IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/hig/wpaper/55man2017.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Contributions Towards a Renewed Debate on Multinational Headquarter-Subsidiary Relations:Subsidiary Mandates, Corporate Parenting Styles and Collective Psychological Contracts

Author

Listed:
  • Igor B. Gurkov

    (National Research University Higher School of Economics)

  • Michael J. Morley

    (University of Limerick)

Abstract

We argue that multinational headquarter-subsidiary relations in international business remain undertheorized as a result of a dearth of constructs that capture and reflect the complex facets of such relations. Based on data from 40 interviews conducted with senior managers in 25 multinational corporations designed to chart both the evolving competitive arena in which they operate and, against this backdrop, the changing nature of the corporations architecture and network of headquarter-subsidiary relations, we make the case for a focus on subsidiary mandates, corporate parenting styles and collective psychological contracts, three constructs which we believe offer explanatory power in landscaping the contemporary nature of these relations. We suggest that insights garnered from these constructs may offer the prospect of charting and explaining a greater range of issues pertinent to headquarter-subsidiary relationships and, from a theoretical perspective, could serve to renew aspects of the debate on such relationships. Arising from this we present a series of propositions designed to explicate the value of these constructs in opening up potential lines of enquiry in multinational headquarter-subsidiary relations

Suggested Citation

  • Igor B. Gurkov & Michael J. Morley, 2017. "Contributions Towards a Renewed Debate on Multinational Headquarter-Subsidiary Relations:Subsidiary Mandates, Corporate Parenting Styles and Collective Psychological Contracts," HSE Working papers WP BRP 55/MAN/2017, National Research University Higher School of Economics.
    • Handle: RePEc:hig:wpaper:55man2017
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://wp.hse.ru/data/2017/04/19/1169065877/55MAN2017.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Meyer, Klaus E. & Thein, Htwe Htwe, 2014. "Business under adverse home country institutions: The case of international sanctions against Myanmar," Journal of World Business, Elsevier, vol. 49(1), pages 156-171.
    2. Heather Berry & Mauro F Guillén & Nan Zhou, 2010. "An institutional approach to cross-national distance," Journal of International Business Studies, Palgrave Macmillan;Academy of International Business, vol. 41(9), pages 1460-1480, December.
    3. Jones, Chris & Temouri, Yama, 2016. "The determinants of tax haven FDI," Journal of World Business, Elsevier, vol. 51(2), pages 237-250.
    4. Igor Gurkov, 2016. "Human resource management in Russian manufacturing subsidiaries of multinational corporations," Post-Communist Economies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 28(3), pages 353-372, July.
    5. Dikova, Desislava, 2009. "Performance of foreign subsidiaries: Does psychic distance matter?," International Business Review, Elsevier, vol. 18(1), pages 38-49, February.
    6. Dörrenbächer, Christoph & Gammelgaard, Jens, 2010. "Multinational corporations, inter-organizational networks and subsidiary charter removals," Journal of World Business, Elsevier, vol. 45(3), pages 206-216, July.
    7. Eero Vaara & Richard Whittington, 2012. "Strategy as practice : Taking Social Practices Seriously," Post-Print hal-02276672, HAL.
    8. Buckley, Peter J., 2009. "The impact of the global factory on economic development," Journal of World Business, Elsevier, vol. 44(2), pages 131-143, April.
    9. Günter K Stahl & Rosalie L Tung & Tatiana Kostova & Mary Zellmer-Bruhn, 2016. "Widening the lens: Rethinking distance, diversity, and foreignness in international business research through positive organizational scholarship," Journal of International Business Studies, Palgrave Macmillan;Academy of International Business, vol. 47(6), pages 621-630, August.
    10. Chini, Tina & Ambos, Björn & Wehle, Katrin, 2005. "The Headquarters-subsidiaries Trench:: Tracing Perception Gaps Within The Multinational Corporation," European Management Journal, Elsevier, vol. 23(2), pages 145-153, April.
    11. Anoop Madhok, 1995. "Revisiting Multinational firm's Tolerance for Joint Ventures: A Trust-Based approach," Journal of International Business Studies, Palgrave Macmillan;Academy of International Business, vol. 26(1), pages 117-137, March.
    12. Richard A. Bettis & Constance E. Helfat & J. Myles Shaver & Emilie R. Feldman & Raphael(Raffi) Amit & Belén Villalonga, 2016. "Corporate divestitures and family control," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 37(11), pages 2389-2389, November.
