The Selected Essays of John H. Dunning

Book excerpt: These volumes should be required reading for anyone with an interest in international business and globalisation. They add immeasurably to our understanding. Mira Wilkins, Business History Dunning is one of the most prominent researchers and thinkers in the IB field. In these books, he has set out his most celebrated writings and has provided us relatively easy access to widely scattered references in the literature. Rajat Kathuria, Global Business Review The modern academic study of the multinational enterprise started with John Dunning s pioneering study of American Investment in British Manufacturing Industry in 1958. In the early 1970s he began to publish an influential and authoritative stream of papers integrating theoretical and empirical analysis of the multinational enterprise. This fascinating volume charts the evolution of John Dunning s thinking, highlighting his attempts to develop a richer, more dynamic and historical framework for the analysis of the multinational enterprise. It makes compelling reading, and offers unique insights into the intellectual development of his well-known eclectic paradigm of international production. Mark Casson, University of Reading, UK This volume contains a selection of John Dunning s best known and highly acclaimed writings on the theory of international business activity. Spanning more than three decades, the 16 contributions trace the evolution of his thoughts and ideas as an economist, from his first article on the determinants of international production, published in 1973, to his most recent essay on relational assets, networks and global business activity, completed in 2002. Theories and Paradigms of International Business Activity gives particular prominence to the author s much renowned eclectic paradigm, which he first promulgated at a Nobel Symposium on the international allocation of economic activity in 1976. Since then, the author has written over 60 articles, pamphlets and chapters in books which have extended, refined and updated his theorizing on the interface between trade, FDI and MNE activity, in the light of the changing characteristics of the world economy and advances in international business scholarship. This, the first of two volumes of John Dunning s work, is essential reading for all students, scholars and researchers with a special interest in the reasons behind the explosive growth in post-war FDI and the globalization of business activity.