John Groenewegen, born in Nootdorp, the Netherlands, in 1949. Ph.D. from the University of Maastricht. Associate Professor of Economic Organisation at Erasmus University, Rotterdam.
Fellow (1 February 1996 – 30 June 1996)
My research at NIAS ‘Institutional Economic Approaches to Asian Business Systems’ had two aims: first to develop further a theoretical framework, in which different approaches were to be integrated and second to apply that framework to Asian business systems. With respect to the former: economic approaches towards economic organisation have been complemented with insights from sociology, history and political science resulting in an inter-disciplinary framework.
The application of the theoretical framework to the Asian business systems was the most important part of my research at NIAS. Attention was focused on the Japanese, Korean and Chinese business groups. About their structure, financial, economic and organisational linkages, strategies and finally their dynamics, a lot of material has been collected and structured using the theoretical framework mentioned above.
At the end of my five-month stay I had structured my data in such a way that before the end of 1996 the publication in an article and a book seems to be possible.