My Project
Julian Wing
International Fashion Business
1. Introduction
Considering the waves of changes worldwide in business, globalization
is a mandatory process to be observed in all MNEs today. The thesis will
be investigating the globalization’s effects on Danish fashion retailers,
looking at the lead companies. Due to rapidly changes that affect this
specific industry and increased competition, fashion multinationals
focus on building competitive advantages to overcome this challenge,
by expanding in other markets for new opportunities and reduce their
dependence on home market. Being part of growth strategy by moving
into foreign markets, globalization creates challenges considering inter-
national expansion.
1.1 Research questions
Can the selected theories of internationalization, be a guideline towards
expansion of fashion retail by answering the 5Ws?
In the light of economic globalization are there challenges that pose the
fashion retailer industry in Denmark?
1.2 Research design
The following structure will help the author of this thesis to guide the
reader as well as to create a flow between the chapters and their under-
standing. The first chapter will introduce the main research questions
that this project aims to answer as well as the problem investigated.
The second chapter will give a more in depth understanding of the
literature available and the research that has been done until now in this
area of investigation.
The third chapter is represented by the methodology selected for this
thesis. The methodology will present the methods used for data collec-
tion, as well as for the entire research design.
The fourth chapter describes the theories of internationalization and
how they can be used in this research along with the chosen mix of
theories. The fifth chapter is the analysis part in which the two research
questions will be answered and have a better understanding to applica-
bility of theories on the case study. The last chapter will be a conclusion
summary of the project along with reflections, more limitations and observations being introduced in the
overall project.
II. Literature review
Having laid out the philosophical research, methodological approach and research design, the author will
treat this chapter as a transit from the methodology chapter. As it was mentioned the theoretical foundation
is one of the factors that influences the choice of paradigm and further on the view upon the methodological
approach in this thesis.
As the system approach is the methodological approach, that author choose to work with, it is to believe that
there is a need for grasping the existing literature of business relevant to the phenomenon of globalization.
2.1 Strategic influence of globalization
This part of thesis is meant to give a proper identity to certain key words that are essential to be introduced,
guiding the reader through a pipeline that gets closer to the problem statement and understanding, giving
more clarity to it.
2.1.1 Globalization as a key word today
Globalization is not just a word that people use today in economic environment, but a phenomenon requir-
ing a special attention and study in the field of international business economics. Whilst many researchers
with different perspectives have tried to write about globalization, this chapter will focus on taking in consid-
eration the most relevant and reliable work in the field of international business.
International business deal with many issues addressed to economic globalization. Whether we talk about
scholars or international managers,
there are many question marks
next to globalization term. Multi-
national or small and medium size
companies, try to survive in their
domestic market or focus on global
expansion by being competitive
in other emerging markets. Even
if the attention today is mostly
on BRIC countries, where it can
be seen the highest level of inter-
est from MNCs, whether we talk
about pharmaceutical companies,
retail, as well as other business-
es, internationalization is seen
everywhere. Looking at one side
of globalization research that has
been done is tempting not to praise
and cheer for the benefits of this
phenomenon.
I cannot exclude to talk about the first business visit on Grundfos headquarters, in my first semester at Aal-
borg University, where I have seen a multinational with focus on building water pumps. Our questions for
one of the managers, were about their expansion in other markets, where they believed of having competitive
advantages and a market in need for this instrumental machineries that has led in showing us how they grow
economically in countries such as Africa, where the lack of clean water represents the top problem. It can be
seen the advantage of blurring barriers in order to provide for emerging markets. Nevertheless, their services
are correlated with the improvement on people’s welfare.
In pursue of defining globalization, a great abundance of work has been done from where to choose. Start-
ing with competitive strategies in order to produce with low prices, crossing competition and marketing
more markets (Porter, 1980, Hout et. al. 1982), arising concepts as global markets, global firm, global strat-
egy (Hamel and Prahalad, 1985, Levitt, 1983). Moreover, being present on a highly basis in foreign markets,
creates advantages that firms can achieve competitive forces, whether we talk about mergers and acquisitions
or strategic alliances, localization is well-known as a pillar in the outlook of internationalization (Bartlett and
Ghoshal, 1991). Globalization has proved to be an
interesting and challenging topic in the business literature over the last
decades, and it still of great importance in all fields. But what makes
globalization attractive is the identity of the firm, whether is a MNC
that expands their business model geographically in search of new prof-
its or smaller constrained firms that feel the need to grow in spite of low
resources to do so, looking for new niche markets by making use of ad-
hoc strategies (Hall, 1995). Going further with understanding globaliza-
tion, OECD (1996, p.9) sees it as: ‘The international expansion of firms’.
Global markets’ accessibility is an ease for companies to produce at a
lower rate, exchange, to access technology, financing and capital, ex-
ports, labour, knowledge; this is of great importance for any company
that allows and incorporate global strategies, to expand on global mar-
kets (Ghemawat, 2003, Czinkota et. al. 2009).
