Liability of political embeddedness in Chinese multinationals: Implications for headquarters’ roles and reverse knowledge transfer
研究中国跨国公司总部在国内的政治嵌入如何削弱其创业和管理角色，进而阻碍从海外子公司获取逆向知识转移，基于99家中国公司的177家子公司数据。
It is well known that Chinese multinationals’ international expansion is often supported by the home-country government. This study argues that the political embeddedness of Chinese multinationals’ headquarters may impair their managerial intentions and abilities to carry out their entrepreneurial and administrative roles and, indirectly, their capacity to achieve reverse knowledge transfers from their foreign subsidiaries. Based on a study of 177 subsidiaries of 99 Chinese multinationals, we find no support for the argument that political embeddedness affects headquarters’ centralization of subsidiary decisions, although such centralization is negatively associated with reverse knowledge transfer. Additionally, our findings show that home-country political embeddedness is negatively associated with headquarters’ entrepreneurial role vis-à-vis individual subsidiaries. This hampers subsidiaries’ reverse knowledge transfers. The results contribute to understanding the value of political embeddedness and headquarters’ roles in the context of Chinese multinationals. They also provide insights into the strategic asset-seeking internationalization of Chinese multinationals. By developing and operationalizing the multidimensional concept of political embeddedness, this study further contributes to the research on firm-government relations.