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This paper attempts to explain why internationalization processes to China are growing despite the significant difficulties that foreign direct investments into China encounter. The answer to this question can be found in the processes of decision-making on internationalization at the company level and how these affect management practices in Chinese subsidiaries. The argument I put forward in this paper is that for the small and medium-sized enterprises the study focuses on, the decisions concerning investment in China are mainly the product of structural and legitimation pressure. Structural pressure can encourage cognitive mechanisms and behavioral consequences similar to those occurring when individuals (and organizations) cope with threat. Legitimation pressure can foster wishful thinking, which pushes actors to believe that desired options are good despite evidence to the contrary. These pressures have an impact on how well companies are prepared when they internationalize and can particularly affect some crucial management practices, leading to inefficiencies and problems in subsidiaries.

The paper examines the role of discourse in supporting firm's decisions to relocate and how main actors influence such discourse. If there is uncertainty about the general functioning of the economy, discourse is the place where ideas and paradigms, and possible options of behavior, are created. Since interests are not given a priori but are socially constructed, discourse contributes to their definition by selecting, amplifying and legitimizing arguments and causal relationships between the functioning of the market and individual behavior. Some surveys of German companies show that while relocation is increasing, the advantages for firms are less clear than expected. The main argument of the paper is that the public debate in German newspapers and the business press since the 1990s could have influenced the processes of decision-making over relocation by amplifying the disadvantages of remaining in Germany and neglecting the conflicts and additional costs arising for companies by relocating their production activities.

Looking back over the two decades since German unification, the main questions I want to answer are to what extent and through what mechanisms the transfer of the system of industrial relations and vocational training—two cornerstones of the West German model—has occurred in eastern Germany. The literature argues that institutional transfer very often leads to a process of hybridization in institutions. However, the concept of hybridization has also been criticized as being mainly descriptive and vague about the actual mechanisms of hybridization. In this paper I argue that these mechanisms should be specified further and suggest that the hybridization approach can be fruitfully linked to recent theories of institutional change. As far as the transfer of industrial relations and vocational training from western to eastern Germany is concerned, I argue in particular that hybridization has mainly occurred through what institutional literature has recently defined as the mechanism of conversion.

This paper attempts to explain why internationalization processes to China are growing despite the significant difficulties that foreign direct investments into China encounter. The answer to this question can be found in the processes of decision-making on internationalization at the company level and how these affect management practices in Chinese subsidiaries. The argument I put forward in this paper is that for the small and medium-sized enterprises the study focuses on, the decisions concerning investment in China are mainly the product of structural and legitimation pressure. Structural pressure can encourage cognitive mechanisms and behavioral consequences similar to those occurring when individuals (and organizations) cope with threat. Legitimation pressure can foster wishful thinking, which pushes actors to believe that desired options are good despite evidence to the contrary. These pressures have an impact on how well companies are prepared when they internationalize and can particularly affect some crucial management practices, leading to inefficiencies and problems in subsidiaries. ; Warum steigt die Anzahl der Unternehmensverlagerungen nach China, obwohl westliche Unternehmen dort auf große Schwierigkeiten treffen? Aufschluss darüber können unternehmerische Entscheidungsprozesse geben, die der Unternehmensverlagerung zugrunde liegen, und deren Auswirkungen auf Geschäftsführungspraktiken in den chinesischen Niederlassungen. Ich argumentiere, dass mittelständische Unternehmen, auf die sich das Interesse dieser Studie richtet, sich vor allem wegen struktureller Zwänge und eines hohen Legitimierungsdrucks zu einer Investition in China entscheiden. Strukturelle Zwänge können kognitive Mechanismen auslösen und Verhaltensweisen hervorrufen, die mit Reaktionen von Individuen (und Organisationen) auf eine Bedrohung vergleichbar sind. Legitimierungsdruck kann Wunschdenken fördern und Akteure dazu bringen zu glauben, die gewünschten Optionen seien gut, obwohl Beweise für das Gegenteil vorliegen. Diese Zwänge haben somit einen Einfluss darauf, wie gut Unternehmen auf eine Internationalisierung vorbereitet sind, und können wichtige unternehmerische Maßnahmen entscheidend beeinträchtigen. Dies führt in der Folge zu Ineffizienz und Problemen in den Niederlassungen.

Institutional actors at the regional or local level increasingly see the development of the creative industry sector as a means of improving local competitiveness. However, research on relations between institutions and local development barely considers the interaction between policies and a sectoral logic of work organization and labor-market functioning. On the basis of qualitative research on the locally clustered media sector in Cologne, Germany, we argue that a sectoral logic which relies strongly on the use of networks can hinder or 'convert', the course of policies aimed at improving the skill supply, and thereby produce unintended effects.

"Das Paper beschäftigt sich mit der Rolle des Diskurses und dessen Hauptprotagonisten bei der Förderung von Entscheidungen über Betriebsverlagerungen. Wenn die Wirtschaftsbedingungen ungewiss sind, ist der Diskurs ein 'Ort', an dem Ideen und Paradigmen sowie mögliche Handlungsoptionen 'kreiert' werden. Da Interessen nicht als gegeben angenommen werden können, sondern vielmehr als 'sozial konstruiert' betrachtet werden sollten, trägt der Diskurs zur Definition der Interessen von Akteuren bei, indem er Argumente und Kausalbeziehungen zwischen dem Funktionieren des Marktes und dem individuellen Handeln auswählt, verstärkt bzw. legitimiert. Einige Umfragen in deutschen Unternehmen zeigen, dass die Vorteile für Firmen nicht so eindeutig sind, obwohl die Anzahl der Produktionsverlagerungen wächst. Das Paper argumentiert, dass die öffentliche Debatte in deutschen Zeitungen und Businessmagazinen seit den 1990er-Jahren die Entscheidungsprozesse über Produktionsverlagerungen beeinflusst haben könnte, indem die Nachteile der Produktion in Deutschland stark betont sowie potenzielle Konflikte und zusätzliche Kosten ausgeblendet wurden, die für die Firmen bei der Produktionsverlagerung zusätzlich entstehen." (Autorenreferat)