    13. Birkinshaw, Julian & Holm, Ulf & Thilenius, Peter & Arvidsson, Niklas, 2000. "Consequences of perception gaps in the headquarters-subsidiary relationship," International Business Review, Elsevier, vol. 9(3), pages 321-344, June.
    14. Roy Y J Chua & Michael W Morris & Paul Ingram, 2009. "Guanxi vs networking: Distinctive configurations of affect- and cognition-based trust in the networks of Chinese vs American managers," Journal of International Business Studies, Palgrave Macmillan;Academy of International Business, vol. 40(3), pages 490-508, April.
    15. Brenes, Esteban R. & Segura, Melina & Pichardo, Caleb A., 2015. "Agropecuaria Montelíbano," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 68(12), pages 2517-2526.
    16. Heather Berry, 2010. "Why Do Firms Divest?," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 21(2), pages 380-396, April.
    17. Eero Vaara & Richard Whittington, 2012. "Strategy as practice : Taking Social Practices Seriously," Post-Print hal-02312709, HAL.
    18. Ciabuschi, Francesco & Forsgren, Mats & Martín Martín, Oscar, 2012. "Headquarters involvement and efficiency of innovation development and transfer in multinationals: A matter of sheer ignorance?," International Business Review, Elsevier, vol. 21(2), pages 130-144.
    19. Conroy, Kieran M. & Collings, David G., 2016. "The legitimacy of subsidiary issue selling: Balancing positive & negative attention from corporate headquarters," Journal of World Business, Elsevier, vol. 51(4), pages 612-627.
    20. Coelho, Bruno Viana & de Mello, Renato Cotta & da Rocha, Angela, 2014. "Leblon Cachaça: A born global in a traditional industry," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 67(4), pages 567-575.
    21. Song, Sangcheol, 2014. "Unfavorable Market Conditions, Institutional and Financial Development, and Exits of Foreign Subsidiaries," Journal of International Management, Elsevier, vol. 20(3), pages 279-289.
    22. Ludwig Bstieler & Martin Hemmert, 2010. "Trust formation in Korean new product alliances: How important are pre-existing social ties?," Asia Pacific Journal of Management, Springer, vol. 27(2), pages 299-319, June.
    23. Geoffrey Wood & Mehmet Demirbag (ed.), 2012. "Handbook of Institutional Approaches to International Business," Books, Edward Elgar Publishing, number 14207.
    24. Graham, John R. & Harvey, Campbell R. & Puri, Manju, 2015. "Capital allocation and delegation of decision-making authority within firms," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 115(3), pages 449-470.
    25. Heather Berry, 2013. "When Do Firms Divest Foreign Operations?," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 24(1), pages 246-261, February.
    26. Emilie R. Feldman & Raphael(Raffi) Amit & Belén Villalonga, 2016. "Corporate divestitures and family control," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 37(3), pages 429-446, March.
    27. Anne-Wil Harzing & Markus Pudelko, 2016. "Do We Need to Distance Ourselves from the Distance Concept? Why Home and Host Country Context Might Matter More Than (Cultural) Distance," Management International Review, Springer, vol. 56(1), pages 1-34, February.
    28. Luo, Yadong, 2005. "Toward coopetition within a multinational enterprise: a perspective from foreign subsidiaries," Journal of World Business, Elsevier, vol. 40(1), pages 71-90, February.
    29. Rugman, Alan M., 2005. "A further comment on the myth of globalization," Journal of International Management, Elsevier, vol. 11(3), pages 441-445, September.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Igor Gurkov & Michael J. Morley, 2022. "Anticipated Trajectories Of Development In Global Industries And The Evolution Of Corporate Parenting Styles Of Multinational Corporations," HSE Working papers WP BRP 65/MAN/2022, National Research University Higher School of Economics.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Igor Gurkov & Evgeniy Morgunov & Zokirzhon Saidov & Alexander Arshavsky, 2018. "Perspectives of Manufacturing Subsidiaries of Foreign Companies in Russia: Frontier, Faubourg or Sticks?," Foresight and STI Governance (Foresight-Russia till No. 3/2015), National Research University Higher School of Economics, vol. 12(2), pages 24-35.
    2. Wu, Yan & Strange, Roger & Shirodkar, Vikrant, 2021. "MNE divestments of foreign affiliates: Does the strategic role of the affiliate have an impact?," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 128(C), pages 266-278.
    3. Tippmann, Esther & Sharkey Scott, Pamela & Reilly, Marty & O’Brien, Donal, 2018. "Subsidiary coopetition competence: Navigating subsidiary evolution in the multinational corporation," Journal of World Business, Elsevier, vol. 53(4), pages 540-554.
    4. Ding, Yang, 2021. "Antecedents and implications of legacy divestitures," Other publications TiSEM f4d5766f-6a5b-43a3-94df-1, Tilburg University, School of Economics and Management.
