Institutional influences on board composition of international joint venture firms listing on emerging stock exchanges: Evidence from Africa

Varieties of institutional systems: A contextual taxonomy of understudied countries

“…Similarly, NBS is not wellsuited to depict many economic systems around the world where different types of state and family capitalism have recently emerged (Musacchio, Lazzarini, & Aguilera, 2015;Lane, 2008;Tsui-Auch & Lee, 2003). Our framework remedies this omission by adding new institutional dimensions to VOC and NBS particularly relevant to Asian, East European, African, Middle Eastern, and Latin American contexts (e.g., Hearn, 2015;Nölke & Vliegenthart, 2009;Witt & Redding, 2013;Schneider, 2009).…”

Determinants of Cash Holdings in Multinational Corporation's Foreign Subsidiaries: US Subsidiaries in China

“…We enrich the international corporate governance literature by showing that relatively strong US corporate governance can spill over to US MNCs' foreign subsidiaries through the installation of monitoring devices, such as subsidiary boards and US expatriate CEOs. As such we advance the literature on subsidiary governance (Du et al ., ; Hearn, ; Reuer et al ., ) by showing that an active subsidiary board can protect headquarters' interests and ensure that subsidiary cash is not expropriated. We also add to the burgeoning literature on corporate cash holdings in MNCs (e.g., Blouin et al ., ; Duchin, ; Foley et al ., ; Pinkowitz et al ., ) by identifying non‐tax reasons that MNCs allow for significant cash holdings in their overseas subsidiaries.…”

“…In the context of MNCs, boards of directors in foreign subsidiaries can monitor and control subsidiary managers on behalf of the headquarters. Moreover, subsidiary boards can provide headquarters with information about the environmental and strategic complexities faced by subsidiaries and consequently reduce headquarters-subsidiary information asymmetries (Du et al, 2011;Hearn, 2015;Reuer et al, 2014). This aspect may be particularly relevant in the Chinese institutional setting.…”

“…Our findings also support the perspective of Filatotchev and Wright () on the usefulness of agency theory in understanding corporate governance in MNCs. In addition, we add to the debate about the impact and effectiveness of the installation of a board of directors in MNC affiliates (Du, Deloof, & Jorissen, ; Hearn, ; Reuer, Klijn, & Lioukas, ). Finally, we extend prior research on the use of an expatriate CEO in foreign subsidiaries (Belderbos & Heijltjes, ; Gaur, Delios, & Singh, ; Riaz, Rowe, & Beamish, ) by illustrating that extended headquarters supervision via an expatriate CEO helps to reduce the agency problems of high cash holdings in subsidiaries with vital positions in innovation as well as in knowledge transfer.…”

‘When in Rome, do as the Romans do’? A call for more context sensitive research on boards of directors

“…The accumulation of different meanings and experiences of concepts could lead to novel understandings and scopes in studies of boards of directors. In fact, boards are influenced by and interact with the formal (e.g., legal origin) and informal institutions (e.g., culture) embedded in national and/or regional business systems (Zattoni et al, 2017;Hearn, 2015;Kim and Ozdemir, 2014). Furthermore, the concept of board capital, understood as the sum of human and social capital of the board members (Hillman and Dalziel, 2003), is also a reflection of the context in which boards are embedded.…”