Asymmetric Integration and the Restructuring of Social Relations in Global Firms: Actors, Institutions and Norms

Multinational corporations (MNCs) play a key role in the process of globalization. Through the development of integrated production networks, MNCs can diffuse work practices and new work norms from one site to another, from one country to another and from one region to another. MNC investment strategies are typically used to reward sites that apply these norms, thus reinforcing their bargaining power vis-à-vis local actors. MNCs are thus able to create new sets of norms. They make new rules and diffuse them, irrespective of local and institutional arrangements.