Thursday, October 23, 2014

East Asia regional production network

Since 1990s, with the development of the international economic globalization, the international division of labor pattern has been deeply transformed from the initial inter-industry to intra-industry. Such intra-product division of labor production mode makes the productive process of the same final product split into several links,which shall be produced dispersively in the most efficient countries or areas with the lowest cost in accordance with the comparative advantages of every country.

The international production network initially permeated into East Asia in 1960s, and the USA semiconductor company and Texas company built the assembly shop in Singapore.In the late 1970s, the multinational corporation with the production equipments in Singapore began to configure the final processing and assembly link in the neighboring countries especially in Malaysia, Philippines and Thailand. A number of multinational corporations began to setup the production base in these countries. Singapore became the regional center for designing and assembling the components, as well as the total service sector for producing the configuration in the neighboring countries. In recent years, as the global production center for the components, the occurrence of China has reinforced the the inter linkage of the country in the aspect of the international production chain, and the success in the exporting of manufacturing industry in China has obviously relied on the importing of the components and parts from the countries in East Asia and Southeast Asia. This regional network is a social network,  since this kind of network requir trust.

Just as Fukunari Kimura (2010) pointedout, the development of East Asia free trade area promoted the liberalization of the trade and investment, and further promoted the development of the regional production network. Due to this open market,dependency reduced through alternative resource.

As far as I can see, the constraints of this network is that in which way could the incentive measures be adopted to attract the medium-sized and small enterprises to join the regional production network, so as to enhance the operating efficiency of the overall East Asia regional production network.

Wednesday, October 15, 2014

legitimacy in NOKIA case

In an increasingly globalized economy, more corporations are 'outsourcing' their production to countries with cheaper labor costs and less legal protection of workers' rights. Some corporate managers, whether out of sincere moral concern or because they must respond to the considerations of investors and shareholders, are attempting to balance profit-making with social morality.

A DECENT FACTORY focuses on such an effort by Nokia, the Finnish electronics firm, which sends a team led by two business ethics advisors to examine conditions at a Chinese factory that supplies parts to Nokia. During their tour the Nokia team investigates working and safety conditions, payroll records, and potential environmental hazards. They also have interviews with the factory managers as well as several young Chinese female employees.

Q1. Analyze how the two key organizations in this case (Nokia and the supplier) are striving for legitimacy.
The extent to which the activities of a firm ‘are desirable, proper, or appropriate within some socially constructed system of norms, values, beliefs, and definitions’ (Suchman 1995)
Obviously, Nokia and Chinese supplier come from two totally different backgrounds.
Nokia is striving for legitimacy by making an assessment of their supplier in China. Nokia wants to make sure that not only the company itself works in a legitimacy circumstance, but also their part suppliers. The Nokia wants to know not only whether their employees being paid at least the legal minimum wage, but also how long they have to work every day and the condition of their dorms and workshops. The Nokia wants to know whether their Chinese supplier meets the legitimacy standards or not.
However the Chinese supplier is in a developing country. What they do to strive for legitimacy is paying the minimum wage to employees but hold back certain amount of money for dorms and food. Also no contacts signed. It’s not only because of lack of a legal consciousness, but also they are satisfied with what they get from the company. In China, a factory in such condition is better than most other factories. Can you imagine places where the employees come from is even worse?
Apparently it can’t meet Nokia’s expectation.

Q2. Is the approach taken by Nokia an effective way of diffusing sustainability criteria?

What Nokia did may have little effect. Because I believe that force can not help to this situation.

In my opinion, I suggest that Nokia should try to understand how this situation came up. And why the Chinese supplier does in such ‘illegitimacy ’ way.

Also, I believe that communication will help. The Nokia’s team could listen to some of the employees’ requirements. Not only do Nokia need to ask questions that Nokia really care about, but also it should to care what supplier cares about.

I think this will be more efficiently.
Q3. How could another coordination mechanism improve on this?

There are 3 ways that we learned from class,which are coercive pressure, mimicry and normative pressure.

