Orville Schell "Walmart in China"

“How Walmart is changing China” by Orville Schell

http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2011/12/how-walmart-is-changing-china/8709/

1). Choose one passage from the reading that you found particularly interesting. Why was this interesting?

One passage that I found to be interesting was talking about how market is basically its own country. Within the article the writer mentions a metaphor basically stating that Wal-Mart (Company) is like a country, which is very interesting to me because it did not occur to me that Wal-mart as a big company can be something that can function like a country. In the article it states, “In many ways, the company is like a country. Its CEO, when abroad, is treated almost like a visiting head of state. Senior executives in charge of overseas operations function like diplomats, signing agreements with governments and businesses and managing the company’s interests. The various national arms of the Wal-Mart Foundation operate almost like a government foreign-aid program. Even Wal-Mart’s stores, arrayed around the world, seem almost as representative of America as our consulates and embassies.” After reading the article it made more sense as to how a company can be a country.

2). Use examples from this reading to illustrate the interaction between multinational firms, economics, and culture.

One of the examples in the reading where there is an interaction between multinational firms, economics, and culture is when the author connects China’s thoughts to Wal-mart’s thought. It states, “China’s leadership, with its socialist roots, has long stressed “serving the people,” while Walmart, with its capitalist roots, emphasizes “service to the customer.” Both statements are relates to the people and is about the people, placing a high importance on the civilians. The next example was the South Park episode on boycotting the stores. It basically talk about ways to stop the spread of the multinational firms but at the end, the people cannot do it and keeps going to the store because market is needed and consumption is needed. A conclusion for the episode is that “the South Park posse must save the world by finding and destroying the heart of their Walmart, which turns out to be located near the TV-sales department.”

Towards at the end of the article an important statement that Lucy mentions is that multinational firms is not necessary a bad thing in China. In fact “Chinese workers learned a lot about quality, pricing, and management from Walmart,” She states, “At first, we didn’t quite understand, but they patiently explained consumer demand to us. So we came to understand that Walmart not only had vision about these things, but also were the strictest in maintaining standards. Now we have started moving from green to organic.” This help China became a better country with food standards and regulation.

3). Beyond the specifics of this article, what impact do multinational firms have on economics and culture? Have they had an impact on your country?

Multinational firms have a big impact on economies and culture because it connects the two concepts. Having multinational firms in different countries can increase consumption, investment. This can drive the GDP to increase making the economy for that country to be better than before. And since multinational firms are located in different country, they also have to cater their goods to the people that live in the local areas and the country and make the product attractive to the customers, therefore for example a wal-mart in china may be different from a wal-mart here in the states. This leads the economies and the markets to connect it to culture and makes the products more cultural related which can increase the demands for certain products. This article clearly shows the impact of Wal-Mart on China and did a great job of talking about the impact of multinationals firms having on economics and culture.

Work Cited

"How Walmart Is Changing China - Magazine - The Atlantic." The Atlantic — News and analysis on politics, business, culture, technology, national, international, and life – TheAtlantic.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 18 May 2012. <http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/print/2011/12/how-walmart-is-changing-china/8709/>.