NES

Question 1
Indeed, the amount of money that Chen was told to give each of the government officials was not much, but the action itself would have some consequences. However, it is unquestionably right to look at these consequences in two ways, the rule of law and local culture. First, According to the Chinese law, giving gifts of any kind to the government officials with intent of taking advantage of their position and power to conduct illegal action is bribery. This action of giving money to government officials may therefore be regarded as bribery; as a result involved parties may be penalized or even end up in jail. The Stakeholders may also decide to withdraw investing in such a corrupt environment. Secondly, it is undeniably true that local culture plays a tremendous role in a local business environment, therefore we must also argue with regards to culture. As far as Chinese culture is concerned, the need of maintaining networks or relationships (locally known as “關係Guan Xi”) in business environment is tremendously important and it is deeply rooted in the Chinese people’s DNA and other Asian countries that are also influenced by the Teachings of Confucius. According to the teachings of Confucius, relationships or networks(關係), and Face (mian zi), were among other things that were highly emphasized and helped to build up the Chinese culture which can be evidenced by the findings of Geert Hofstede in his theory of culture dimension that most Asian culture with no exception of the Chinese culture scored high in the dimension of collectivism. According to Chen for example, she argues that gifts are offered to establish relationship with government officials so that they get motivated to handle their application legally but without delay. This is contrary to what the Chinese Law Stated “giving gifts of any kind to the government officials with intent of taking advantage of their position and power to conduct illegal action is bribery” in the sense that the law prohibits giving gifts for illegal actions, where as Chen is asked to give gifts to speed up legal actions since officials will just show their appreciation hence no serious ethical problem. So, in culture point of view, NES would gain credibility from the officials, and the officials would also help to speed up the application.

Question 2
It seems that Mueller has no idea about Chinese Culture, so as Chen, we would give Mueller a better understanding of Chinese culture which is stemmed from the ideology of Confucianism such as relationships or networks(關係), Face, Hierarchy and obedience, etc. We would tell Mueller that there is a very thin dividing line between success and failure for Multi National Companies doing business in China, and failing to adapt to the local business environment, MNCs are likely to fall in to the wrong side of the diving line. What Mueller must know is that you can not apply foreign principles of doing business in a local business environment. We would give Mueller a good example of what the regional manager for SEALED AIR CORPORATION (China Region), Bob Kayser did when entering Taiwan market (According to a case study: Sealed Air Taiwan –A). He first read a lot about Taiwan. He concentrated on the legacy of Confucianism in Taiwan, the impact of its educational system and the concept of Relationships (關係) and Face. For Bob Kayser, he did not find a lot of difficulties in solving major problems of Sealed Air Taiwan. Mueller must therefore know that there is no magic about running a MNC in a country of totally different culture from his, it takes understanding of that culture, accepting that culture and adapting to that culture.