The Intertextual Production of International Relations in Mergers and Acquisitions (original) (raw)
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Varieties of National Metonymy in Media Accounts of International Mergers and Acquisitions
Journal of Management Studies, 2011
International mergers and acquisitions (M&As) often invoke national identification and national cultural differences. We argue that metonymy is a central linguistic resource through which national cultural identities and differences are reproduced in media accounts of international M&As. In this paper, we focus on two revealing cases: the acquisition of American IBM Personal Computer Division (PCD) by the Chinese company Lenovo and the acquisition of American Anheuser-Busch (A-B) by the Belgian–Brazilian company InBev. First, we identify the forms, functions, and frequencies of national metonymy in media accounts of these cases. We present a typology that classifies varieties of national metonymy in international M&As. Second, we demonstrate how these metonyms combine with metaphor to generate evocative imagery, engaging wit, and subversive irony. Our findings show that national metonymy contributes to the construction of emotive frames, stereotypes, ideological differences, and threats. Combinations of national metonymy with metaphor also provide powerful means to construct cultural differences. However, combinations of metonymy with wit and irony enable the play on meanings that overturns and resists national and cultural stereotypes. This is the first study to unpack the deployment of metonymy in accounts of international M&As. In doing so, it also opens up new avenues for research into international management and the analysis of tropes in management and organization.
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In this article, the authors explore media coverage of a recent acquisition across national borders. Their starting point is that the media represent a key arena of -discursive strategizing‖ for actors such as corporate managers. They illustrate and specify how global capitalism, as discourse relying on economic and financial rationale and exemplified here by the acquiring firm's attempts to expand, meets national spirit, exemplified here by the complexity in selling the acquisition target to foreigners. The main contribution of this study lies in identifying how key actors draw on and mobilize rationalistic and nationalistic discourses in public discussion. The analysis illustrates that the same actors can draw on different-even contradictory-discourses at different points in time. Furthermore, different actors-even with opposing objectives-may draw on the same discourse in legitimizing their positions and pursuing specific ends.
English for Specific Purposes, 2020
Corporate leader messages posted by senior management play a pivotal role in building relationships with stakeholders in the professional corporate communication context and such messages often explicitly or implicitly draw on prior texts to establish credibility. This mixed methods study seeks to analyse how intertextuality is manifested linguistically through the types of intertextual links, sources of reference and move structure in leaders' messages of Fortune Global 500 corporations in the United States and People's Republic of China. The findings indicate that intertextuality is a prevalent feature of all leader messages. However, striking cross-cultural observations are noted in that the types of intertextuality vary since corporations in the PRC often draw on direct quotes in messages whereas indirect quotes are preferred by corporations from the US. In addition, intertextuality in leaders' messages reveals ideological variations in that leaders from corporations in the PRC make explicit intertextual references to texts on government policies while corporations from the US have a tendency to refer to social responsibility issues. Discussion of how intertextuality as manifested in the messages and move structure is thereby driven by the goals of corporations from different cultures concludes this study alongside wider implications for learning and teaching ESP.
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Culture and Organization, 2003
In this study of symbolic power relations in a transnational merger, we suggest that the popular media can provide a significant arena for (re)constructing national identities and power in this kind of dramatic industrial restructuring, and are an under-utilized source of empirical data in research studies. Focusing on the press coverage of a recent Swedish-Finnish merger, we specify and illustrate a particular feature of discursive (re)construction of asymmetric power relations; superior (Swedish) and inferior (Finnish) national identities, which, we argue, are embedded in the history of colonization and domination between the two nations. The findings of the present study lead us to suggest that a lens taken from postcolonial theory is particularly useful in understanding the wider symbolic power implications of international industrial restructuring.
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Journal of Intercultural Communication
This article investigates how the leadership of Lenovo and IBM PC Division integrated their corporate cultures after Lenovo’s acquisition of IBM PC Division. The study identified some post-acquisition cultural integration challenges between Lenovo and IBM PC Division such as: Language and communication differences, power distance, different leadership and managerial styles and difficulties in socializing Lenovo’s corporate culture and IBN PC’s corporate culture into a shared corporate culture. In view of this, the authors recommended that Lenovo and IBM PC Division should build structures, procedures and working environment which promote cultural synergy and adopt a cultural relativistic policy. The authors adopted personal interview data generated by earlier researchers. The data was analysed using a hermeneutic approach of data analysis..
This paper focuses on research on the " human side " of global mergers and acquisitions (M&As). We argue that there is a need for a more fine-grained understanding of the " human side, " which requires conceptualizing M&As as practice-oriented processes. Drawing on the practice approach, we outline avenues for further research on the " human side " of global M&As. The research directions include (1) multilayered identity dynamics, (2) emotional processes, (3) participation and change agency, (4) resistance, (5) human resource management (HRM) practices and tools, and (6) new forms of communication.
This article investigates how the leadership of Lenovo and IBM PC Division integrated their corporate cultures after Lenovo's acquisition of IBM PC Division. The study identified some post-acquisition cultural integration challenges between Lenovo and IBM PC Division such as: Language and communication differences, power distance, different leadership and managerial styles and difficulties in socializing Lenovo's corporate culture and IBN PC's corporate culture into a shared corporate culture. In view of this, the authors recommended that Lenovo and IBM PC Division should build structures, procedures and working environment which promote cultural synergy and adopt a cultural relativistic policy. The authors adopted personal interview data generated by earlier researchers. The data was analysed using a hermeneutic approach of data analysis.