Change your identity and fit in: an empirical examination of ownership structure change, firm performance and local knowledge spillovers in China

This paper evaluates the effectiveness of China's reform of state-owned enterprises (SOEs) by exploring if reformed SOEs have genuinely changed their identity and fitted in. Using a firm-level data set, we show that reformed SOEs have learned more from non-SOEs about how to promote economic performance. Empirical results also confirm that the effectiveness of the SOE reform is contingent on regional institutional contexts. Finally, this research contributes to the existing literature by bringing firm's financial performance to the forefront, and pointing out that knowledge spillovers derived from non-SOEs have impacts on the financial performance of reformed SOEs.