Political connections and firm export during institutional transition: evidence from Chinese private firms

Political connections influence firms’ international activities by changing their ability to negotiate with governments. Previous research has investigated the role PCs play in firms’ export but has failed to analyse the heterogeneity of PCs. This research disentangles the role that different types of PCs play in the PC-export relationship. Drawing on resource dependence theory and using a sample of 3586 firm-year observations from 1008 firms between 2008 and 2013, we find that the board of directors’ PCs negatively influence firms’ export. Exploration of the boundary conditions of the PCs-export relationship reveals that this negative impact is mainly caused by executive, as opposed to legislative PCs. We also find that the negative relationship between PCs and firm export is weakened when there is a broader range of PCs at different administrative levels among the board. This paper offers managerial insights for Chinese private firms developing their export strategies.