In this case, I think normative pressure would help. Because if supplier does not lead to the desired effect, external control should be needed. And this control, in my opinion, had better from the government. Because in China, legislation is convincing. If supplier doesn’t obey the law, it would face severe punishment by Chinese government.




feedbacks

Assignment1:
feedback for Koen koenjjkuipers.wordpress.com
as for the ‘correlation between per capita income and the adoption of good climate policies. i do agree with you. i think in developed countries, people there have rich resources. but in some parts of developing cuntries ,they even don’t have enough food and water, how could they care about environmental problems? so i think developing countries should develope their economy first.
‘business of business ‘ i agree that a business intentions are primarily focused on the profit-making process. and i think the core part of business is gain profits.
feedbacks for Weiwen https://weiwenzhong.wordpress.com/
well, i am really interested in your question. if a man is stuck in a isolated island, he has to consider about how long it will take before being rescued.if it only take several hours, i believe that eating the hen is a wise idea. But if the situation is like Robinson of Robinson Crusoe, i think he’d better feed the only hen he has and wait for chickens hatched from eggs. In my opinion, this is also suitable for energy resources, if just focused on the present, it’s okay to ride a fuel motor. However if you focused on the long term, i think electricity is more eco-friendlier than fuel. I think that is also the reason why traditional gasoline or diesel petrol is replaced by blended fuel for buses in China.
&
i agree with your opinion. but i think the core part of business is increase its profits. wihtout increasing profits, how can those businessmen care about other things like charity? if their companies cant gain profits, i think they wouldn’t like to reach a tradeoff that benefits the whole.
Assignment 2.
feedbacks for Elke http://anieperspective.wordpress.com/
DEVELOPMENT TOWARDS MY POSITION ON THE FRIEDMAN PROPOSITION
I really agree with opinion, especially ‘the concept of profit will no longer be divided from people and planet but a form a strong coalition’.I agreed with Friedman‘s words from very beginning, but then after I read some articles, I found that the meaning of profits should keep pace with the times.I think your opinion is not much different from mine. however, as for your last paragraph, I think it will be powerful if you have a detailed explanation about ‘The government has its role to play and guide companies even if they do not embed these factors into their vision’.
best,
cenyang
RATIONAL DECISION-MAKING AND BOUNDED RATIONAILITY
hi Elke,
First of all, you have a very specific explanation about Rational decision-making, Rational Actor Model and bounded rationality. And I think your structure is very clear. It's easy for me to read and understand your opinion. 
In my opinion, the nuclear resource itself is controversial. I believe that it's impossible to make a 100% guarantee for the safety of those people who live aroud nuclear power plants. for those people, if some accidents happen, it is irreversible.
It's a nice post.
best,
Cenyang
Assignment3.
feedback for Jason http://sspm-ie.blogspot.nl/
hi Jason,
I think your view is unique. Your blog make me clear headed. What I struggled about before is the priority of making profits and sustanability. I used to consider that companies should increase profits first so that they would have abilities to make a contribution to sustainability. I never noticed that both of them could be achieved at the same time. thanks for your post.
In your post, the profits are long term profits. but what about the short one? Actually, improvident companies exist indeed. These companies could roil the market. It's not that easy to keep a balanced between supply and demand.
thaks again for your post. I really like it.
best
cenyang

feedback for Kjell kwansleeben.wordpress.com

hi kjell,
Thanks for your post.
I think your post is in a distinct frame, so that it’s really easy for me to understand what’s your post taliking about. And you also have a very detailed introduction about SES and the Great Barrier Reef.
However, in my opinion the framework which Ostrom constructed is not well applied. I think it would be better if you stretched your last paragraph with your opinion, like in which way would governance systems play a more important role in Ostrom’s framework.
best,
Cenyang



Assignment 4.

Feedback for Stephany



Overall I think your Nokia blog is well structured. Nice to start with the definition of legitimacy.

Maybe there are other mechanisms that can help? Such as governance?



Feedback for Anne



I think the blog overall is very well written and interesting.

I do not agree with the fact that the strategy of Nokia would have been more effective if they sent male investigators.

I think it might be better to detail more which coordination mechanism or a combination of some of them should be involved such as: self organization, self governance.



Assignment 5.

there is no blog for this week on http:\\bobindustrial.wordpress.com



Feedback for Hans



I don’t have anything to add.

I think your blog is well structured and easy to read. You made a clearly explanation on Resource dependency, the network ,Resource networks etc.

I think it could be better if you have a general introduction of The Kalundborg Eco industrial park at the beginning of your blog.

Thanks for your blog.



