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This study examines the impact of China’s mixed-ownership reform on the innovation of non-state-owned acquirers, with a particular focus on the impact on firms with high financing constraints, low-quality accounting information or less tangible assets.

We use a proprietary dataset of firms listed on the Shanghai and Shenzhen Stock Exchanges to investigate the impact of mixed ownership reform on non-state-owned enterprise (non-SOE) innovation. We employ regression analysis to examine the association between mixed ownership reform and firm innovation.

The study finds that non-state-owned firms can improve innovation by acquiring equity in state-owned enterprises (SOEs) under the reform. Eased financing constraints, lowered financing costs, better access to tax incentives or government subsidies, lowered agency costs, better accounting information quality and more credit loans are underlying the impact. Additionally, cross-ownership connections amongst non-SOE executives and government intervention strengthen the impact, whilst regional marketisation weakens it.

This study adds to the literature on the association between mixed ownership reform and firm innovation by focussing on the conditions under which this impact is stronger. It also sheds light on the policy implications for SOE reforms in emerging economies.

This policy paper compares the performance of state-owned enterprise (SOEs) versus private firms in selected emerging economies in Asia, focusing on a number of performance indicators. The indicators are internationally recognized quality innovation, product and/or service innovation, financing of operations, dealing with government regulations and labor performance. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, there has been no such comparative study for these indicators between SOEs and private firms and across countries. Most studies of SOEs have been national case studies. As such, they give us little knowledge of how a country compares with other countries at similar stages of economic development. A cross-country comparative analysis can help us identify broader trends and patterns.

The authors compare and discuss the performance of SOEs versus private firms in a number of emerging Asian countries, namely China, India, Indonesia, Malaysia and Vietnam. To do so, the authors use data from the 2018 World Bank Enterprise Survey (which is the latest available) for the period 2012–2015. The authors focus on a number of key performance indicators, namely internationally recognized quality innovation, product and/or service innovation, financing of operations, dealing with government regulations and labor performance.

The comparative analysis uncovers some interesting differences between the two types of firms. For example, somewhat surprisingly, SOEs tend to innovate more than private firms. However, the single most significant pattern the authors find is that in middle-income Asia both types of firms face formidable challenges with respect to doing business – e.g. scarcity of relevant training programs for employees. Therefore, the priority of policymakers must be to improve the overall business environment for all firms, regardless of their ownership structure.

The nature of this paper is a policy paper. This is because the data used in this study is survey data, conducted every four–five years (or more) for each country in the study and available for very few countries. As the data are not available for a continuous period of time, The authors could not conduct empirical research for this topic and thus made it a policy paper that presents a comparison across Asian countries as case studies.

The five selected Asian countries are interesting case studies for a comparative analysis since they are middle-income countries where SOEs play a significant role in the economy. Furthermore, state ownership is an important institutional dimension in emerging markets, and strong ties with the government can influence the performance of SOEs through various market and non-market channels. Despite the potential importance of the research theme, there is very little existing research on cross-country comparisons of the performance of SOEs vis-à-vis private firms. This could be explained by scarce data availability. With this in mind, the study attempts to shed some light on SOEs' performance and add to the rather limited literature.

This paper aims to establish a theoretical framework that can comprehensively explain the executive compensation in state-owned enterprises (SOEs) within the context of socialism with Chinese characteristics.

The author develops a theoretical framework for executive compensation in SOEs from the perspective of Marxist economics and points out that the executives in SOEs are engaged in management labor, and their compensation should adhere to the principle of distribution according to labor contribution.

Based on this theory, the author posits that the continuous upward trend of executive compensation in SOEs, is consistent with the trend of SOEs' ongoing expansion, which reflects a continuous improvement of SOE executives' management labor in both quality and quantity.

It is necessary to start with Marxist economic theory and scientifically study the issue of SOE executive compensation, adhere to the principle of distribution according to work in the context of a socialist market economy and implement the specific guideline of the Party Central Committee; only in this way can the long-term healthy development of SOEs be promoted continuously.

