27:T532,

This paper examines the emergence of business groups in Israel and South Korea. The paper questions how, in very different institutional contexts, similar economic organizations emerged. In contrast to the political, cultural and market perspectives, the comparative institutional analysis adopted in this research suggests that one factor alone could not explain the emergence of business groups. In Israel and South Korea, business groups emerged during the 1960s and 1970s, and there are common factors underlying their formation: state-society relations, the roles and beliefs of the elites, and the relative absence of multinational corporations in the economy. To a large extent, the chaebol are the result of an intended creation of the South Korean state, whereas the Israeli business groups are the outcome of state policies in the economic realm. In both countries, the state elite held a developmental ideology, did not rely on market forces for economic development, and had a desire for greater economic and military self-sufficiency. In addition, both states were recipients of large grants and loans from other countries, which made them less dependent on direct foreign investments. As a result, the emerging groups were protected from the intense competition of multinational corporations.

28:T4b7,

A stream of research has focused on the ownership shares that partner companies take in international joint ventures [IJVs] and the leverage this may provide for control and performance. This research has normally adopted a `variance' approach, which examines `independent' variables as potential predictors of the focal phenomenon. The variance approach has yielded reasonably consistent results for the relationship between IJV ownership and control, but not in respect of performance. In searching for the optimum predictive model for whole samples, the variance approach risks overlooking inter-case nuances that may result from somewhat different configurations of variables. An alternative approach seeks to explore how and why variables configure together in different combinations.

This paper draws on a study of 20 Sino-UK IJVs and their parent companies. It proceeds from a conventional variance analysis to identify different IV configurations. These configurations can be understood in the light of each IV's formative context, and they relate to performance in different ways. Propositions deriving from the study are offered as guidelines for further research.

29:T410,

The emergence of the idea that organizations are like organisms is generally seen as having saved organization studies (OS) from its mechanistic precepts. We argue that it has not. Rather, the mechanistic underpinnings of organization merely found a new medium of expression in the organism metaphor. This is largely due to the particular legacy that first informed so-called organic thinking about organizations in the 20th century. This essai investigates the history of the words organization and organism and asks how it became possible for one to be used as a metaphor for the other. Then it examines the way that the organism was brought into the fold of organization so as to reinforce the Modernist and mechanistic underpinnings of the field. We conclude that if the mechanistic ghost in the organism is to be exorcised, OS needs to recognize and rethink these underlying premises. Towards this end, we offer two alternative ways of thinking organization via the organism: one pre-Modern and one post-Modern.

2a:T14e4,