Business Commons^™

Subsidiary Staffing, Location Choice, And Shareholder Rights Effectiveness, Nathaniel C. Lupton, Vishaal Baulkaran, Yeonji No

Faculty Research, Scholarly, and Creative Activity

Institutional differences between countries influence strategic choices and performance of international businesses, but the unintended effects of legal institutions on firm legitimacy have received less attention. We argue that, while minority shareholder rights protection in an investment location does not directly protect shareholder interests abroad, the normative and mimetic effects it has on host country managers can mitigate agency problems. Using Japanese FDI established between 1986 and 2013 we find that (a) subsidiaries established in host countries with higher shareholder rights protection employ a smaller proportion of Japanese expatriates, (b) shareholder rights protection enhances a country’s FDI attractiveness, and (c) …