gwd-8-9

nina_nn

   In recent years, Western

       business managers have been

       heeding the exhortations of busi-

Line       ness journalists and academics

  (5)      to move their companies toward

long-term, collaborative “strategic

partnerships” with their external

business partners (e.g., suppliers).

The experts’ advice comes as

 (10)      a natural reaction to numerous

studies conducted during the past

decade that compared Japanese

production and supply practices

with those of the rest of the world.

 (15)      The link between the success of

a certain well-known Japanese

automaker and its effective

management of its suppliers, for

example, has led to an unques-

 (20)      tioning belief within Western

management circles in the value

of strategic partnerships.  Indeed,

in the automobile sector all three

       United States manufacturers and

 (25)      most of their European competitors

have launched programs to reduce

their total number of suppliers and

move toward having strategic

partnerships with a few.

 (30)            However, new research con-

cerning supplier relationships in

various industries demonstrates

       that the widespread assumption of

Western managers and business

 (35)      consultants that Japanese firms

       manage their suppliers primarily

through strategic partnerships is

unjustified.  Not only do Japanese

firms appear to conduct a far

 (40)      smaller proportion of their busi-

ness through strategic partnerships

than is commonly believed, but

they also make extensive use of

“market-exchange” relationships,

 (45)      in which either party can turn to

the marketplace and shift to dif-

ferent business partners at will,

a practice usually associated

with Western manufacturers.

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Q9:

The passage is primarily concerned with

             

1. examining economic factors that may have contributed to the success of certain Japanese companies
2. discussing the relative merits of strategic partnerships as compared with those of market-exchange relationship
3. challenging the validity of a widely held assumption about how Japanese firms operate
4. explaining why Western companies have been slow to adopt a particular practice favored by Japanese companies
5. pointing out certain differences between Japanese and Western supplier relationships

答案是c,为什么不是b呢？