ABSTRACT
The aim of this book is to provide a benchmark review of inward investment in Britain in the late 1980s. The timing is appropriate in a number of ways. The country has experienced nearly a decade of the Thatcher experiment, increasingly affecting inward investment through events such as the 'Big Bang', 1 and yet the UK economy has shown only limited improvement. It is pertinent to ask: 'what part, if any, can foreign multinationals play in the restoration of British competitiveness and the regeneration of the British economy?' The international business environment within which inward investment is taking place has, moreover, changed very radically. While subject to much hype, from industrialists themselves (witness the 'world car'2) as well as from journalists and academics, it is still true that competition has become increasingly international, even global in scale, and this process may extend to a wider range of manufacturing and service sectors in the years to come. The role of the subsidiaries of multinationals in Britain within this global competitive framework needs to be considered and questioned, as indeed does the relevance of 'national' industrial policy. Ten years ago, two of the present authors wrote that the failure of the government's attempt to rescue Chrysler UK was due to a 'lack of understanding of the operations of multinational enterprises';3 is the suggestion still not true in relation to British MNE policies?
