Winners and Losers — The Crisis Strategies of Diaspora Chinese Capitalism

Over the last quarter of the twentieth century, Chinese diaspora capitalism has emerged as a distinctive and significant current in world capitalism. With some time lag, it has been increasingly described and theorized, despite the opacity of its ownership structures and business practices and its lack of visibility in nationally collected statistics. The features that have distinguished it from the mainstream of Western or Japanese forms of capitalism have, arguably, been more of degree than of kind, more a case of the greater frequency and legitimacy of certain attributes than a contrast of presence and absence. Nonetheless, in combination they add up to a characteristic business culture and mode of operation, with its own needs, strengths and weaknesses. ¹