Our study analyzes a gap in research on Chinese and Western management teams, based on a broad literature review. We claim that prevalent theoretical perspectives in the management team literature might be biased toward a Western-centric view of team dynamics. This obscures alternative ways of understanding top teams encompassing Chinese cultural traditions. We outline how an essentialist team conceptualization leads to a paradox consisting of three mutually contradicting myths. Myth 1 implies that Western groups of managers comply with theoretically “ideal” team processes and characteristics. Myth 2 derives from research literature on Chinese teams claiming that team features are assumed absent or weak in China due to cultural particularities. Paradoxically, the same research tradition constructs another third myth by reporting that Chinese teams successfully comply with the Western ideal team model. The three coexisting myths point to a theoretical confounding of contextual mediators in team processes. We discuss how indigenous Chinese leadership theory and Chinese systems of philosophy give Chinese teams access to distinct and effective team processes to reach high-performance outcomes. This paper aims to open the rich possibilities of Chinese management and team practices to the cross-cultural context, and on return to novel understanding of Western teams beyond traditional essentialist theory anchors.

This article explores the role of narratives as drivers that guide the institutional change associated with globalization and deglobalization. For China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) to succeed as a driver of institutional change in favor of globalization, it must pass the narrative “virality” test and successfully contend with competing narratives. Rival narratives will be launched by firms and organizations worldwide that expect to win or lose from deglobalization or from new forms of globalization. This study develops a useful framework for establishing the extent to which China’s BRI is a genuine narrative or just a story. In this regard, four testable propositions are put forth to ascertain whether the BRI is values-based, extends an invitation to participate, is open-ended, and is associated with economic performance for both Chinese and non-Chinese participants. The analysis of the BRI-related institutional change that leads to globalization applies a theoretical lens centered on the narrative economics perspective and on the institution-based view and political economy perspective. Implications for BRI stakeholders, international business practitioners, and international business scholarship are outlined.

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Where does Japan fit in a rapidly changing world, and how should it relate to the United States and China? Three foreign commentators make a provocative and persuasive argument that the time has come for Japan to help build a stronger Asian community, and to become an engaged and conscientious global citizen.

This paper explores the concept of the living-dead trap (LDT), a pervasive state of entrepreneurship resulting from the decision to persevere in the operation of a venture in the face of sustained financial underperformance and personal psychological disutility. Financially underperforming firms can survive for long periods, usually with injections of sweat equity and debt, often decimating in the process the capital of their founders and investors as well as the obligations incurred to employees and other creditors. More specifically, this paper suggests a personal composite of specific cognitive and affective processes that leads entrepreneurs to commit to “failing but not failed” projects. That is, to fall into a trap known as the living-dead trap. We posit the living-dead phenomenon as a most pervasive state in firm founding drawing on cognitive and affective perspectives to model the attendant decision-making processes.