Co‐evolution in Strategic Renewal Behaviour of British,Dutch and French Financial Incumbents: Interaction of Environmental Selection,Institutional Effects and Managerial Intentionality*

abstract How do incumbent firms and environments co‐evolve and how are firm‐level adaptation and selection at industry level interrelated? Can and do large established organizations renew themselves to adapt to their environment? Three single‐lens theories, relating to environmental selection, institutional theory, managerial intentionality, and a co‐evolutionary perspective are used to investigate strategic renewal of incumbent firms. We derive propositions and distinguish between three dimensions of strategic renewal and develop metrics to investigate our propositions in a multi‐level, multi‐country, longitudinal study of the European financial services industry. Our results provide the following insights. From an environmental selection perspective, we found incumbents have a preference for exploitation renewal actions. Country institutional environments appear to explain to what extent incumbents prefer internal and/or external renewal actions. Managerial intentionality seems to explain outlier behaviour and firm‐specific frequency and timing of renewal actions. From a co‐evolutionary perspective, interaction effects explain deviations from predictions derived from the single‐lens theories applied in this paper.     

多元化战略、经济绩效与资本结构——关于上市公司股权融资偏好解释

我国上市公司存在十分强烈的股权融资偏好,学术界一般将其原因归结为股权融资成本偏低。笔者研究则表明,融资成本因素并不能全部解释上市公司股权融资偏好。本文从企业多元化经营战略角度来剖析股权融资偏好。研究发现:企业多元化程度越低负债率越低,企业经济绩效越好;企业有动力降低负债率,采用股权融资。研究还发现,企业多元化战略已经构成融资决策的有效约束,股权融资偏好是上市公司的理性选择。     

Fiscal decentralization and multinational firms’ ownership: evidence from China

China’s fiscal decentralization increases the incentive for local governments to maintain economic prosperity and improve institutional environments for multinational firms. This study investigates the impact of fiscal decentralization on the ownership shares of multinational firms in China. Multinational firms located in regions with higher degrees of fiscal decentralization are found to own larger shares of their foreign subsidiaries. This result is consistent under various robustness checks, including instrumental variables estimations. The finding suggests that multinational firms respond to local fiscal decentralization by increasing their participation in investment. This study therefore provides additional evidence for the beneficial effect of fiscal decentralization on China’s economic growth by highlighting the risk-mitigating role of fiscal decentralization.     

金融分权对企业投资效率的影响

本文基于金融分权的内涵,分析金融分权对企业投资效率的影响机制,并利用2003—2015年的上市公司数据,估算企业投资效率,实证检验金融分权对企业投资效率的影响。结果表明,金融分权降低了企业投资效率,并主要体现为投资过度;财政分权加剧了金融分权对企业投资效率的负效应。进一步研究发现,相对于国有企业而言,金融分权对非国有企业投资效率的负效应较小。中介效应检验表明,金融分权通过影响企业银行信贷和代理成本来降低企业投资效率。本文的政策含义是：理顺中央和地方财政关系,降低地方政府对金融资源的竞争性需求;完善地方政府官员考核机制,弱化地方政府参与金融竞争的激励;完善金融分权,既要求政府在保证金融市场稳定、不发生系统性风险的前提下应向市场逐步分权,又要求清晰界定中央政府与地方政府各自的监管权限,明确双方的救助责任。     

THEORIES OF THE FIRM: IMPLICATIONS FOR STRATEGY RESEARCH*

Theories of the firm provide a perspective for thinking about organizational objectives and a framework for analysing important research problems. Here, we demonstrate the usefulness of several economic theories of the firm for guiding strategy research. We evaluate the relevance of each theory with regard to how the underlying conceptualization of the firm permits us to investigate issues of substantive interest to strategy researchers, and how compatible the assumptions contained within the theory are with the traditional strategy framework. We also examine the relevance of the theories from the viewpoint of philosophical methodology. We argue that, because of the integrative nature of strategy research, it is imperative for researchers to adopt multiple frameworks represented by different theories for the advancement of the field.     

Wage mobility: do institutions make a difference?

This paper checks empirically the assertion that strict labour market regulation leads to low wage mobility, addressing an apparent puzzle. Indeed, most economic reasoning links a combination of regulations in the labour market to low wage flexibility and mobility, but the scarce empirical evidence available challenges that view. I focus on Portugal, one of the most regulated labour markets in Europe. The evidence gathered indicates that an aggregate view—of minimum wage enforcement, unionisation rates and extension of collective bargaining contracts—provides a misleading idea of the actual constraints imposed by the institutional framework on wage setting. Instead, micro conditions at the firm level play a major role shaping wage mobility in Portugal. Some comparisons with the UK, traditionally pointed out as a flexible labour market, are provided. Remarkable similarities in mobility level and trend are detected between the two countries, further suggesting that a regulated institutional framework does not necessarily reduce individual mobility in the wage distribution.     

