The book's vantage point for exploring the varieties of capitalism is the headquarters of large corporations--in particular, their human resources departments, where changes in markets and technology turn into corporate labor policies affecting millions of workers. Jacoby reveals the inner workings of these departments. Despite some cross-fertilization, Japanese and American corporations maintain distinctive approaches to human resource management, with Japanese HR departments occupying a more central position within the corporation. As Jacoby shows, this has important consequences for how firms compete, for corporate governance, and even for the level of inequality in Japan and the United States.
The Embedded Corporation is a major contribution to our understanding of comparative management and the relationship between business, society, and the global economy.
Sanford M. Jacoby is the Howard Noble Professor of Management, Policy Studies, and History at the University of California, Los Angeles. His books include "Modern Manors: Welfare Capitalism since the New Deal" (Princeton) and "Employing Bureaucracy: Managers, Unions, and the Transformation of the Workplace in the 20th Century" (Erlbaum).