| الوصف: |
THERE has been a remarkable growth in the literature on multinational corporations (MNCs) in recent years. Much of this literature has been concerned with what John Dunning (1977) calls the OLI framework, where OLI stands for ownership, location and internalization. First the firm should enjoy an ownership advantage, such as a patent, managerial know-how, special marketing technique and so on. Second, tariffs and taxes should be such that it is profitable for the firm to locate production facilities in different countries rather than in one country. Finally, the firm chooses to internalize international transactions rather than use arm's length contracts. The third aspect, internalization, is now being recognized as the essence of multinational activity across countries. This is what mainly distinguishes direct foreign investment from other types of foreign investment. Buckley and Casson (1976), Casson (1979), McCulloch (1984) and Ethier (1984), among others, have emphasized inernalization as the main characteristic of the MNC phenomenon. However, internalization itself derives from two other aspects. One is the international economics of information. That is to say whether or not a particular international transaction should be internalized depends on the outcome of the exchange of asymmetric information between two agents. The second aspect of internalization, emphasized by Pomery (1984), is the socalled "Principal-Agent Problem." That is, if the other agent is likely to abuse or manipulate the exchange of information, then the firm, possessing some specific knowledge, will have to use its own production facilities rather than enter into an arms-length contract with a foreign licensee. Much of the literature cast in the OLI framework has been partial equilibrium in nature. The notable exceptions have been the work of Markusen (1984), Helpman (1984) and Batra and Ramachandran (1980) and Ethier (1984). In this paper we utilize the ownership aspect of the OLI framework and develop a general equilibrium model of the MNCs operating in LDCs. This emphasis on LDCs is noteworthy because, as is well known, there are significant differences between the behavior of global firms in developed and developing countries. |
