Danny Breznitz, associate professor of international affairs and strategic management at the Scheller College of Business, recently won the British International Studies Association's Susan Strange Best Book Award for 2012.

He shared the honor with co-author Michael Murphree for their book Run of the Red Queen: Government, Innovation, Globalization, and Economic Growth in China.

Published by Yale University Press, the closely examines the strengths and weaknesses of the Chinese economic system to discover where the nation may be headed and what the Chinese experience reveals about emerging market economies. The authors find that contrary to popular belief, cutting-edge innovation is not a prerequisite for sustained economic vitality—and that China is a perfect case in point.

The book has won significant acclaim and attention from the business press since its publication last year. The Economist dedicated a Schumpeter column to it, emphasizing Breznitz and Murphree's point that innovation is not limited to the invention of breakthrough products: "In an emerging economy, other forms of innovation can yield bigger dividends," wrote the columnist. "One is 'process innovation': the relentless improvement of factories and distribution systems. Another is 'product innovation': the adaptation of existing goods to China’s unique requirements."

Breznitz says, "Chinese companies have been doing wonderfully by being on the cusp of the latest available technologies developed elsewhere and then being able to work on them. It's a strategy that's basically against the central government's push. But those innovation capabilities are probably going to maintain Chinese growth for the next 15 years." That is, Breznitz adds, if the country's privately owned companies are undermined by the government's hunger for big, state-directed projects.

Run of the Red Queen also won a Bronze Medical in the 2012 Axiom Business Awards in the International Business/Globalization category.