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The purpose of this paper is to examine the impact of inter-group conflicts on the trust toward the acquirer and then further on cooperation intention after acquisitions in cross-border mergers and acquisitions (M&As), in the lens of the social classification theory. Two types of conflicts (realistic conflicts and symbolic conflicts) and a mediating mechanism (trust toward the acquirer) exhibit different effects on cooperation intention. The research further examines two moderating coping strategies (localizing management and assigning trustworthy expatriate managers) and tests their effectiveness in promoting trust toward the acquirer and increasing cooperation intention in cross-border M&As.

The research hypotheses were empirically tested in the context of post-acquisition of Chinese companies' cross-border M&As. In total, 600 questionnaires were provided to the research participants of 37 acquired firms/units from advanced economies of 12 Chinese companies, and 209 valid questionnaires were collected (the response rate is 34.83%). Confirmatory factor analysis was conducted to verify data validity and hierarchical multiple regression analyses were employed to test relational and moderating effects.

This research demonstrates that both realistic and symbolic conflicts can reduce the intention to cooperate, but the latter does not have a significant influence. The results also uncover that whether employees from acquired firms trust in their acquirers mediates the relationship between realistic conflicts and cooperation intention. Moreover, management localization (a measurement of whether local/original managers are retained with a high degree of freedom and autonomy after M&As) and trustworthiness of expatriate managers (a measurement of whether the assigned expatriate managers is trustworthy) positively moderate the relation between realistic conflicts and trust toward the acquirer. In addition, trust toward the acquirer mediates the interaction of realistic conflicts and management localization on the cooperation intention of the acquirers' employees.

This study examines how inter-organizational conflicts influence trust toward the acquirer and then cooperation intentions in the context of Chinese companies' M&A behavior of targets from developed countries and gain supportive evidence, which enriches the literature on the management of international M&As. By introducing two management localization and trustworthiness of expatriate managers into the model, the research deepens our knowledge of how to build trust toward the acquirer in cross-border M&As.

Based on the knowledge-based view, this paper aims to uncover the formation mechanism of marketing dynamic capabilities (MDCs) in international firms and to examine the moderating effects of learning culture, organizational structure and institutional distance on knowledge and knowledge integration.

This study used a survey of 223 Chinese international firms and applied partial least squares path modeling to test the conceptual model.

The results indicated that both market knowledge dimensions (i.e. knowledge breadth and knowledge depth) and knowledge integration constitute important sources of MDCs. Specifically, knowledge breadth has direct and indirect effect on MDCs, while knowledge depth has indirect effect on MDCs; knowledge integration mediates the effects of knowledge dimensions on MDCs. Formalization and institutional distance significantly moderate the relationship between the breadth of knowledge and knowledge integration, whereas the learning culture shows little moderating effect on the above paths.

The authors identify an association between the knowledge-based view and the dynamic capability view, suggesting that a firm’s essential capability of knowledge integration constitutes a genesis of MDCs. In addition, while knowledge breadth strengthens MDCs, knowledge depth carries no direct effect, indicating that the attributes of knowledge have asymmetric influences on MDCs. The indirect effects of knowledge on MDCs through knowledge integration vary under different organizational conditions and institutional distances.

This study aims to examine the relationship between renqing and purchase intentions and the mechanism of its impact in the Chinese business-to-business (B2B) context.

Renqing in China has played an important role in business relationships and has been receiving increased attention in both practice and theory. However, little is known about whether it can influence purchase intentions in a rational B2B condition. This research aims to examine the relationship between renqing and purchase intentions and the mechanism of its impact in the Chinese B2B context. Based on a survey of 1,010 industry buyers from 468 Chinese downstream buyer companies, the empirical findings indicate a positive relationship between renqing and purchase intentions and the mediating role of long-term orientation (LTO) for increasing purchase intentions. In addition, this study also finds that product involvement (PI) has a negative moderating effect on the relationship between renqing and purchase intentions, which means that renqing has a big positive effect on purchase intentions in low PI conditions. The results highlight several implications for B2B companies that sell products to Chinese enterprises.

The empirical findings indicate a positive relationship between renqing and purchase intentions and the mediating role of LTO for increasing purchase intentions. In addition, this study also finds that PI has a negative moderating effect on the relationship between renqing and purchase intentions, which means that renqing has a big positive effect on purchase intentions in low PI conditions.

