ABSTRACT
This chapter highlights the poles of global and local and standardization/adaptation in international marketing and calls for a focus on the specific interaction between a local context and global forces while forming a glocalization strategy. It argues that emergent market companies have the potential to successfully compete with transnational giants by developing brands that help consumers to bridge various sociocultural tensions in their daily lives. Firms have been grappling with the trials and tribulations of global standardization, local adaptation, and recently, glocalization. Standardization operates “as if the world was one large market”. The opponents of standardization point to the persistent differences in cultural, political, legal, and economic environments worldwide; and hence, advocate the adaptation of the marketing mix to suit local market conditions and characteristics.
