[ONLINE EVENT] SMU Tower Center – China and the Japanese Multinational: Politics and the Risks of Doing Business

Co-presented by the Japan-America Society of Dallas/Fort Worth and the Sun & Star Program on Japan and East Asia at SMU’s Tower Center for Public Policy and International Studies.

In the context of a changing balance of regional power and economic interdependence between Japan and China, this talk will examine how Japanese multinational companies try to minimize damages and manage their own fear and uncertainty to sustain their overseas business interests. Professor Vekasi will discuss which kinds go businesses get targeted in the aftermath of political disputes, which escape unscathed, and how the targeted businesses try to manage political risks. The risk management strategies reveal private sector diplomacy in China when firms use their voice, and a transformation of regional distribution of trade networks when they choose to exit.

About the Speaker

Kristin Vekasi is an Associate Professor in the Department of Political Science and School of Policy and International Affairs at the University of Maine. Her research interests focus on international political economy, and the dynamics of political conflict, foreign direct investment, and nationalism. She specializes in Northeast Asia, and has spent years conducting research in both China and Japan. Her book Risk Management Strategies of Japanese Companies in China: Political Crisis and Multinational Firms (Routledge 2019) analyzes the political risk mitigation strategies of Japanese multinational corporations in China. Professor Vekasi received her PhD in political science from the University of Wisconsin, Madison in 2014. Prior to joining the faculty at University of Maine, she taught at New College of Florida, was a visiting Research Fellow at the University of Tokyo and a Fulbright Fellow at Tohoku University.

Co-presented with