First of all, by answering the research question, this study shows that renqing has a positive effect on purchase intentions in Chinese B2B context. Second, this study elucidates the influence mechanism of renqing on purchase intention and identifies the mediating effect of LTO and the moderating effect of PI.

The relationship between cultural novelty and cross-cultural adjustment of expatriates is often assumed to be negative and linear, while the empirical results for the relationship has been demonstrated by researchers as either negative, positive or absent.

The current research challenges the negative and linear assumption conceptually and empirically and tests a curvilinear relation between cultural novelty and general adjustment. The authors specifically propose and test a theoretical model whereby emotional stability moderates the curvilinear cultural novelty–general adjustment relationship such that the negative effect of cultural novelty on general adjustment is mitigated by emotional stability. Survey data are collected from expatriates recruited from two different host countries, India (N = 151) and China (N = 157).

The findings provide support for the curvilinear relationship between cultural novelty and general adjustment and the moderating effect of expatriates' emotional stability on this relationship.

This present study makes unique contributions to the expatriate management literature in at least two major ways: first, this study consolidates the otherwise contradictory findings and furthers the understanding on the nature of the effect of cultural novelty on expatriate adjustment. In addition, this research tests a cultural novelty–expatriate adjustment model using expatriate samples drawn from China and India, the two largest emerging markets that capture the demographic-profile changes pertaining to the newly emerging expatriation trends.

The purpose of the paper is to provide an optimization algorithm for a large-span suspendome which is a spatial prestressed structure with complex mechanical characteristics. The algorithm optimizes the cable tension, the dimension of components, the shape parameters of structure simultaneously.

With the span-to-rise ratio, the length of the strut, the cable tension, the cross-sectional area of the cables and the cross-sectional size of steel members as design variables and the gross mass of entire structure as the objective function, a mathematical optimization method was proposed in the paper based on the hybridization of full stress and particle swarm optimization.

By using the improved particle swarm optimization algorithm, the coupling problem of the three types of design variables was resolved: the cable tension and the size and shape of the structure were optimized simultaneously for a suspendome. A program was compiled according to this method and was used for a large-span suspendome. The optimization results of the suspendome demonstrates that the method proposed in the paper has the advantages of high efficiency, rapid convergence, and general applicability, which enable it to be used for the optimization of various types of prestressed steel structures.

The optimization program has more general parameters, which can be used to optimize suspendome with different spans, different lattice divisions and different cable-layouts. In addition to the strength of steel and cable, the integral stability of the members, the deformation of the structure and the geometrical and material nonlinearity were considered in this algorithm and program. The optimization result was compared to the design of an actual large-span suspendome engineering project.

The purpose of this paper is to attempt to realize a complete analysis at scenario deduction of unconventional incidents coupling based on the GERTS network method.

Starting from the manifestation of coupling objects, three types of emergency coupling are analyzed according to different rules, which are “events‐events” coupling, “event‐factors” coupling and “factors‐factors” coupling. Then the coupling mechanism for emergency is focused on analyzing, and the concepts of three types of coupling are put forward, at the same time, three quantitative models for coupling mechanisms are present. Also, a case was discussed to verify the analysis of coupling mechanism of emergency.

According to the types of factors rules, the classes of coupling of emergency have been divided into three types. The coupling mechanism of emergency can be used to describe the novel coupling models.

This research provides the method for coupling analysis in the scenario of unconventional incidents and guides the emergency managers to develop contingency strategies.

The paper succeeds in constructing a novel coupling model for emergency, and it could provide an effective tool for a quantitative study on unconventional incidents coupling.

The purpose of this paper is to provide an understanding of principal preparation and training in China by providing a background discussion of principal preparation in a number of countries. As an illustration, it provides an overview of the curriculum used in the initial preparation of school principals at Beijing Normal University.

The paper draws mainly on writing and research from China, Australia and the USA to explore principal preparation and training in China.

In addition to providing a rich description of principal preparation in China, the paper's main findings comprise seven key challenges that confront China as it endeavours to provide quality principal preparation. These challenges include China's diversity and uneven social, cultural and educational development; limited resources in some regions throughout China; the place and importance of study tours for principal preparation; the teaching approach used to train principals; the process used for assessing principal learning during their training programs; the limited transfer of learning from the classroom to the school environment; and the timing of training for principals.

