Contingent political capital and international alliances: Evidence from South Korea

• 成果类型: Review
• 署名作者: Siegel, Jordan
• 署名单位: Harvard University
• 刊物名称: ADMINISTRATIVE SCIENCE QUARTERLY
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0001-8392
• DOI: 10.2189/asqu.52.4.621
• 发表日期: 2007
• 页码: 621-666
• 关键词: MARKET TRANSITION; firm performance; NETWORK FORMS; state; ORGANIZATIONS; ECONOMY; CHINA; Embeddedness; corporations; connections

摘要

Though prior research has suggested that a company's ties to political networks have only a positive value or no value, this study examines whether political network ties can also be a significant liability for companies. Analyzing South Korea as a representative emerging economy, I find that being tied through elite sociopolitical networks to the regime in power significantly increased the rate at which South Korean companies formed cross-border strategic alliances, but also that being tied through elite sociopolitical networks to the political enemies of the regime in power significantly decreased that rate. Results show that an unexpected change in political regime could quickly change a political liability into an asset and that network ties continued to be important determinants of cross-border alliance activity as South Korea proceeded with liberalization. The present study sheds further light on the so-called dark side of embeddedness by focusing on who is negatively targeted by having the wrong friends at the wrong time. Just as positive ties can lead to favor exchange and other benefits for companies, negative ties can lead companies to be the victims of discrimination, resource exclusion, and even occasional expropriation and sabotage between rival sociopolitical networks.