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Political Activism and Firm Innovation

Author

Listed:
  • Alexei Ovtchinnikov

    (HEC Paris - Ecole des Hautes Etudes Commerciales)

  • Syed Walid Reza
  • Yanhui Wu

Abstract

Political activism positively affects firm innovation. Firms that support more politicians, politicians on Congressional committees with jurisdictional authority over the firms' industries and politicians who join those committees innovate more. We employ instrumental variables estimation and a natural experiment to show a causal effect of political activism on innovation. The results are consistent with the hypothesis that political activism is valuable because it helps reduce political uncertainty, which, in turn, fosters firm innovation. Also consistent with this hypothesis, we show that politically active firms successfully time future legislation and set their innovation strategies in expectation of future legislative changes. Keywords: political contributions, innovation, investment policy, policy uncertainty

Suggested Citation

  • Alexei Ovtchinnikov & Syed Walid Reza & Yanhui Wu, 2014. "Political Activism and Firm Innovation," Working Papers hal-02058269, HAL.
    • Handle: RePEc:hal:wpaper:hal-02058269
    DOI: 10.2139/ssrn.2471058
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    Citations

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    Cited by:

    1. Qi‐an Chen & Shuxiang Tang & Yuan Xu, 2022. "Do government subsidies and financing constraints play a dominant role in the effect of state ownership on corporate innovation? Evidence from China," Managerial and Decision Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 43(8), pages 3698-3714, December.
    2. Hinh Khieu & Nam H. Nguyen & Hieu V. Phan & Jon A. Fulkerson, 2023. "Political Corruption and Corporate Risk-Taking," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 184(1), pages 93-113, April.
    3. Shen, Huayu & Zheng, Shaofeng & Xiong, Hao & Tang, Wenjie & Dou, Jiachun & Silverman, Henry, 2021. "Stock market mispricing and firm innovation based on path analysis," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 95(C), pages 330-343.
    4. Ferguson, Andrew & Hu, Wei & Lam, Peter, 2022. "Political uncertainty and deal structure: Evidence from Australian mining project acquisitions," Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 73(C).
    5. Taehyun Kim & Quoc H Nguyen, 2020. "The Effect of Public Spending on Private Investment," Review of Finance, European Finance Association, vol. 24(2), pages 415-451.
    6. Onal, Bunyamin, 2023. "Do politically connected directors play an information role under policy uncertainty?," Journal of Multinational Financial Management, Elsevier, vol. 68(C).
    7. Dane M. Christensen & Arthur Morris & Beverly R. Walther & Laura A. Wellman, 2023. "Political information flow and management guidance," Review of Accounting Studies, Springer, vol. 28(3), pages 1466-1499, September.
    8. Jooyoung Kwak & Shih-Yi Chang & Meihui Jin, 2023. "The effects of political ties on innovation performance in China: Differences between central and local governments," Asian Business & Management, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 22(1), pages 300-329, February.
    9. Croci, Ettore & Pantzalis, Christos & Park, Jung Chul & Petmezas, Dimitris, 2017. "The role of corporate political strategies in M&As," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 43(C), pages 260-287.
    10. Dorottya Sallai & Gerhard Schnyder & Daniel Kinderman & Andreas Nölke, 2024. "The antecedents of MNC political risk and uncertainty under right-wing populist governments," Journal of International Business Policy, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 7(1), pages 41-63, March.
    11. Almaghrabi, Khadija S. & Tsalavoutas, Ioannis, 2022. "Political spending, related voluntary disclosure, and the cost of public debt," Journal of Financial Stability, Elsevier, vol. 63(C).
    12. DeBoskey, D.G. & Luo, Yan & Wang, Jeff J., 2018. "Do specialized board committees impact the transparency of corporate political disclosure? Evidence from S&P 500 companies," Research in Accounting Regulation, Elsevier, vol. 30(1), pages 8-19.
    13. Dokas, Ioannis & Panagiotidis, Minas & Papadamou, Stephanos & Spyromitros, Eleftherios, 2023. "Does innovation affect the impact of corruption on economic growth? International evidence," Economic Analysis and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 77(C), pages 1030-1054.
    14. Sallai, Dorottya & Schnyder, Gerhard & Kinderman, Daniel & Nölke, Andreas, 2023. "The antecedents of MNC political risk and uncertainty under right-wing populist governments," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 118668, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    15. Chen, Tao & Park, Hyeyoun & Rajwani, Tazeeb, 2024. "Diverse human resource slack and firm innovation: Evidence from politically connected firms," International Business Review, Elsevier, vol. 33(2).
    16. Jiao, Anqi & Lu, Juntai, 2024. "Buffing firm innovation by lobbying," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 85(C).
    17. Bian, Wenlong & Ji, Yang & Wang, Peng, 2021. "Political connections and banks' credit smoothing behavior: Incentives and costs," Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 68(C).
    18. Nian Li & Chunling Li & Runsen Yuan & Muhammad Asif Khan & Xiaoran Sun & Nosherwan Khaliq, 2021. "Investor Attention and Corporate Innovation Performance: Evidence from Web Search Volume Index of Chinese Listed Companies," Mathematics, MDPI, vol. 9(9), pages 1-23, April.
    19. Hedy Jiaying Huang & Ahsan Habib & Sophia Li Sun & Ying Liu & Huiting Guo, 2021. "Financial reporting and corporate innovation: a review of the international literature," Accounting and Finance, Accounting and Finance Association of Australia and New Zealand, vol. 61(4), pages 5439-5499, December.
    20. Christensen, Dane M. & Jin, Hengda & Lee, Joshua A. & Sridharan, Suhas A. & Wellman, Laura A., 2023. "Corporate political activism and information transfers," Working Papers 334, The University of Chicago Booth School of Business, George J. Stigler Center for the Study of the Economy and the State.
    21. Dane M. Christensen & Hengda Jin & Suhas A. Sridharan & Laura A. Wellman, 2022. "Hedging on the Hill: Does Political Hedging Reduce Firm Risk?," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 68(6), pages 4356-4379, June.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    political contributions; innovation; investment policy; policy uncertainty;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D72 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - Political Processes: Rent-seeking, Lobbying, Elections, Legislatures, and Voting Behavior
    • D80 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - General
    • G31 - Financial Economics - - Corporate Finance and Governance - - - Capital Budgeting; Fixed Investment and Inventory Studies
    • G38 - Financial Economics - - Corporate Finance and Governance - - - Government Policy and Regulation
    • O31 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Innovation and Invention: Processes and Incentives
    • O38 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Government Policy

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