Damian Tobin; Laixiang Sun :
052_DP69 Inducement Mechanisms for Entrepreneurship in the State Sector: China's Telecommunication Industry as an Illustrative Case
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Abstract:
Employing the concept of bureaucratic entrepreneur this paper examines the possibility of bureaucrats in big businesses making the transformation from political- to corporate-styled entrepreneurs in a transition economy like China. It proposes an analytical framework which explicitly incorporates the constraints of weak institutions and the incremental nature of the transformation process. Using the case of China’s telecommunications sector it illustrates that by mobilizing a number of inducement mechanisms including market competition and international listing, bureaucrats are promoted to overcome institutional rigidities, draw on inherited organisational resources, and behave not unlike entrepreneurial capitalists. However their ability to fully benefit from the market mechanism is limited by the strong political incentives that remain.
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