Each of the challenges arising here raises important practical implications for developers of principal training programs.

The paper paints a picture of principal preparation in China and raises a number of issues and challenges with which it continues to grapple. Of note is that China is not alone in facing some of these ongoing concerns.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the means for enhancing the image and business legitimacy of a socially discredited industry – pawnbroking in pre-1949 China – are explored. Previous studies suggest companies operating within such industries cannot solely rely on hard marketing strategies “to maximize sales and profits as they do with soaps and shoes” (Davidson, 2003, p. 7). Instead, they must find soft strategies for improving company and industry image and legitimacy.

This research relies on qualitative analysis of historical data and documents.

Soft strategies deployed by Chinese pawnbrokers – such as interpretations, moral value advocacies and institutionalized arrangements – contributed substantially to improving pawnbroking’s image and business legitimacy.

Interconnections among ethical values, image, business legitimacy and select marketing strategies are clarified. The efficacy of historically analyzing previously implemented business strategies and their embedding contexts is discussed.

Strategies Chinese pawnbrokers used to mitigate their previously negative image and boost their business legitimacy suggest strategies current socially disapproved companies can use to improve their image and business legitimacy.

A historical analysis of pre-1949 Chinese pawnbroking can suggest soft marketing strategies for overcoming consumers’ negative company and industry impressions.

Over the past two decades, China’s stock market has experienced rapid growth. This period has seen the transplantation of many “OECD principles of corporate governance” into the Chinese corporate regulatory framework. These regulations are dominated by shareholder values. This paper aims to discover whether there is a causal relationship between the changes in China’s corporate governance and financial market growth.

This paper uses data from 1995-2014 to create a robust corporate index by looking at 52 variables and a financial index out of five financial market parameters. Subsequently, data are subject to a panel regression analysis, with the financial market index as the outcome variable, corporate governance index explanatory variable and a variety of economics, social and technological control variables.

This paper concludes that changes in corporate regulation have in fact had no statistically significant impact on China’s financial market growth, which must therefore be attributed to other factors.

The study is the first in the context of Chinese corporate governance impact studies to use Bayesian methodology to analyse a panel dataset. It uses OECD principles as the anchor to provide a clear picture of evolution of corporate governance for a 20-year period which is also longer than previous studies.

For the past two and half decades, there has been a marked shift in the corporate governance regulations around the world. The change is more remarkable in developing countries where countries with little or no corporate governance regime have adopted “world class” standards. While there can be a debate on whether law in books actually translates into law in action, in the meantime it might be interesting to analyse the law in books to understand how the corporate governance regime has evolved in the past 20 years. This paper quantitatively tracks 21 countries, most of them being developing and emerging economies, over a period of 20 years. The period covers 1995 to 2014; thus, it traverses the pre and post crisis period in 1999 and 2008. Thus, the paper also provides a snapshot of the macrolegal changes that the countries engage in hoping to stave off the next crisis. The paper uses over 50 parameters modelled on the OECD Principles of Corporate Governance. The paper confirms the suspicion that corporate governance norms around the developing economies are converging on shareholder primacy end of the continuum. The rate of convergence was highest just before the financial crisis of 2008 and has since then slowed down.

The paper uses data collected from experts. They filled up detailed questionnaire which quizzed them on the rules relating to corporate governance norms in their country and asked them to retrospectively check their data every five years for the past 20 years. This provided an excellent overview as to how the law has evolved in the past two decades on corporate governance. The data were then tabulated using a scoring sheet and then was put together using item response theory (IRT) which is a Bayesian method similar to factor analysis. The paper then follows a comparative approach using heatmaps to analyse the evolution of corporate governance in developing countries.

Corporate governance norms around the developing economies are converging on shareholder primacy end of the continuum. The rate of convergence was highest just before the financial crisis of 2008 and has since then slowed down.

This is the first time that corporate governance panel data analysis has been carried out on top developing countries across so many parameters for such a long period. This paper also uses Bayesian IRT modelling to analyse the evolution which is novel in its approach especially in the corporate governance literature. The paper thus provides a clear view on the evolution of corporate governance norms and how they are converging on a particular ideology.