NETWORK STABILITY: THE ROLE OF GEOGRAPHY AND BROKERAGE STRUCTURE INEQUITY

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Kumar, Pankaj; Zaheer, Akbar
• 署名单位: Virginia Polytechnic Institute & State University; University of Minnesota System; University of Minnesota Twin Cities
• 刊物名称: ACADEMY OF MANAGEMENT JOURNAL
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0001-4273
• DOI: 10.5465/amj.2020.0903
• 发表日期: 2022
• 页码: 1139-1168
• 关键词: MANHATTAN HOTEL INDUSTRY; STRATEGIC ALLIANCES; social-structure; CO-LOCATION; KNOWLEDGE; biotechnology; INNOVATION; firm; performance; COMPETITION

摘要

While the outcomes of brokerage have been extensively investigated, the issue of when and why brokerage structures persist or decay has attracted relatively little research interest. Taking the perspective of the disconnected firms to whom the broker is tied, the alters, we argue that structurally induced inequity in opportunity, or the broker's potential recombination of a larger share of alters' knowledge than vice versa, exerts a destabilizing effect on brokerage persistence. Furthermore, geographic distance, via its role in the cognitive classification of rivals, enhances alters' tolerance for inequity and contingently weakens the destabilizing effect of structural inequity in knowledge recombination opportunity that benefits the broker. Specifically, we postulate about the socio-cognitive prismatic nature of geography in that geographic distance makes it less likely that alter firms see the broker as a rival and are hence less sensitive to inequity. We test our hypotheses with 260 broker and 517 alter firms in the global biopharmaceutical industry from 1985 to 2005, yielding 53,377 triad-year observations using a complementary log-log discrete time survival estimator. Our results support the hypotheses, highlighting the interplay between structural inequity and geographic distance in explaining brokerage decay.