We use community detection analysis to investigate the structure of Bengaluru's ICT cluster's inter-organizational network during the period 2015–2017. Building on the knowledge sourcing literature, we conjecture that cluster firms primarily build knowledge-seeking horizontal linkages with technologically similar companies, and that this splits the network into multiple technological communities within which firms are tightly connected, but between which linkages are scarce. We further propose that community-spanning firms which build horizontal linkages that bridge technological communities are more likely to conduct radical innovation than their peers. We finally argue that no relation exists between technological proximity and community formation in the network of vertical buyer-supplier relations. Using a voltage-based algorithm for community discovery, we draw empirical support for these predictions. We discuss the implications of our findings for Bengaluru's upgrading potential.

Since 2012, a large-scale Party branches building campaign intending to regain political influence in the private sector has been sweepingly promoted. Drawing on the Chinese Private Enterprise Survey conducted in 2008, 2012, and 2018, this study investigates private enterprises’ strategies in response to the intensified political pressure by integrating socioemotional wealth theory and neo-institutional theory. It is found that (1) private enterprises with high family ownership tend not to establish Party branches until political pressure is very high; (2) enterprises with high family ownership are more likely to adopt a decoupling strategy of evading the Party's political and social goals; and (3) the owners’ perceptions of a better market and legal environment weaken the negative effect of family ownership on the establishment of Party branches. These results reveal the key logic of preserving the socioemotional wealth and ‘embedded agency’ of Chinese private enterprises when they confront institutional legitimacy mandates. This study also sheds new light on the causes of the decoupling phenomenon and the dynamic interactions between institutional environment and organizational behaviors.

Despite the rich set of theories that have developed on international joint ventures (IJVs), little is known about what theoretical criteria senior executives actually incorporate in their judgments of IJV opportunities and partners. Empirical studies have often applied individual theories in a particularistic fashion, rather than recognizing the different theoretical perspectives that boundedly-rational executives may incorporate into their decision models. In this article, we combine decision criteria associated with multiple theories rooted in organizational economics to investigate how top executives process information on IJV opportunities in China. Using an established experimental technique known as policy capturing, we examine how executives cognitively weigh criteria from four prominent theories when making initial assessments of IJVs (i.e., the resource-based view, transaction cost economics, information economics, and real options theory). Our arguments and findings on executives' IJV decision models contribute to decision-making research on alliances and IJVs in China.

Through two in-depth case studies, we compare the approaches of a state-owned enterprise (SOE), Beijing Automotive Industries Holding Co., and a privately owned enterprise (POE), Geely, to acquire and absorb advanced technological knowledge to enhance their innovation capabilities. Each company acquired advanced knowledge from troubled famous Swedish automakers and upgraded their products technologically. Analyzing data mainly collected from secondary sources identifies major differences in approaches and actions at each acquisition step rooted in the type of ownership. We juxtapose these differences with insights from the literature on knowledge acquisition and research on firm ownership. Our findings show that the POE seeks the strategic goal of synergistic technology integration for better innovation and economic performance. In contrast, the SOE pursues national objectives with less regard for market success. This SOE focuses on an independent approach to knowledge absorption and development during their acquisition, whereas the POE emphasizes collaboration in innovation capacity development. This study provides insights into Chinese firms’ positioning on innovation development on the global stage, comparative capitalism, and the particular case of state capitalism in China.

Our understanding of how an organisation operates is elucidated by the host country's political system. Myanmar has remained abstruse to researchers for many decades, as do most emerging markets prior to their transition from a centrally planned economy to a market economy such as China. We establish how the problematising and contextualisation of the methodologies adopted during longitudinal fieldwork in Myanmar (2008 to 2016) has influenced our research focus and question. By reflecting on our experience of conducting organisational research in a highly institutionalised environment, we have identified limitations in the prevalent research methodologies used by the extant literature. Such methodologies tend to be incompatible with the Asian context. This process of problematisation required us to remain flexible and adaptive during the process of the generation of the research questions. We adopted a context-informed theory-building process and reflect on the interplay between interviewer, interviewees, and local institutional contexts. An important insight from this process was the need to nullify the asymmetry of power between the interviewer and interviewees to obtain honest responses rather than superficial data that aimed to satisfy and please the interviewer/institutional context.

In light of inconclusive findings on the effect of political connections, this study explores conditions that affect the effectiveness of political connections on firm performance in democratic systems. First, using a resource dependence rationale, this study stresses the importance of variation in political connections and classifies direct and indirect political connections based on sources of power and the mechanisms for developing connections. Second, this study recognizes that influencing political outcomes is an entire political process in which political power matters. Furthermore, as power is central to the resource dependence rationale unlike exchange in transaction cost economics, this study explores how the effectiveness of political connections is contingent on the dynamics of de jure political power. We find that the effect of direct political connections is susceptible to changes in de jure political power due to its dyadic relationship with de jure power, while indirect political connections are more robust to such changes due to their connections with informal networks holding de facto political power. Further, the positive effects of political connections on firm performance are mediated by operational capability.

