Mapping the global FDI landscape: network linkages and regional disparities

Foreign direct investment (FDI) serves as a crucial mechanism through which multinational enterprises conduct overseas operations, integrating economies into global value chains and production networks while shaping the global economic landscape. However, the intricate patterns and topology of the global FDI network have yet to be illustrated in a refined manner. This paper addresses this gap by utilising the Coordinated Direct Investment Survey database to construct a comprehensive global FDI flow matrix among countries. The global FDI landscape is visualised through the integration of maps and cartograms. The findings reveal a distinctly hierarchical global FDI network characterised by a core–periphery structure both within and across continents. North America, Europe and Asia emerge as the core regions, marked by larger FDI scales and denser linkages, while South America, Oceania and Africa remain on the periphery with relatively limited FDI activity. Both outward FDI (OFDI) and inward FDI (IFDI) exhibit similar patterns, primarily concentrated in North America, Western Europe and East Asia. Notably, the spatial polarisation effect of OFDI is more pronounced than that of IFDI. The United States, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, Hong Kong, the United Kingdom and China consistently rank among the top six in both OFDI and IFDI.