Christian Berndt investigates how selected corporate actors in German small and medium-sized enterprises and in large companies respond to globalisation and the apparent crisis of the German model. By exploring the role of economic and non-economic factors in shaping business strategies he argues that, rather than simply being formal opposites, forces of dynamic change and irrational persistence are intertwined.

CHRISTIAN BERNDT is Wissenschaftlicker Assistant at Katholische Universität Eichstäett, Germany. He undertook his PhD in Cambridge and has contributed a number of articles to economic and geographical journals.