In this exploratory multiple case study, we aim to compare the internationalization of two state-owned enterprises (SOEs) owned by subnational governments with three owned by central governments in Latin America. This study provides a contextualized answer to the question: What are the differences in the internationalization of subnationally owned SOEs compared to central SOEs? This study finds that the speed and diversification of these two types of SOEs’ internationalization differ because they have a different expansion logic. Subnationally owned SOEs have a gradual and diversified expansion following market rules. Central government’s SOEs are specialized and take more drastic steps in their internationalization, which relates to non-market factors.

This study builds an exploratory qualitative comparative case analysis that uses multiple sources of data and information to develop a comprehensive understanding of SOEs through process tracing.

The study posits some assumptions that are confirmed in the case analysis. This study finds relevant differences between sub-national (SSOEs) and central authority (CSOEs’) strategies. SSOEs’ fewer resources and needs to increase income push them to follow a gradual market-driven internationalization and to diversify abroad. CSOEs non-gradual growth is justified by non-market factors (i.e. national politics). CSOEs do not diversify abroad due to the broader set of constituencies they have to face.

Given the exploratory comparative case study of this research, the findings are bounded by the particularities of the cases and their region (Latin America). This paper and its findings can be useful for theory building but it does not claim any generalization capacity.

This study adds complexity into the SOEs phenomenon by distinguishing between different types of SOEs. This paper contributes to the study of subnational phenomena and its effect in SOEs’ internationalization process, which is an understudied topic. To the authors’ best knowledge, this is among the first studies that explore subnational SOEs in Latin America.

A country’s institutional environment influences every facet of its business. This paper aims to identify institutional factors (state ownership, government attention on employment and employees’ educational background) that affect the asymmetric cost behavior in China.

Using 2,570 listed firms’ data between 2002 and 2015, we use empirical models to explore the effects of state ownership, government attention on employment and employees’ educational background on the asymmetric cost behavior in China.

This study found that the asymmetric cost behavior of central state-owned enterprises (CSOEs) is greater than local state-owned enterprises (LSOEs). Meanwhile, the empirical results show that government attention on employment is reflected in five-year government plans, and employees’ educational backgrounds are positively associated with asymmetric cost behavior.

This study contributes to the economic theory of sticky costs, institutional theory and asymmetric cost behavior literature by providing evidence that shows how government intervention and employee educational background limit the flexibility of corporate cost adjustments. Additionally, this study provides guidance to policymakers by showing how government long-term plans affect firm-level resource adjustment decisions.

Since the implementation of reform and opening up, China has made remarkable achievement in terms of economic reform and development. China’s path, as well as its experience, has simultaneously gained worldwide concerns. Developing the market economy against the backdrop of socialism brings conclusions from China’s achievement, deepens knowledge of China’s pathway and builds a socialist political economy with Chinese characteristics. That is the way to realise a basic socialist system, especially with regards to the organic integration of public ownership and market economy. This combination determines the future of socialism with Chinese characteristics and the success or failure of economic restructuring. Therefore, it requires consideration and in-depth study. The paper aims to discuss these issues.

The goal of economic restructuring is to establish and develop the socialist market economy. Its main content can be summarised in two parts. The first is the relationship between plan and market or government and market. The second is compatibility or combination of public ownership and market economy. The former is one of the superficial problems, relevant to resource allocation method or economic operation mechanism. The latter stems from deep-rooted problems, represented by ownership or the underlying economic system. These two work together to form the organic integrity of socialist market economy where both similarities and contrasts coexist.

The shared ideal of socialism with Chinese characteristics and the lofty goals of communism will then become empty words. In this sense we can say that, whether we can realise the unity and opposition between public ownership and market economy and better integrate advantages of socialist system with strengths of market economy, will to a large extent determine the future and destiny of the socialist market economy.

As previously mentioned, the relationship between plan and market or government and market are part of resource allocation methods or economic operation mechanism. Compatibility and combination, however, with public ownership and market economy are part of an ownership or basic economic system. Science reveals the nature and developmental law of the socialist market economy. An in-depth study must be conducted on the relationship between public ownership and market economy.

The authors estimated the hidden overhead (capital diversion or wasteful use of capital) of Vietnam state-owned enterprises (SOEs).

