Saileshsingh Gunessee

Purpose: Chinese multinational enterprises’ (MNEs) unprecedented, aggressive cross-border mergers and acquisitions (CBMAs) have led to several studies examining Chinese CBMAs, which importantly has also led to some degree of “theorising”. This study aims to undertake a “non-theoretical” fact-finding exercise before any theorising and empirical “causal” examination for a better understanding of the phenomenon (the rise of Chinese CBMAs).Design/methodology/approach: This study uses a “stylised facts” approach which documents “empirical regularities” concerning Chinese CBMAs and thus guides new research questions.Findings: Several facts are documented. Firstly, both the value and frequency of Chinese CBMAs are catching up to greenfield investments, with CBMA deals being larger in scale but lower in frequency. Secondly, Chinese CBMAs show a global reach away from the regional orientation of their early years. Thirdly, Chinese MNEs are possibly transforming their value chain with industrial upgrading as an aim. Fourthly, Chinese “full” acquisitions of targets have surged, especially in OECD countries, suggestive of Chinese MNEs’ “radical” acquisition approaches.Originality/value: The gathered facts lend support to the view of the need for such fact-finding exercises to explicate and shed “new” light on the phenomenon (beyond our “current” views/beliefs). An understanding of the underlying trends beyond bare facts can also identify new knowledge, which can in turn provide new directions for research.

The Africa–China engagement continues to attract attention from scholars and the media, and is increasingly characterized by controversy and conjecture. This special issue sought to re-examine the engagement against this backdrop, to provide a forum where some important aspects of this engagement might be debated with reference to contemporary research, and to identify some possible avenues for further research. This introductory article thus seeks to reframe the debate with a view to interrogating conventional wisdom and to identify possible new directions for further research. It also provides a short summary of the two papers that follow.

China has emerged as an important partner for Africa. Not surprisingly, Chinese business and investment relations with Africa have been growing. This article contends that Africa offers a different proposition to Chinese business interests in non‐African developing economies. In this optic, it takes a “comparative” institution‐based view treating factors that determine Chinese multinationals' cross‐border merger and acquisition (CBMA) decisions as comparatively different for Africa to the rest of the developing world. From a panel data estimation of the number of Chinese CBMAs from 2007 to 2016, we find among market size, natural resources, strategic assets, labor productivity, and institutional governance, only natural resources and market size have a distinctive effect, with Chinese investors being more attracted to African natural resources than the African market. The drive for natural resources provides impetus for Chinese MNEs to choose CBMAs over greenfield investment, and through majority ownership to exercise control. Our inference is that Africa is “significantly” different from other developing regions, in terms of CBMAs, as Chinese multinationals have a strong motive to control access to natural resources.

Using new estimates of ad valorem equivalent of nontariff measures (NTMs) over time, this paper examines NTMs and tariffs’ relationship for a sample of 70 economies for 4,949 products at the 6‐digit harmonized system level over the period 2003–2015. A panel data methodology models the lagged adjustment of NTMs to tariffs, consistent with a causal relationship. Trade policy substitution is found when the models are estimated in both levels and changes; with this holding for both OECD and non‐OECD countries, but not for the agriculture sector in OECD countries. Overall, there is a fairly complete substitution between policy instruments in absolute terms.

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to provide quantitative evidence of natural disasters’ (NDs) effect on corporate performance and studies the mechanisms through which the supply chain moderates and mediates the link.Design/methodology/approach: Using two major NDs as quasi-experiment, namely the 2011 Japanese earthquake-tsunami (JET) and Thai flood (TF), and data over the period 2010Q1-2013Q4, effect of these events on end assemblers’ performance is studied, with a focus on the personal computer (PC) supply chain. The moderating influence of delivery and sourcing – as supply chain flexibility and agility – are examined through end assemblers’ and suppliers’ inventory. The suppliers’ mediating role is captured as disruption in obtaining PC components through their sales.Findings: Only JET had any negative effect, further quantified as short-term and long-term. The TF instead portrays an insignificant but positive aftermath, which is construed as showing learning from experience and adaptability following JET. Inventory matters, but differently for the two events, and suppliers only exhibit a moderating influence on the assemblers’ disaster-performance link.Originality/value: NDs, as catastrophic vulnerabilities, are distinct from other vulnerabilities in that they are hard to predict and have significant impact. Since little is known about the impact of NDs on firm performance and how supply chain mechanisms moderate or mediate their impact, they should be distinctly modelled and empirically studied from other vulnerabilities. This paper sheds light on supply chain resilience to such events with the role of dynamic capabilities.

Chinese scientific output has increased dramatically in recent years, but its internal spatial structure has received scant attention. Estimated gravity models of intercity scientific coauthorships show that there are two types of spatial political bias in China, apart from the expected mass and distance effects. Intercity coauthorships involving Beijing are more common than Beijing's output volume and location would imply, and this Beijing bias is increasing over time. The second type of spatial political bias is greater intraprovincial collaboration than is accounted for by size and distance. The geography of Chinese science is thus not only monocentric as regards overall scientific output, but also exhibits unusually hierarchical collaboration patterns. Unlike in Europe and North America, national and regional capitals are becoming ever more important as scientific coordination centers.

This paper examines a strategic tax competition model. I study the effect of different preferences for the public good (and resulting payoff changes) on choices, where policy makers choose one of four tax rates. Three tax competition games are derived with symmetrically low preferences and payoffs; asymmetric preferences and payoffs; and symmetrically high preferences and payoffs. Policy makers are paired both randomly and repeatedly. I investigate the effect of (1) asymmetric needs for the public good (and resulting payoff advantage) and (2) symmetrically higher public good needs. I establish that preference for the public good does affect tax choices but not always as predicted by theory. My results show (1) fiercer competition for symmetrically higher public good needs, (2) difference in behavior of policy makers under asymmetric preferences, and (3) that under repeated interactions, cooperation can be sustained only when countries have symmetric public good needs, with almost no cooperation emerging for asymmetric preferences.