Economic Influences on the Structure of Local Government in U.S. Metropolitan Areas

There is a large degree of variation in the number of general-purpose local governments and school districts, per square mile and per person, among United States' metropolitan areas. Using data from 1982, this paper provides an empirical test of whether economic factors (especially variation in demand for local government services) partly account for these differences. The empirical findings show that after controlling for political, historic, and institutional factors, variations in the characteristics that affect demand for local government services do influence the number of local governments. This result is consistent with the hypothesis first put forth by Tiebout.     

Complementarity,fiscal decentralization and economic growth

Theories of the voluntary provision of public goods and development economics have clarified that complementarity in the production process is a crucial ingredient to understanding how alternative economic environments affect economic performance. This paper examines how the structures of intra- and inter-regional complementarity affect the relationship between economic growth and fiscal decentralization. We provide a theory that describes how fiscal decentralization affects economic growth under various structures of regional complementarity. Our empirical analysis, based on a panel data set of the fifty states of the United States over the period of 1992–1997, supports our theoretical specification of the production function. Also, we observe a hump-shaped relationship between fiscal decentralization and economic growth that is consistent with our theoretical result. Our analysis also shows that the optimal degree of fiscal decentralization conducive to economic growth is higher than the average of the data in some cases, and hence further decentralization is recommended for economic growth. The previous version of the paper was presented at the 59th Congress of the International Institute of Public Finance (University of Economics in Prague, Prague), the 2003 Fall Meeting of the Japanese Economic Association (Meiji University, Tokyo), the 60th Annual Meeting of the Japanese Institute of Public Finance (Kansai University, Osaka), and in seminars at Yokohama National University and the University of California, Irvine. The authors acknowledge the comments and discussions by people including Timothy Goodspeed, Kiyoshi Mitsui, Motohiro Sato, Etsuro Shioji, Tsunao Okumura, and Craig Parsons. We are also grateful for the comments by the Editor (Amihai Glazer) and two anonymous referees. The usual disclaimer applies. Nishimura acknowledges the financial support from JSPS (Japan Society for the Promotion of Science) Postdoctoral Fellowships for Research Abroad.     

政府竞争:行政区经济运行中的地方政府行为分析

从政府竞争的角度,为行政区经济形成构建了一个政府行为分析框架.通过对政府竞争和博弈三个层面的考察,揭示区域经济发展中的各层级政府间互动关系,对行政区经济形成的深层次原因提供较为系统的解释.     

Explaining cross-country variations in the prevalence of informal sector competitors: lessons from the World Bank Enterprise Survey

To advance understanding of informal sector entrepreneurship, the aim of this paper is to evaluate and explain the cross-country variations in the prevalence of informal sector competitors. To do so, World Bank Enterprise Survey (WBES) data is reported from 142 countries. This reveals that 27% of formal enterprises view competition from the informal sector as a major constraint on their operations, although this varies from 72% of formal enterprises in Chad to no formal enterprises in El Salvador. To explain these cross-country variations, four competing theories are evaluated which variously view informal sector entrepreneurship and enterprise to be more prevalent when there is either: economic under-development (modernisation theory); high taxes and state over-interference (neo-liberal theory); too little state intervention (political economy theory), or an asymmetry between the laws and regulations of formal institutions and the unwritten socially shared rules of informal institutions (institutional theory). A multilevel probit regression analysis confirms the modernisation and institutional theories, but not the neo-liberal and political theories. Beyond economic under-development, therefore, it is not too much or too little state intervention that is associated with the prevalence of informal sector competition but rather, whether the laws and regulations developed by governments are in symmetry with the norms, values and beliefs of entrepreneurs. The paper concludes by discussing the theoretical and policy implications of these findings.

     

The effects of slack resource of R&D professionals on firm performance: evidence from traditional manufacturing firms in an emerging economy

Abstract

As an important component of organizational human resource slack (HR slack), the slack of research-and-development (R&D) professionals has been studied by several authors. However, it remains unclear whether and how this small component of general HR slack, i.e. the slack of research-and-development professionals (RHR slack), may affect overall firm performance in an emerging economy without much R&D tradition or pro-R&D institutions. Based on two organizational theories, i.e. institutional theory and the resource-based view of the firm (RBV), we propose competing hypotheses on the relationship between RHR slack and firms’ accounting performance. We also examine whether the relationship between RHR slack and firm performance should be linear or curvilinear. Finally, we also test the relationship between RHR slack and other dimensions of firm performance. Several interesting findings have been obtained. For instance, neither the perspective based on institutional theory nor that based on RBV can fully predict all types of RHR slack-performance relationships, be these relationships linear or curvilinear.     

