Journal Article
The authors present an institutional comparison of 13 major Asian business systems—China, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Japan, Laos, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore,
Korea, Taiwan, Thailand and Vietnam—with one another and five major Western economies—France, Germany, Sweden, the UK and the USA.
The authors find five major types of business systems in Asia: (post-)socialist, advanced city, emerging
Southeast Asian, advanced Northeast Asian and Japanese. With the exception of Japan, all Asian forms of capitalism are fundamentally distinct from Western types of capitalism.
The authors conclude that the Varieties of Capitalism
(VOC) dichotomy is not applicable to Asia; that none of the existing major frameworks capture all Asian types of capitalism; and that Asian business systems (except Japan) cannot be understood through categories identified in the West.
The authors' analysis further suggests a need for the field to invest in further research on social capital, culture, informality and multiplexity.