Host Country Network Integration, Home Country Government Involvement, and Corporate Overseas Survival: Evidence from China

Traditional overseas survival of enterprises theories can no longer meet the needs of enterprises’ internationalization. With Chinese companies gradually integrating into the global network, it becomes a problem to be solved urgently that how should companies use their host country network to improve overseas survival performance. To make up for this theoretical gap, based on social network theory and enterprise survival theory, we conducted a Cox survival function analysis on 479 overseas subsidiaries established by 213 Chinese listed companies from 2005 to 2015. The results show that host country network–integration density significantly negatively impacts a company’s overseas survival. Host country network–integration breadth positively impacts a company’s overseas survival. Government participation weakens the negative impacts of the host country’s network–integration density on a company’s overseas survival. At the same time, the heterogeneity of the host country affects a company’s overseas survival and the moderating effect of government participation. This article breaks through the limitations of the existing research using the monistic perspective, further improve the theoretical framework of the "survival determinism of overseas subsidiaries". The article also provides a new analytical perspective and theoretical paradigm for companies’ overseas survival from a network perspective through the exploration of the characteristics of overseas subsidiaries' integration into the host country network, which provides the possibility to promote Chinese overseas subsidiaries to build new advantages in the international competition.