The access to global markets allows firms to sustain themselves, because
a large firm needs a large market. Globalization has made it possible,
not only but the law of monopoly itself to be altered. As the main rule
of monopoly is for a company to have a bigger share than the rest of the
companies in a specific market, this ‘invisible hand’ of world market
diminishes directly the innovation (J. Stiglitz, 2007, p. 202). This is the
case of Microsoft that has become the ‘ruler’ over PC market with 87
percents in August 2005. Why globalization is not working properly in
order to demonstrate that the world which is nowadays interconnected
and interdependent, but in other words (J. Stiglitz, 2007, p.63):
‘….liberalization of trade leads to rich countries with poor people…’
2.1.2 What does globalization really mean?
One simple search on Google, about globalization exceeds hundreds
of thousands of hits. It’s simply overwhelming in its nature. Maybe
this whole notion erupted into a big cloud that today leads managers,
researchers, governments and countries into unknown directions. I
shall honor Susan Strange, a top political economist that wrote in 1995
an interesting article named “The Limits of Politics.” in which she states
that: ‘a term used by a lot of woolly thinkers who lump together all sorts
of superficially converging trends in popular tastes for food and drink,
clothes, music, sports and entertainment with underlying changes in the
provision of financial services and the directions of scientific research,
and call it all globalization without trying to distinguish what is impor-
tant from what is trivial, either in causes or in consequences’.
Whether someone might say that what is old is underrated, I tend to
think the opposite and agree with Susan S., even though this was stated
in 1995. Industries has fallen and rise over time, counting many ‘casu-
alties’, economically speaking. In the same mass it’s included also the
clothing industry that will be discussed later on.
The truth behind this is that everything of what happens in this very
moment, every decision, and every bankruptcy; every won, impacts
economies or individuals in other geographical places. And all this
is gathered under a big roof named ‘globalization’ (P. Dikens 2011,
[Link] 2007). In nature, globalization is good, transforming the bor-
ders into a forgotten notion rather than a reality, with so many advan-
tages that have a direct trajectory to the top class instead of sharing.
Although this dissertation is focused on economic globalization and
not political, the term implies to look at all the trends in order to see a
future perspective.
Looking back at the main motto of the French revolution in Europe:
Liberté, Egalité, Fraternité!, which is translated as 1)liberty ( political rights, rights of free entrepreneurship,
free entry to the market, freedom of choosing between alternate goods and services); 2) Equality; 3) Frater-
nity or Solidarism (J. Kornai, Harvard business review, 2010). With this in mind, the author will discuss in
the following part the theoretical background of internationalization theories and put them in practice in a
deeper analysis.
III. Methodology
3.1 Introduction
The necessary steps towards knowledge research and creation is done by engaging into the methodological
methods, stated out in this very chapter. There is no perfect approach for each type of problem in any field of
research but by mentioning and explaining various methods of research, I will be trying to use the most ap-
propriate for answering the research question which will is linked to choice of theory, for a more precise out-
come. As is it used to be called in social science, methodology is a plan or a blueprint of the entire research.
The design helps the researcher to get the knowledge he is looking for and guides him to do so.
3.2 Social science paradigms
Even though there is no general
definition for a paradigm, I will
choose to look for authors spec-
ified in references chapter and
their view over the concept. It
is of absolute relevance to begin
with the author that studied and
introduce first the term of para-
digm in social science: Thomas
Kuhn, (1970), argues the charac-
teristics that constitutes a para-
digm is that every field of research
has a common understanding of
the phenomena, Kuhn’s under-
standing of philosophy of science
is built on how the researchers
answer their questions and how
they interpret the results (Kuada,
2009 p.5)
A paradigm is defined as “A phil-
osophical and theoretical frame-
work of presumptive and guiding principles which are governing knowledge and the creation of knowledge,
but which cannot be empirically or logically tested” (Abnor&Bjerke, 2009 p.424). Understanding the para-
digm definition characteristics, results in choosing an actual paradigm that is built from beliefs and percep-
tions of the researcher in relation to the field of study. There are many methodological approaches that can be
chosen for this study.
Every choice for the approach on each study is directly influenced by factors; factors that must be in the same
line with philosophical stance of the researcher, the linkage between theories and research, the actual re-
searcher beliefs about reality, whether reality is seen objective or dependent of the actors (Bryman&Bell, 2007
p.27) As mentioned above the most appropriate research taken into consideration for this dissertation must
be in accordance with author’s belief and philosophy in the process of knowledge creation and the study area.
Even though is clear that every research approach must be in concordance with the two factors, there must
also be fit with the problem of investigation. There are studies that need different research approaches, i.e.
studies that aim to investigate behavior and studies that aim to understand the reason behind the phenome-
non. In the vision of Bryman&Bell
(2003, pp. 7-14), there are two
opposed studies, the first one that
starts from the theory in order
to test them in real environment,
under the name of deductive
studies. The second category is
opposed to the deductive, so the
name inductive. These studies
start from observation and statisti-
cally research in order to generate
theories further on.
Grasping the research approach,
one factor that influences the find-
ings, is the philosophical stance
and beliefs of researcher, which is
split in two major views whether
the reality is seen as objective/sub-
jective. Whereas the researchers
see the social entities objective,
and reality is independent of the
actors or the researchers that state,
reality is dependent on actors of
social entities, being the subjective
view (Bryman&Bell, 2007, p. 20).
This subchapter is linked to the
previous one above, stating the
various paradigms elaborated of
Abnor and Bjerke. As mentioned
there are so many different views
on how to approach a research,
even though there are many, social
scientists elaborated similar views
on reality, also named paradigms
or concepts. Bearing this in mind
the following six main groups of
paradigms enumerated by Ab-
nor&Bjerke, is trivial in order to
understand the process of knowl-
edge creation (Abnor&Bjerke,
1997, pp 25-34)
