when my time came to retire from academic life. I did not anticipate continuing with my research or teaching much beyond the early 1990s, but rather do something to which I could apply my Christian beliefs. Much earlier in the 1950s and 1960s, I had enjoyed lay preaching, but I ruled this option out after the events of the subsequent decade.
      
      Again, serendipity entered into the picture. In 1998 I was invited to give a talk on the Christian response to global capitalism at the annual meeting of the European International Business Academy (EIBA) in Jerusalem. This, along with the parallel presentations with Jewish and Islamic speakers, stimulated a great deal of interest among my friends and colleagues, and after careful thought, and with a growing realisation that moral and ethical issues were now increasingly entering the domain of globalization, I redirected much of my scholarly attention in the early 2000s towards identifying the ways and means by which capitalism could be made both more economically inclusive and socially acceptable.
      
      One of the results of this work was the publication of my edited volume ‘Making Globalization Good’ – in 2003 by the University of Oxford Press. To finance the project, I secured generous grants from the Templeton and Carnegie Bosch Foundations. My aim was to gain the insights of distinguished scholars, businessmen and statesmen on (what they perceived to be) the essential moral and ethical attributes of a sustainable global market based system. In this, I believe, I was successful. I certainly learned a lot about the different views expressed, but, at the end of the day, I was comforted to discover that there was a substantial commonality among the contributors as to what they thought needed to be done if global capitalism was to be an efficient, fair and sustainable economic system for both the creation and utilisation of scarce human and physical resources.
      
      The volume was launched at three half day conferences in London and New York in 2003, and New Delhi in early 2004. But, in spite of a sensitive introduction to the volume by the Prince of Wales, the press coverage was disappointing; and although subsequent reviews of the book have been favourable, they have not been as many as I would have wished. In short, the impact of my efforts has been much less than I had hoped for; and this in spite of the almost daily indicators of corruption, corporate malfaisance, and differences among belief systems on the content of the ‘good’ society. It would seem that moral issues do not rate high on the agenda for action of most people. In this respect, I compare the present attitudes to the ethical imperatives of capitalism to those towards climate change 20-30 years ago. And like the latter, I fear that, by the time it is recognized that there are endemic moral challenges to the contemporary global market system, which must be tackled, it will be too late!
      
      I continue to address this issue in my writings and lecturing. For example, in 2000, I contributed a paper to the ‘Moral Response of Capitalism: Can we learn from the Victorians?’ to a symposium organized by Julian Birkinshaw and his colleagues at the London Business School in honour of John Stopford. I also observe that, almost every day, in the popular media, and in the gatherings ranging from the World Economic Forum to the United Nations, and in the interfaith dialogues, the issue of religion in business is aired.”
      

10. EIBA - AIB

    1. The EU at Fifty 

       Danny Van Den Bulcke
       EIBA Chairman

       While a few years ago the relations between AIB and EIBA were somewhat tense, it would seem that everything has returned to normal and that there is a mutual respect from both sides and a willingness to cooperate without affecting the specific charateristics of the organizations. Scholars, who played an important role in EIBA, are increasingly recognized and asked to take up positions of responsibility in AIB. John Cantwell, a former president of EIBA and organizer of the 1992 Reading conference was in charge of the highly successful Milan meeting of AIB, while Torben Pedersen, EIBA ‘s Vice Chairman and organizer of the Copenhagen meeting in 2003, will be responsible for AIB’s San Diego conference in 2009. Yves Doz, who has been elected President of AIB, has been a regular member of EIBA’s Doctoral Tutorial, while Pervez Ghauri, the editor of the International Business Review, which is EIBA’s official journal, will serve as Vice President Administration in the new AIB Board. Although this is not the first time that EIBA scholars have been members of AIB Boards it shows that interaction between the two academies can be beneficial for both sides. All of them should be congratulated with their functions in AIB.
       