The authors used a panel data set of 10,200 Vietnam SOEs observed over the period 2010–2018. The authors modeled and estimated the hidden overhead by using a stochastic production frontier. The hidden overhead parameter is modelled as the technical inefficiency in the production function.

Vietnam SOEs are very capital intensive. The hidden overhead (or the wasteful use of capital) is very high with an average rate of 69%.

Alternative estimation methods should be used to account for endogeneity in production inputs. Lack of comparison with the Vietnam private firms.

The paper proposes an original way to quantify hidden overhead (or capital diversion) in the Vietnam SOEs. The finding (a capital diversion rate of 69% on average) is astonishing. It calls for an urgent and profound reform of the Vietnam SOEs.

The purpose of this paper is further leveraging the advantages of the basic socialist economic system and exploring the realistic way of transforming the advantages of the socialist economic system with Chinese characteristics into governance efficacy. At its Fourth Plenary Session, the 19th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC) elevated the socialist market economy system to China's basic economic system, further affirming the significant advantages embedded in the socialist market economy from an institutional perspective.

The essence of the basic socialist economic system consists of the ownership structure with public ownership as the mainstay, the income distribution system with distribution according to work as the mainstay and the socialist market economy, which are interrelated, supportive and reinforcing mutually, forming an organic whole.

Over the past 40 years of reform and opening-up, it has been proven through practice that the basic socialist economic system has played a fundamental role in guaranteeing rapid economic development and social stability. The system not only corresponds to the development level of the productive forces in the primary stage of socialism in China but also demonstrates its strengths in eliminating polarization between the poor and the rich and achieving common prosperity.

It is necessary to make the basic economic system more coordinated and consistent and be committed to the philosophy that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts to form a systemic synergy, so as to achieve synergistic enhancement of institutional advantages and governance efficacy.

In a state capitalist country such as China, an important influence on company reporting is the government, which can influence company decision-making. The nature and impact of how the Chinese government uses its symbolic power to promote corporate environmental reporting (CER) have been under-studied, and therefore, this paper aims to address this gap in the literature by investigating the various strategies the Chinese government uses to influence CER and how political ideology plays a key role.

This study uses discourse analysis to examine the annual reports and corporate social responsibility (CSR) reports from seven Chinese companies between 2007 and 2011. And the data analysis presented is informed by Bourdieu's conceptualisation of symbolic power.

The Chinese government, through exercising the symbolic power, manages to build consensus, so that the Chinese government's political ideology becomes the habitus which is deeply embedded in the companies' perception of practices. In China, the government dominates the field and owns the economic capital. In order to accumulate symbolic capital, companies must adhere to political ideology, which helps them maintain and improve their social position and ultimately reward them with more economic capital. The findings show that the CER provided by Chinese companies is a symbolic product of this process.

The paper provides contributions around the themes of symbolic power wielded by the government that influence not only state-owned enterprises (SOEs) but also firms in the private sector. This paper also provides an important contribution to understanding, in the context of a strong ideologically based political system (such as China), how political ideology influences companies' decision-making in the field of CER.

This paper examines the relationship between indigenous cultures and employee efficiency and how cronyism strengthens or weakens the relationship in the Ghanaian state-owned enterprises (SOEs) in response to the employee efficiency.

This study employs a quantitative approach by a cross-sectional survey to collect data from 400 workers in ten SOEs in Ghana. The analysis is done by using descriptive statistics and hierarchical regression techniques.

The findings indicate that showing gratitude is the predominant indigenous culture in the SOEs of Ghana while irregularity (absenteeism) is not dominant. Moreover, the practice of cronyism is high. It reveals that the indigenous cultures, except for respect for the elderly, relate negatively to employee efficiency, and cronyism strengthens the relationship between indigenous cultures and employee efficiency.

The paper contributes to the literature by providing empirical evidence that cronyism effectively strengthens the relationship between indigenous cultures and employee efficiency in a developing country. Strategies to discourage cronyism should be the key focus of public administrators, as well as mechanisms to limit the practice of adverse indigenous cultures.