SCOPE: Expertise in International Business and Sustainable Development

The SCOPE centre for international business and sustainable development was founded in 1997 at the Rotterdam School of Management. The prime aim of SCOPE is to document the internationalization strategies of the largest (core) firms in the world. The internationalization strategies of a relatively limited group of around one thousand corporations has shaped the present era of great societal change, also referred to as the new era ‘globalization’. The strategic choice of these corporations have been heralded, but also been criticized in particular because of their multinational operations. Many of these impressions are seriously flawed due to lacking data. Studying the logic, direction and consequences of the internationalization strategies of core companies, thus, can be considered a vital contribution to the understanding of the nature of globalization and its impact on many topics in general and sustainable development in specific. The study of core companies around the world forms the linking pin between the micro-economics of corporate behaviour and the macro-economics of national and global trends in particular in areas such as international trade, foreign direct investment and sustainability.

Method
The internationalization strategies of core companies can be linked to other strategies of firms such as Research and Development, Human Resource Management, out/in-sourcing, environmental strategies, codes of conduct, reporting. SCOPE aims at adding at least six levels of analysis to the national level of analysis that is normally applied to the study of societal change on a comparative – country by country – basis:

• The Multinational Enterprise: how core corporations manage risk and responsibilities across borders

• The International Value Chain: how specific value or commodity chains across borders are influenced by the strategic behaviour of a limited number of core or ‘lead’ companies

• The local level: what is the impact of ‘home’ and ‘host’ companies on local development

• The regional level: what new state configuration at the regional level (such as the European Union, Nafta, Mercosur, Asean) appear and what is their impact on the operations of ‘home’ and ‘host’ corporations (and vice versa).

• The supranational or global level: what is the impact of supranational or international organisations on the operations of multinational enterprises

• The issue level: to what extent can multinational corporations – in interaction with civil society and governments – be considered part of the problem or part of the solution of global issues such as poverty, global warming or human rights’ violations.

Largest Multinationals in the world
The group of core companies documented and studied by SCOPE has increased over the years from the ‘traditional’ multinationals from developed countries to include also a new breed of emerging market multinationals. Since its inception SCOPE compiles together with the United Nations Conference on Trade Aid and Development (UNCTAD) the annual list of the world’s largest so called ‘Transnational Corporations’ (TNCs). These lists are annually published in the World Investment Report and receive wide coverage in the international media, although it is not always clear that the Scope team is jointly responsible for these lists. The source is either referred to as ‘Unctad/Erasmus university database’ or just ‘Unctad’, which in the latter case of course does not hold any reference to the Scope team. This effort has resulted in the annual publication in the World Investment Reports of two widely quoted lists: (1) the world’s top 100 Transnational Corporations (TNCs) and (2) the Top50/100 TNCs from developing countries. Internationalisation is measured by the Transnationality Index (TNI), a weighted measure of the internationalization of sales, employment and assets. The overall ranking is based on the total size of foreign assets. The world’s largest Transnationals generally come from the developed countries in particular Anglo-Saxon and smaller countries. The developing world’s largest TNCs originally were only based in the oil industry, but presently indicate the coming of age of Asia and parts of Latin America as a breeding ground for (future) multinationals. The leading multinationals in the world, generally represent a relatively stable group (as the illustrative table shows), but below the surface major turmoil can be registred. The largest TNCs from developing countries are more international in much earlier phases of their existence than their developed countries’ counterparts. But the illustration also shows that the process of ‘globalization’ is not that clearcut and does not necessarily lead to ever increasing levels of internationalization of leading firms.