       To confirm the good relationship, the EIBA Fellows organized a special panel at the AIB conference in Milan (July 2008), about the European Union at Fifty. With so many IB scholars coming to Europe, it was thought to be appropriate to evaluate the European Union in the area of FDI and MNEs, on the occasion of its 50th anniversary. Vitor Corado Simoes wrote the following personal account of this panel session. 
       

       THE EUROPEAN UNION AT FIFTY

       Vitor Corado Simões
       ISEG – Instituto Superior de Economia e Gestã
       Technical University of Lisbon

       On the 2nd of July 2008, the EIBA Fellows held a panel at the AIB Annual Conference, at Bocconi University in Milan. The panel was organised by Danny Van Den Bulcke, under the following title: ‘The European Union at Fifty – Foreign Direct Investment in the European Union: Achievements, Challenges and Corporate Responses’.

       The panelists included Danny Van Den Bulcke (University of Antwerp), who chaired, John Dunning (Rutgers and Reading Universities), Juán José Durán (Autonomous University of Madrid), Marjan Svetliæiæ (University of Ljubljana), and the author of this article. It was a lively session, providing diverse perspectives about the European Union and direct investment flows. As John Dunning put it, there has been a changing interaction between the evolving economic integration in Europe and inward and outward direct investment.
        
       The quality of the presentations notwithstanding, my idea now is not to report on the panel, but rather to profit from this opportunity to share with the EIBA community the headlines of my presentation. I think, in fact, that Europe is facing very hard challenges in an increasingly globalised and East-bound World.
        
       In spite of its achievements, the European Union, and the West as a whole, is losing steam. The world is changing. As a result of globalisation, the centre of gravity of the world economy is moving towards Asia. Europe is ‘greying’ and has been unable to turn nice ideas into reality. The United States are facing the consequences of an ‘imperialist’ dream (in the sense used by Eric Hobsbawm), together with an increasing debt, a financial turmoil, and an uncertain future. Asia is therefore becoming the most dynamic space in the World.

       Statistics show that the economic performance of Asian economies has been, throughout the present decade, much above those recorded by Western countries. Even European enlargement has not been enough to bring about a significant acceleration in European economic growth. There are, of course, question marks regarding China’s contradiction between an increasing economic openness and a non-democratic political régime. India also shows some weanesses, ranging from the management of change to the co-existence of  sharp economic and social contrasts between ‘peaks’ and ‘valleys’, to use Florida’s words. It is out of queston, however, that Asia has a huge and vibrant market as well as a large pool of  highly skilled, hard working, committed, and talented people, with an enormous ambition.

       The president of Siemens recently defined the strengthening of the “global diversity” of Siemens top management as a key priority for the company. In a ‘shrinking’ and ‘fast-running’ World, one cannot expect the West to remain at the centre forever. Being aware of this fact is essential for Europe to design and implement a consistent policy to respond the challenges raised by a new economic landscape. Such a policy should not follow a defensive stance. It has to be based on a firm commitment to ‘embrace the World’, by building bridges and fostering mutually profitable interactions. Responding the challenges raised by a changing world is a must to build our collective future.
       

11. Various

    1. Conference Ethics: A Letter from Peter Buckley 

       Danny Van Den Bulcke
       EIBA Chairman

       The mail below was forwarded by Peter Buckley to Grazia Santangelo, Torben Pedersen and myself shortly after the conference in Catania (December 19, 2008). It was discussed during the Board’s Spring meeting in Tallinn last May, where the described behaviour was condemned as unaceptable. It was decided to ask Peter Buckley’s approval to publish his mail in EIBA-zine, without mentioning the names of the ‘perpetrators’. Together with the Board, I subscribe to Torben Pedersen’s comments that he hopes ‘that this is not reflecting a tendency that younger EIBA participants see themselves more as customers shopping around in the intellectual supermarket instead of members of the intellectual community with a desire and wish to push our knowledge further. It would be good to work with an un-negotiable requirement reminding people of their obligation to participate in the intellectual debate and sit through other peoples presentations even when they would rather wish they were somewhere else.’
       
