ABSTRACT
Starting from an economics perspective, it ventures into business policy, marketing, political economy, economic geography and general management, and successfully integrates a great deal of otherwise disparate knowledge. Hong Kong began its existence as a colonial trading outpost and grew into a significant entrepot for trade in and out of China, until the Second World War and the subsequent defeat of the Kuomintang by Communist forces led to the effective sealing off of China from world trade and commerce. A study of Hong Kong’s two leading manufacturing industries, garments and electronics, reveals interesting differences in their modes of adjustment to the forces affecting the economy since 1980. The overwhelming impression is that the garment industry has adopted a strategy of reliance on the transaction cost efficiency of the dense and highly developed subcontracting network, plus the attraction to buyers of a very high speed of response to changes in demand.