Assignment 6.



there is no blog for this week on http://iektkj.wordpress.com/

there is no blog for this week onhttps://sspmblog.wordpress.com/





Assignment 7

there is no blog for this week on http://iezejun.wordpress.com/

there is no blog for this week on http://michaeloconnorindustrialecology.blogspot.nl/



Assignment 8

there is no blog for this week on http://sairamiroslava.wordpress.com/



Feedback for Nicole

Thanks for your post.

Reading through the rules you designed for the car game made me feel I really want to try it out now and see how it works! I think the game you developed is very interesting and also very executable.





Assignment 9

there is no blog for this week on http://suchasocialsystem.wordpress.com/

there is no blog for this week on http://silverliningsspm.blogspot.nl/





Assignment 10

there is no blog for this week on http://dicapojura.blogspot.nl/

there is no blog for this week on http://thesocialsideofie.blogspot.nl/ 

Monday, October 6, 2014

decisionmaking in site selection

Choose a newsitem about an event in which the actions of a firm or governmental agency play a crucial role. 

Write a plausible account of how these actions might be the result of rational decisionmaking.

Write an alternative, equally plausible account, showing how these actions might result from a boundedly rational organization (à la Jones 2003).
Rational decision-making is a systematic approach that is reliant on obtaining sufficient data through observations and mathematical/statistical analysis or modeling in order to formulate long-term decisions.A Rational Actor Model is such a way that the action is optimal, the beliefs are supported by evidence, and where the evidence is a result from optimal investment in information gathering. And bounded rationality can be difined as individuals that are known to formulate decisions in such a way that it systematically differs from the RAM. A more realistic approach is required that builds on the insights of cognitive science. Jones (1999) difined that at an organisational level, optimal rational decisions are limited by organisational rules, agenda setting, as well as parallel and serial processing.
during my undergraduate study, I learnt something about site selection in my logistics course.I believe that site selection has a very close relationship with boundedly rational decisionmaking. I'd like to introduce the site selection of  university town as an example. university town is a district with several universities in city or suburban area. it's very common to have a university town in big cities of China, such as xi'an an wuhan. in Xi'an the site of university town is located in the southern suburbans which is quite far from the city center.

rational decisionmaking:
There are lots of factors should be taken into consideration when selecting a site of universities, such as environment, transportation convenience,the educational attenment of surrounding residents etc.
in Rational decisionmaking, you need to choose several sites as alternates. and you should rank the importance level of the factors too. then you should evaluate each factor of each site with AEIOU(A means the most relative one). fianlly the site with highest score is the place for university town.

boundedly rational decisionmaking:
Bounded rationality is due to limited by the information they have, the cognitive limitations of their minds, and the finite amount of time they have to make a decision. in this case, the agency may lack of information about which idle land is available. and not all the requirement could be met.so the place they finally chose is in the southern suburbans which is not so convenient for a good weekend but is a good place for study.



Sunday, October 5, 2014

the primary goal but not for profit only

(Write down how materials provided and collected have led you to develop your position on the Friedman-proposition)

the business of business is to increase its profits.the sentence itself is absolutely correct. however increasing profits is not the only purpose of business.in other words, it's just the primary goal. nowadays, with the development of the times, people will focus more on eco.

in the movie 'not business as usual',R.Edward freeman said 'he(friedman) would understand that the only way to create value for shareholders in today's world is to pay attention to customers suppliers employees communities and the shareholders at the same time.’it clearly shows that the times are different, nowadays industrial chains and roles in industrial chains are closely tied up.the producers used to produce products without knowing where the materials come from. it's really Irresponsible. however the producers today should know how the materials come out.they are also aware of whether it would produce pollution or not and dealing with these pollution

according to what Friedman said 'The Social Responsibility of Business is to Increase its Profits', the way of producing would not satisfied 'increase profits'. because it's obviously increasing the cost of products.this makes the products be sold in a higher price than before. and this will affect sales and finally decrease its profits.

if Friedman's words are totally right, why are people involved in that?obviously,with the improvement of people’s living standard, more attention is paid on the quility of life and protecting our environment.

so i think in 1970s, Friedman's view was reasonable. even today, i still support Friedman's view, but not totally. i think we should add social responsibility in.
'only people have responsibilities, but business as a whole cannot be said to have responsibilities ' the business is human's business.so i think we need more businessmem with responsibilities.