This volume offers a wide-reaching exploration of foreign direct investment and developmental impacts through case studies from Africa, Asia, Latin America and Central Europe, also examining the role of 'new players' such as Chinese, Indian and South African TNCs.

Published in 1999, this text investigates whether FDI caused spill over effects which have led to the economic growth of the ASEAN-5 economies, and if that it so, whether the ASEAN Preferential Trade Agreement (APTA) had a significant effect in attracting FDI to the region. It takes into account the different levels of economic development of the countries under analysis. The results from the structural (static) model suggest that FDI has stimulated economic growth through the human factors followed by technology transfer, international trade, and learning by doing, and that the formation of APTA had a lagged influence on FDI inflows into the advantage of the more developed member countries and the disadvantage of the less developed countries. Those from the multiplier (dynamic) effects analysis demonstrate that whereas the impact is immediate in the more developed, politically stable and foreign investment friendly economies, there is a time lag in those economies which are less developed and more hostile to FDI. The analysis presents an empirical comparison of how the level of economic development affects the interaction of FDI, regionalism and economic growth.

Transnational Corporations, Technology Transfer and Development: A Bibliographic Sourcebook compiles references one can use in studying transnational corporations and related topics. The compilation divides various source materials into eight major themes. The sourcebook presents publications on the development of science and technology; the International Technology Gap and the NIEO; and transnational corporations and technology. The other groups of publications compiled mainly focus on the anatomy of corporate technology transfer; technology transfer and host countries; and sectoral analysis, wherein several case studies are included. The last two sets of reference materials are concerned with technology transfer and the home country and its regulation. This sourcebook will be invaluable to those in need of lists of reference materials on transnational corporations.

This volume surveys current views in the debate about the impact of foreign direct investment on Third World development--on growth, employment, exports, technology, and distribution of income. It examines whether the efforts of less developed countries to attract and control multinational corporations have constituted a serious "distortion" of trade that threatens jobs in the home nations. It provides new studies of foreign investment in agriculture and in the least developed states. It looks at the threat of transmitting environmental pollution. And it analyzes the link between international companies and the "umbrella" of World Bank cofinancing as a mechanism to reduce risk. Finally, it attempts to estimate how much of the "gap" in commercial bank lending might plausibly be filled by direct corporate investment over the next decade.

Western ideas, worldviews, actors, tools, models, and frameworks have long dominated development theory and practice in Africa. The resulting development interventions are too rarely locally rooted, locally driven, or resonant with local context. At the same time, theories and practices from developing countries rarely travel to the Western agencies dominating development, undermining the possibility of a beneficial synergy that could be obtained from the best of both worlds. There are many reasons why the experiences of locally driven development are not communicated back to global development actors, including, but not limited to, the marginal role of Southern voices in global forums. This volume gives a platform to authentic African voices and non-African collaborators, to explore what endogenous development means, how it can be implemented, and how an endogenous development approach can shape local, national and global policies. This book was originally published as a special issue of Development in Practice.

Although Germany has been a major international player in Africa ever since West Germany's readmission to international politics after 1955, surprisingly little has been written about this topic, and even less reliable knowledge has been established. This study poses the need for a review of Germany's relations with the African continent over the past decades. It challenges scholars to fill the factual gaps that characterize the state of research so far. Ulf Engel is associate professor of politics in Africa at the Institute of African Studies, University of Leipzig. Robert Kappel is professor of politics and economics at the Institute of African Studies, University of Leipzig.

This book investigates the relationship that Multinational Corporations form with Local Authorities and governments in West Africa. It argues that informal partnerships at the local level can provide significant socioeconomic benefits to communities and overcome shortfalls in state provision of infrastructure and collective goods and services. Drawing on in-depth case studies in Niger, Ghana and Liberia, the book demonstrates that Decentralized Partnerships benefit from lower transaction costs while maintaining profitability and investment protection, whereas in formal relationships between multinationals and local government, asset specificity and uncertainty are high. By complying with informal rules, which are in many ways just as restrictive as formal rules, Multinational Corporations can adapt and acculturate themselves, become actors of territorial authorities and can get around the incompleteness of the contract that binds them to the state. Reflecting on a range of local projects (educational, infrastructural, health, micro-financial, entrepreneurial), this book provides a rich and detailed assessment of the interactions between Local Authorities and Multinational Firms. The book will be useful to upper-level students and researchers across the fields of economics, business, sociology, anthropology and African studies as well as to development practitioners and regional and international organizations with interest in the functioning of Multinational Corporations in local environments.