China, which was once a world champion in invention, has failed to maintain its global leadership in innovation after the middle of the Ming Dynasty (1368–1644). Today, frame-breaking innovations are more likely to originate from European and North American countries than from China. In the perspective article (Augier, Guo, & Rowen, 2016), the authors attribute this phenomenon, which is often referred to as the Needham Puzzle, to three reasons: (1) the Chinese did not develop a scientific method like that in the West; (2) lack of educational diversity and structural inertia in China; and (3) lack of openness to the outside world. The authors also attribute the US's leadership in innovation to its culture of encouraging experimentation, tolerating failure and accepting deviance, and to its institutional support for decentralization of and competition in R&D and basic research. This commentary aims to enrich this insightful analysis. We focus on (1) the reasons for the demise of Chinese leadership in science and technology since the middle of the Ming dynasty, and (2) the historical and cultural obstacles to the development of frame-breaking innovations in modern China.

Chinese business schools have made impressive progress in improving their quality, but there is still room for improvement. However, they have improved largely by copying the traditional American model of business education at a time when this model is coming under increasing critique for good reasons, including placing great effort on producing much rigorously conducted research, which makes little practical impact. Thus, having learned much from foreign business schools, the time has come for Chinese business schools to be bold and pursue their own model. Such a model should focus more on research that pays increased attention to context, including indigenous research, and is of greater practical relevance. Furthermore, given ongoing change inside Chinese business schools and in their external environment, it may be easier to make needed changes in China. Regarding teaching, business schools are encouraged to move beyond a focus on teaching content well to teaching content in ways that it can be readily applied; do more to develop understanding of how to leverage modern technologies like AI, big data, internet of things, and digitalization; focus more on adjusting teaching to the local context; and focus more on developing innovation/creativity and analytical ability, rather than memorization of facts.

In this article, I draw from organizational imprinting theory to illuminate the impact of the Soviet legacy on contemporary Russian economic geography and regional policy. I argue that central coordination in the creation and regulation of Russian urban agglomerations is connected to a socialist imprinted paradigm associated with the Soviet economic regionalization model and territorial-production complexes (TPCs). I conduct a qualitative historical study to analyze the role of the foundational environment and the dynamics in the development of this imprint. I propose that this imprint effect is prone to reproduction in contemporary regional development strategies and community-based paradigms due to exaptation and cultural-cognitive persistence. The article extends the literature of socialist imprinting by demonstrating how imprints may emerge, transform, and affect localized organizational communities in transition economies and highlights the role of imprinted paradigms in policymaking and regional development.

This study provides new insight into the effectiveness of different knowledge acquisition strategies for organizations at different positions in a production network. Component specialists and systems integrators require a different knowledge repertoire in terms of knowledge depth and knowledge breadth. We show that a greater reliance on inter-organizational partnering than on intra-organizational acquiring is effective in the acquisition of knowledge breadth rather than knowledge depth. And the positive effect of a greater reliance on inter-organizational partnering on knowledge breadth is particularly strong for system integrators.

This study examines the international performance of emerging economy multinational enterprises (EMNEs) from a strategic configuration perspective. We propose that the strategic patterns of EMNEs that deliver growth and/or profitability are characterized by different configurations of environment, strategy, and managerial resource factors. Therefore, identifying and assessing strategic configurations is key to understanding EMNEs’ international performance. Employing fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis, we analyze a multi-sourced dataset of Chinese firms’ outward investment and identify multiple equifinal strategic configurations that are associated with superior international performance in terms of sales growth and/or profitability. These findings inform the development of a taxonomy of EMNEs’ strategic configurations corresponding with three performance groups, namely profitable growth, profitable niche, and poor performers.

In this study, we propose and test the idea that a strong relationship between leader and follower will be associated with the subordinate’s burnout. We base the study on the leader–member exchange framework (LMX), resource exchange theory, and the job demands–resources model of burnout, and conceptualize that a strong LMX is associated with burnout in two ways: high LMX involves high job demands, which lead to exhaustion; low LMX involves low job resources, which leads to cynicism. We propose that the relationship between LMX and the two forms of burnout will be stronger when the leader is perceived to be low on moral integrity. Using a survey of 218 employees, we find support for the hypotheses. Implications for future research and managerial practices are discussed.

In this perspective article, I draw on transition research that has been developed to account for the transitions in many socio-technical systems within human society, such as energy, water, and food. I argue that many ideas developed in transition research can be applied to the ecosystem of contemporary business schools in China for its transformation. Using the multi-level perspective (MLP) from transition research as an analytic framework, I examine the socio-technical system of business schools in China for understanding the main forces that may shape a potential transition of the sector. I also draw on transition management theory and insights from research on the politics of transitions for important conditions that are required to enable a transition in this specific context.

The central theme of this commentary is that The Art of War is not only highly useful for Chinese business historically in particular, but also universally relevant for global business (including Chinese business as an integral part) in general at the present time and also in the future. We will discuss three issues to elaborate the above central theme: (1) the essence of The Art of War, (2) its historical relevance, and (3) its modern and global implications.