| Summary: | 碩士 === 國立政治大學 === 亞太研究英語碩士學位學程(IMAS) === 103 === Over the last few years, Foxconn has started to gain massive international attention, however influenced by the high rate of suicides that afflicted plants in Mainland China, scholars focused the most on the labor condition of Foxconn workers, pushing the company’s very interesting business expansion, diversion and relocation into the background. This paper will focus on these processes in the context of China’s economic development of the past forty years.
A growing literature about the latest developments of the Chinese economy adopts the flying geese model to describe the phenomenon of factory relocation that is taking place within the Chinese national borders. Foxconn is also part of the process. For this reason this work will also join in the scholar debate about the flying geese, making clear that the model falls short in explaining some aspects of this phenomenon. A detailed description of China spatial development, that is the gradual development of different regions brought about the launch of national and local policies, will make up for the shortcomings.
Results show that investments were often taken according to the relative comparative advantage of regions in their respective stage of development, however in some cases China’s governmental policies changed the country’s comparative advantage dynamics, and investments’ driving forces were therefore in contrast with Akamatsu’s precepts. An analysis of Foxconn direct and indirect investments shows that the company has mirrored the growth of China, and evolved simultaneously in two different ways: geographically speaking they have moved investments from the Chinese coast to the central regions, and further to South East Asia, US and Europe; while at the same time expanding production into a more diverse and advanced set of products.
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