This dissertation sets out to investigate the management of relationships in British-Chinese business settings. Whilst set in the frameworks of politeness theory and accommodation theory, this dissertation studies the management of relationships in British-Chinese business interactions from a more comprehensive perspective. It examines the sociocultural as well as the communicative behaviour of the interactions between British and Chinese business people, to explore how relationship issues were handled and how communicative as well as cultural/sociocultural strategies affected the management of relationships. This work is based primarily on research conducted in Britain during November-December 1996, June 1997, and November 1997, when three Chinese delegations were visiting a local engineering company in the southeast of England. For the purpose of this study, three kinds of data were collected: 1) video recordings of authentic meetings between British business people and their Chinese clients (including training sessions); 2) comments from subsequent interviews and playback sessions held with the British and Chinese participants; 3) field notes. This study has shown that a variety of aspects can be held accountable for the management of relationships in intercultural settings. On a macro level, linguistic features alone can not adequately explain the process of negotiating relationships in fonnal intercultural settings, it also involves the non-linguistic perspective. From a linguistic perspective, attending to face needs is not the sole agent for relational management. Accommodation and respect for sociality rights also play an important part in it. The thesis attempts to distinguish the self-claimed face (self-image) and the perceived face (public self-image) and explore their respective functions in the management ofrelationships. The research also claims that group face is more likely to surface in group-versus-group. individual (group identity marked)-versus-group, or individual (group identity marked)-versus-individual (group identity marked or unmarked) settings. This study also argues that communication accommodation theory should incorporate convergence, maintenance or divergence along the line of culture specific behaviour. It proposes a new conceptualisation of CAT that should involve both speech and non-speech accommodative features. This study shows that a wider range of perspectives are needed in order to investigate intercultural communication.

This paper is an in-depth study of business relationships in the Swedish construction industry and how e-commerce applications have affected the matter.  E-commerce applications are being used by all types of industries, while the construction industry lags behind and is currently in the process of implementing such type of systems. Primary data was obtained through four in-depth interviews, three of which were conducted with leading Swedish construction companies, and one with a large supplier to the industry.  The data obtained was analyzed using a series of academic tools such as currnet peer reviewed articles and models covering the topics of business relationships as well as e-commerce applications. Most importantly, the research revealed that communication on levels that affect business relationships has not decreased substantially wit hthe implementation of e-commerce applications.  Secondly, an important aspect and prerequisite for a business relationship is the price of goods traded and geographic positioning.  This may be an industry specific finding, due to both factors' high impact on total cost.  Accordingly, the paper provides a model using the obtained data, as the current academic literature weighs aspects which suppoert the forming of business relationships differently.