Comparing the Three Coordination Forms and Hypotheses Testing

This chapter is dedicated to show data and analysis of comparisons between the types of links and to test some crucial hypotheses about topics addressed in the literature review discussed in Chap. 2 . The first purpose is achieved by comparing the four networks according to some fundamental aspects, and with a special focus on bridging companies and hybrid coordination, which, despite their very small quantitative presence, are nevertheless qualitatively very important and different from the other two. The fundamental aspects according to which we did our comparison of the three coordination forms are: (i) the distribution of bridging companies; (ii) the degree of assortativityAssortativity; and (iii) the degree of similarity of coordination patterns within and between each type of link. The chapter proceeds by testing seven hypotheses, which play an important role in Social Network AnalysisSocial Network Analysis (SNA) or in the theory of inter-firm networks or in the BINT form of coordination. Such hypotheses can be summarized through the following questions: (i) Does interlock coordination enhance a better economic performance? (ii) Could the connectivity-performance relation be nonlinear? (iii) Does proximity influence the propensity of interlock coordination? (iv) Is the Financial sectorFinancial sector the main partner for interlock coordination? (v) Are the continental EuropeContinental Europe countries more connected than Anglo-American ones to the Financial sector? (vi) Is there an association between a company’s size attributes and its interlock coordination propensity? (vii) Is the companies’ propensity to interlock country/size-specific?