Business politics as a causal mechanism shaping uneven regional development across Romania’s automotive industry

Abstract We develop and deploy a business politics lens to examine the mechanisms and processes of negotiation through which multinational enterprises (MNEs) and various host country actors interact, leading to different regional trajectories of economic development. We assess two contrasting lead firms from differing home country contexts investing in the automotive industry in Romania, operating in two regions with distinct historical-spatial industrial organization and economic development. We advance a contribution on business politics as dynamic, relational, multi-scalar, and influenced by varied conjunctural factors—historical, geographical, political, institutional, and firm-driven—exposing how MNEs and territorial actors co-shape distinct processes of international economic (dis)integration.