    5. Xu, Kai & Hitt, Michael A. & Brock, David & Pisano, Vincenzo & Huang, Lulu S.R., 2021. "Country institutional environments and international strategy: A review and analysis of the research," Journal of International Management, Elsevier, vol. 27(1).
    6. GuiDeng Say & Gurneeta Vasudeva, 2020. "Learning from Digital Failures? The Effectiveness of Firms’ Divestiture and Management Turnover Responses to Data Breaches," Strategy Science, INFORMS, vol. 5(2), pages 117-142, June.
    7. Jiménez, Alfredo & Salvaj, Erica & Lee, Jeoung Yul, 2018. "Policy risk, distance, and private participation projects in Latin America," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 88(C), pages 123-131.
    8. Xie, En & Reddy, K.S. & Liang, Jie, 2017. "Country-specific determinants of cross-border mergers and acquisitions: A comprehensive review and future research directions," Journal of World Business, Elsevier, vol. 52(2), pages 127-183.
    9. Nguyen, Pascal & Rahman, Nahid & Zhao, Ruoyun, 2013. "Ownership structure and divestiture decisions: Evidence from Australian firms," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 30(C), pages 170-181.
    10. Mujtaba Kayani, Ghulam & Saeed, Abubakr & Riaz, Hammad & Ali, Ashiq, 2023. "Political power shift in host markets and firm asset retrenchment: Evidence from Chinese MNCs," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 161(C).
    11. Viacheslav Iurkov & Gabriel R G Benito, 2020. "Change in domestic network centrality, uncertainty, and the foreign divestment decisions of firms," Journal of International Business Studies, Palgrave Macmillan;Academy of International Business, vol. 51(5), pages 788-812, July.
    12. Tatiana Kostova & Sjoerd Beugelsdijk & W. Richard Scott & Vincent E. Kunst & Chei Hwee Chua & Marc Essen, 2020. "The construct of institutional distance through the lens of different institutional perspectives: Review, analysis, and recommendations," Journal of International Business Studies, Palgrave Macmillan;Academy of International Business, vol. 51(4), pages 467-497, June.
    13. Igor Gurkov & Michael J. Morley, 2022. "Anticipated Trajectories Of Development In Global Industries And The Evolution Of Corporate Parenting Styles Of Multinational Corporations," HSE Working papers WP BRP 65/MAN/2022, National Research University Higher School of Economics.
    14. Arte, Pratik & Larimo, Jorma, 2019. "Taking stock of foreign divestment: Insights and recommendations from three decades of contemporary literature," International Business Review, Elsevier, vol. 28(6), pages 1-1.
    15. Wang, Yi & Larimo, Jorma, 2020. "Survival of full versus partial acquisitions: The moderating role of firm’s internationalization experience, cultural distance, and host country context characteristics," International Business Review, Elsevier, vol. 29(1).
    16. Schmid, David & Morschett, Dirk, 2020. "Decades of research on foreign subsidiary divestment: What do we really know about its antecedents?," International Business Review, Elsevier, vol. 29(4).
    17. Coudounaris, Dafnis N. & Orero-Blat, María & Rodríguez-García, María, 2020. "Three decades of subsidiary exits: Parent firm financial performance and moderators," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 110(C), pages 408-422.
    18. Nguyen, Ha Thi Thu & Larimo, Jorma & Ghauri, Pervez, 2022. "Understanding foreign divestment: The impacts of economic and political friction," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 139(C), pages 675-691.
    19. Lai, Christine & Singh, Barjinder & Alshwer, Abdullah A. & Shaffer, Margaret A., 2014. "Building and Leveraging Interpersonal Trust Within and Across MNE Subsidiaries: A Social Exchange Perspective," Journal of International Management, Elsevier, vol. 20(3), pages 312-326.
    20. Ozkan, Kubilay S.L., 2020. "International market exit by firms: Misalignment of strategy with the foreign market risk environment," International Business Review, Elsevier, vol. 29(6).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Multinational Corporations; Headquarter-subsidiary Relations; Subsidiary Mandates; Collective Psychological Contacts; Corporate Parenting Styles.;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • F23 - International Economics - - International Factor Movements and International Business - - - Multinational Firms; International Business
    • L23 - Industrial Organization - - Firm Objectives, Organization, and Behavior - - - Organization of Production

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:hig:wpaper:55man2017. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Shamil Abdulaev or Shamil Abdulaev (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/hsecoru.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.