       “I am writing to the Chair and Vice Chair of EIBA and the President 2007 in order to express my extreme displeasure at the behaviour of a couple of participants in EIBA 2007. In Session H: 2W. MNE Strategies and Linkages at 16:00 – 17:30 (parallel sessions 5) I was present whilst my doctoral student Elizabeth Wang gave a paper. This was followed by a paper given by Celeste Amorim Varum and then by a paper by xxxx and xxxx from a Swedish University and xxxx of an Italian University. Our paper and the paper by Celeste were given to the session without the participation of xxxx and xxxx. Both of them then turned up and gave their paper without bestowing their presence on either of the two earlier papers. I said the following at the end of their presentation “I consider it to be an extreme discourtesy to the other presenters, the audience and particularly to the Chair of this session that you didn’t see fit to attend the first two presentations. We have paid you the courtesy of listening to your presentation and it is a great shame that you did not see fit to pay us the courtesy of listening to our papers”. One of them then muttered something about this being the fault of the organisers because he wished to be in the panel session running parallel to our session. I consider that this behaviour simply cannot be tolerated. The whole system of conferences is based on the fact that we have to go to sessions when we would prefer to be in other parallel sessions. This must happen to every participant in every conference with parallel sessions. Not to attend other presentations in the same session in which a participant is giving a paper is not only extremely discourteous, but would destroy the system of conferences as currently arranged. I should add that the Chair of the session was completely blameless in this, as she attempted to encourage xxxx and xxxx in the strongest possible terms to attend. I consider it to be an extreme discourtesy to the Chair of the session to behave in this way.
       
       There is little that can be done to proscribe this type of behaviour if academics are as antisocial as these two appear to be. However, maybe an un-negotiable requirement can be put in next year’s (and future years) programmes reminding people of their obligations to sit through other people’s presentations even when they would rather wish they were somewhere else.
       
       (I was informed that a similar thing had happened in another session where a doctoral student gave the paper first and then walked out of the session. As this is hearsay I cannot take it any further, but may be you would wish to follow this up too.)”
       
       Best wishes.
       
       Yours sincerely,
       
       Peter
       
       Peter J Buckley
       Centre for International Business
       University of Leeds (CIBUL)
       

    2. Golden Pen Award for Sylvie Hertrich and Ulrike Mayrhofer 

       Sylvie HERTRICH (Ecole de Management Strasbourg, Robert Schuman University) and Ulrike MAYRHOFER (IAE Lyon, Jean Moulin University and ESC Rouen) have received the Golden Pen of the French Chamber of Commerce and Industry for their case-study: "Adidas: la femme est l'avenir du sport". This prestigious award is given to authors whose case studies are used by an important number of Business Schools and Universities. The case-studies have been published at the Centrale de Cas et de Médias Pédagogiques, CCMP (http://www.ccip.fr/ccmp).

       Sylvie Hertrich and Ulrike Mayrhofer have developed a rich expertise in the field of marketing case-studies: they have written twenty case-studies, prepared in collaboration with companies like Adidas, Audi (Volkswagen), Club Méditerranée, Eurodisney (Disneyland Resort Paris), Hilton, Parc Astérix (Compagnie des Alpes). More than 38.000 students have been working on their case-studies. Following their success, the two authors are currently preparing a book on marketing case-studies (Editions Management & Société, 2008).
       

    3. A Picture Souvenir from the 3rd EIBA Conference in Uppsala, 1977 

       Who is who?
       
       
       
       Only the following participants have been identified:
       
       1st  row:  John Dunning, Gunnar Mattson, Birgitta Swedenborg, …
       2nd row:  Gerry Van Dyck, Sylvain Plasschaert, Erik Hörnell, Peter Sanden, …
       3rd row:  Peter Walters, Pal Korsvold, Björn Wootz, Mats Forsgren, …
       4th row:  Hans Günther Meissner, Reijo Luostarinen, …
       5th row:  Barto Roig, …
       6th row:  Peter Buckley, Eleonor Morgan, Poul Schultz, Deo Sharma, …
       7th row:  Gunnar Hedlund, …
       
       Further down: …