THE SELF-PRESERVATION PERSPECTIVE OF MNES IN TRANSNATIONAL SOCIAL SPACES: A NEW THEORETICAL LENS FOR ANALYZING ANTI-SOCIETAL FIRM BEHAVIOR

Stephen R. Buzdugan, David Freund, Mats Forsgren and Ulf Holm

No m87se_v1, SocArXiv from Center for Open Science

Abstract: This article unveils a new way of theorizing the multinational enterprise (MNE) to explain why it may engage in ‘anti-societal’ behavior – i.e. behavior that may systematically lead to negative societal outcomes, such as environmental degradation, poor working conditions, or antitrust violations. Our new ‘self-preservation perspective’ of the MNE holds that MNEs exert their relative political power to protect their market position, assets, and strategic advantages from political and economic threats. In doing so, negative societal outcomes can result, not as anomalies but rather a structural phenomenon rooted in the firm’s intrinsic drive for survival. Drawing on insights from institutional economics and international relations theory, we argue that self-preservation behavior is more fundamental than profit-maximization behavior, which has long been assumed to be the primary motive of MNEs. We shed new light on why MNEs engage with transnational social spaces through an illustrative case of Tesla's anti-union activities in Sweden. We observe how self-preservation has influenced Tesla’s resistance to signing collective bargaining agreements in Sweden and has led to the emergence of a self-interested transnational regulatory community that deteriorates labor rights. Thus, we posit that the self-preservation perspective offers a powerful complement to existing international business theory by providing a critical analytical lens on the societal role of MNEs in the context of the ‘grand challenges’. This alternative perspective challenges conventional narratives of MNE behavior as primarily cost-efficient, value-creating or innovative, and demonstrates that MNE anti-societal behavior is structural rather than isolated to a few individual cases.

Date: 2025-06-27
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://osf.io/download/685c1830b9365c1d44d162e6/

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:osf:socarx:m87se_v1

DOI: 10.31219/osf.io/m87se_v1

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in SocArXiv from Center for Open Science
Bibliographic data for series maintained by OSF ().