Ownership structure and firm performance: Some empirical evidence from Spain

The ‘managerial’ and the ‘contractual’ theories of the firm imply different causes and consequences for the relationship between ownership and performance of firms. This paper provides a test of the two conflicting theories, using ownership and performance data from a sample of Spanish family- and non-family-controlled firms. We find evidence in support of the contractual theory of the firm, according to which firms choose their ownership structure maximizing economic value, net of contractual costs.     

Can Two Wrongs Make a Right? State Ownership and Debt in a Transition Economy

Existing literature suggests that both state ownership and debt have detrimental performance consequences in transition economies. Paradoxically, however, we contend that the confluence of these two conditions may not be harmful. By considering the interactions between the governance properties of state ownership and debt, interpreted in light of the institutional context of China (i.e. the interplay between local governments, managers, and central banks), we argue that state ownership and debt can potentially offset each other's detrimental effects. We test our hypotheses with a sample of over 1300 Chinese firms that were listed on the Shanghai and Shenzhen Stock exchanges between 2003 and 2005. Results of the tests confirm that while debt and state ownership each have a negative impact on firm performance when used in isolation, their interaction has a positive impact on firm performance.     

经济规模、技术创新与垂直专业化分工

借鉴Hummels等(2001)的垂直专业化分析框架,本文比较了中国大陆等32个经济体1995年、2000年以及2005年制造业出口的垂直专业化水平。在此基础上,本文利用中国大陆等32个经济体18个制造业行业数据,进一步探讨了影响垂直专业化水平的主要因素。经验观察和计量分析结果发现,经济规模越大、技术创新能力越强的经济体,垂直专业化水平越低;技术复杂度越高的行业,垂直专业化水平也越高;技术越复杂的行业在经济规模越大、技术创新能力越强的经济体内,垂直专业化水平相对更低。本文的研究结论为我们评估中国当前的经济发展方式和国际竞争力提供了一个思路。     

资本结构与公司产品市场战略——一个模型分析

本文在总结了以前资本结构理论的基础上,提出了分析资本结构与产品市场战略关系的一般框架,按照公司债务是否能使公司在产品市场竞争中处于强势或弱势地位的标准,分别介绍不同的战略决策对公司财务杠杆的影响,得出了正的战略效应能够增加高负债水平的杠杆收益;负的战略效应会减少高负债水平的杠杆收益。与不考虑战略安排的情况相比,相应地应该举更多(更少)债务的结论。相反,我们也描述了负债对公司产品市场竞争战略的影响,得出了上述结论另一方面的解释。最后,讨论了结论的理论意义及现实意义。     

Institutional perspectives on cost allocations: integration and extension

The debate on cost allocations in the management accounting literature has been dominated by a largely rationalistic perspective primarily informed by economic theories. However, there is growing evidence of institutional factors influencing cost allocation practices in organizations. This paper draws on neo-institutional sociology (NIS) and attempts to integrate prior research evidence of the institutional influence on cost allocation practices into an analytical framework. The core of our argument hinges on the observation that most cost allocations generate some degree of ambiguity. We argue that the implementation of various cost allocation techniques (in terms of their coupling to operating control) reflects differences in management of such ambiguity, but that this is conditioned by the patterns in which cost allocation techniques diffuse across organizations. We also address some pertinent criticisms of the NIS literature by discussing how certain intra-organizational factors and aspects of the organization's technical environment might interact with external institutional pressures in the implementation of cost allocation techniques. We advance six research propositions reflecting how such external institutional pressures and interaction effects influence the coupling of cost allocation practices to operating control.     

Property rights theory,transaction costs theory,and agency theory: an organizational economics approach to strategic management

Property rights theory has common antecedents with contractual theories of the firm such as transaction costs and agency theories, and is yet distinct from these theories. We illustrate fundamental theoretical principles derived from these three theories by analyzing the business case of oil field unitization. Theoretical principles and application of theory to oil field unitization are each summarized. From this, it is possible to see how property rights theory is well suited to explain business situations where inefficient economic outcomes persist. Additionally, property rights theory forges new theoretical connections with other branches of organizational economics, in particular, resource‐based theory. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

百家争鸣难结论:股利之谜

迄今为止,有三类理论试图解释"股利之谜":代理理论(道德风险)、信号理论(逆向选择)和行为金融理论。这些理论详细解释了"为什么公司支付股利","为什么投资者喜欢股利","股利如何影响股价","管理者对分配股利的态度怎样"等问题。在详细总结国内外研究文献的基础上,我们提出了股利研究的未来发展方向。