Table of Contents

Contents

Introduction

Preface

1 The Need for a New Paradigm

Conflicting Explanations

Asking the Right Question

Classical Rationales for Industry Success

The Need for a New Paradigm

Toward a New Theory of National Competitive Advantage

The Study

A Broader Concept of Competitive Advantage

PART I

FOUNDATIONS

2 The Competitive Advantage of Firms in Global Industries

Competitive Strategy

Competing Internationally

The Role of National Circumstances in Competitive

Success

3 Determinants of National Competitive Advantage

Determinants of National Advantage

Factor Conditions

Demand Conditions

Related and Supporting Industries

Firm Strategy, Structure, and Rivalry

The Role of Chance

The Role of Government

The Determinants in Perspective

4 The Dynamics of National Advantage

Relationships Among the Determinants

The Determinants as a System

Clustering of Competitive Industries

The Role of Geographic Concentration

The Genesis and Evolution of a Competitive Industry

The Loss of National Advantage

The Diamond in Perspective

PART II

INDUSTRIES

5 Four Studies in National Competitive Advantage

The German Printing Press Industry

The American Patient Monitoring Equipment Industry

The Italian Ceramic Tile Industry

The Japanese Robotics Industry

6 National Competitive Advantage in Services

The Growing Role of Services in National Economies

International Competition in Services

The Relationship Between Services and Manufacturing

National Competitive Advantage in Services

Case Studies in the Development of Competitive Service Industries

PART III

NATIONS

7 Patterns of National Competitive Advantage: The Early Postwar Winners

American Postwar Dominance

Stable Switzerland

Sweden's Choices

Renewing German Dynamism

8 Emerging Nations in the 1970s and 1980s

The Rise of Japan

Surging Italy

Emerging Korea

9 Shifting National Advantage

The Slide of Britain

Crosscurrents in America

Postwar Development in Perspective

10 The Competitive Development of National Economies

Economic Development

Stages of Competitive Development

The Stages and the Postwar Economies of Nations

Postwar Economic Progress in Perspective

PART IV

IMPLICATIONS

11 Company Strategy

Competitive Advantage in International Competition

The Context for Competitive Advantage

Improving the National Competitive Environment

Where and How to Compete

Tapping Selective Advantages in Other Nations

Locating the Home Base

The Role of Leadership

12 Government Policy

Premises of Government Policy Toward Industry

Government Policy and National Advantage

Government's Effect on Factor Conditions

Government's Effect on Demand Conditions

Government's Effect on Related and Supporting Industries

Government's Effect on Firm Strategy, Structure, and Rivalry

Government Policy and the Stages of Competitive Development

Targeting

Government Policy in Developing Nations

The Role of Government

13 National Agendas

The Agenda for Korea

The Agenda for Italy

The Agenda for Sweden

The Agenda for Japan

The Agenda for Switzerland

The Agenda for Germany

The Agenda for Britain

The Agenda for the United States

National Agendas in Perspective

Epilogue

Appendix A. Methodology for Preparing the Cluster Charts

Appendix B. Supplementary Data on National Trade Patterns

Notes

References

Index

About the Author

About the Author

Michael E. Porter, one of the world's leading authorities on competitive strategy and international competitiveness, is the C. Roland Christensen Professor of Business Administration at the Harvard Business School. In 1983, Professor Porter was appointed to President Reagan's Commission on Industrial Competitiveness, the initiative that triggered the competitiveness debate in America. He serves as an advisor to heads of state, governors, mayors, and CEOs throughout the world. The recipient of the Wells Prize in Economics, the Adam Smith Award, three McKinsey Awards, and honorary doctorates from the Stockholm School of Economics and six other universities, Porter is the author of fourteen books, among them Competitive Strategy, The Competitive Advantage of Nations, and Cases in Competitive Strategy, all published by The Free Press. He lives in Brookline, Massachusetts.

Reviews

Business Week Rich in lessons about why and how industries, regions, and nations succeed or fail.

The Economist An all-embracing view of economic change that amounts in the end to a powerful analytic framework. Porter has done for international capitalism what Marx did for the class struggle....A real achievement.

Administrative Science Quarterly Should have a profound and far-reaching impact on academic course work, managers' perceptions, and public policy.

Business in a Contemporary World The Competitive Advantage of Nations is destined to become a classic in its field.

Journal of Development Economics The first serious attempt to develop a really original grand theory of national economic development processes since the early years of Postwar development economics, and one of the most original ways of thinking about development policy in years.

Publishers Weekly This massive, impressive, salient tome is structured so that business executives, economists, policy-makers and ordinary readers can turn to the sections most relevant to their needs.