Research Agenda
My research explores how interrelationships among private firms, state institutions, and nonprofit organizations are formed, reproduced, and disrupted across diverse political contexts. Broadly speaking, my research projects are motivated by two fundamental questions: What spurs corporate, state, and nonprofit actors to collaborate with each other when their strategic goals do not coincide? In a world of ever-growing economic and political uncertainties, how are boundaries of private, public, and civil society spheres contested and reconstituted? To address these puzzles comprehensively, I center on organizations in China and the United States, two economies that epitomize contemporary emerging and developed markets respectively. Philanthropy, government procurement, and social movements are among the substantive domains where I contextualize my theoretical pursuits. My research takes a mixed methods approach, which draws on qualitative techniques, regression frameworks, and computational text analysis.
My research explores how interrelationships among private firms, state institutions, and nonprofit organizations are formed, reproduced, and disrupted across diverse political contexts. Broadly speaking, my research projects are motivated by two fundamental questions: What spurs corporate, state, and nonprofit actors to collaborate with each other when their strategic goals do not coincide? In a world of ever-growing economic and political uncertainties, how are boundaries of private, public, and civil society spheres contested and reconstituted? To address these puzzles comprehensively, I center on organizations in China and the United States, two economies that epitomize contemporary emerging and developed markets respectively. Philanthropy, government procurement, and social movements are among the substantive domains where I contextualize my theoretical pursuits. My research takes a mixed methods approach, which draws on qualitative techniques, regression frameworks, and computational text analysis.
Dissertation: The Architecture of Grassroots-Oriented Corporate Philanthropy in China
Rustandy Center for Social Sector Innovation Best Dissertation Prize, 2021
Center for International Social Science Research Dissertation Fellowship, 2021
Center for East Asian Studies Dissertation Fellowship, 2021
Charles R. Henderson Research Grant, 2020
This dissertation explores why firms in China donate to grassroots nonprofit organizations that are not dependent organs of the state. This puzzle is a particularly intriguing one, given that prior research has established that companies primarily support state-led philanthropic initiatives in emerging economies where the government’s influence still pervades almost every corner of the business sector. Specifically, this three-paper dissertation asks three interrelated questions in detail: how corporate donations to grassroots nonprofits rather than state-controlled organizations create opportunity for firms to extend core business activities, what kinds of grassroots nonprofits tend to appeal to corporate donors, and finally what firms are less likely to allocate funds to state-led charities in the first place. In tackling these key questions, these papers not only elaborate a new corporate philanthropy strategy in emerging markets, but also identify stakes of corporate actors in social engagement beyond political and reputational gains. On the basis of a mixed methods approach drawing on interviews, participant observations, and quantitative analysis of original corporate donation datasets, this dissertation makes important contributions to theories of corporate sustainability, political connections, and commercialization.
Varieties of Competition: Nonprofit Status Hierarchies and Grassroots-Oriented Corporate Philanthropy in China. Job Market Paper.
Early Career Workshop Award, Society for the Advancement of Socio-Economics (SASE), 2021
Rustandy Center for Social Sector Innovation Research Funding, 2019-2021
Prior research has established that corporate philanthropic donations in emerging market economies are predominantly received by the government, yet little is known about why firms support grassroots nonprofit organizations that are not dependent organs of the state. Drawing on a comparative qualitative study of corporate donations flowing to three coastal cities of China, I document why this grassroots-oriented corporate philanthropy prevailed in some localities but not others. Rather than surrendering control over donation allocation to political authorities through collaborating with government-led charities, Chinese firms set up social initiatives as immediate extensions of core business activities when working with grassroots nonprofits. Such grassroots-oriented corporate giving was, nevertheless, conditioned by structural configurations of local nonprofit status hierarchies. In localities where constant exposure to nonprofit performance ratings systems induced intense interorganizational competition for higher standings, grassroots nonprofits were more incentivized to invest in technological and organizational capabilities that in turn provided means for firms to implement philanthropic programs on the ground. Besides, when local performance contests were characterized by ambiguous criteria, grassroots nonprofits were more amenable to corporate donors’ commercial goals which had been previously discounted by civil society. These findings inform a status hierarchy theory of social structure underlying corporate philanthropy, contributing more broadly to work on social status competition, corporate social responsibility, and political embeddedness.
The Make or Buy State: Cost Efficiency, Capacity Lock-In, and Partisan Asymmetry in Federal Contracting (with Elisabeth Clemens). In preparation for submission.
Social Sciences Research Center Research Support, 2019
Government contracting reconstitutes boundaries of the public sector through ever-deepening engagement of business firms and nonprofit organizations. Despite a legion of sociological accounts documenting implications of the contracting regime, it is rarely investigated in the first place when outsourcing of state functions is prioritized over “in-house” performing and how configuration of contracting award allocation varies over time. Regression analysis of U.S. federal contract spending across both granting administrative agencies and grantee states from 1979 to 2018 demonstrates that delegatory relationships are sustained by the need to incentivize contractors’ specialized capacities and to maneuver partisan politics. Instead of optimizing cost efficiency in service delivery, the federal government contracts out more responsibilities to nonstate organizations that are able to facilitate building of the administrative state and help absorb uncertainties within the political system. Furthermore, this capacity lock-in process is augmented by laissez-faire presidential administrations, which at the same time more readily leverage market transactions to expand electoral support for the presidential party.
Phantom of the Past: Resurgence of Totalitarian Discourses in Post-Socialist Propaganda (with Tong Ju). Working Paper.
In what circumstances do radical, ideology-infused discourses crafted by the totalitarian state re-emerge in its authoritarian successor’s propaganda agendas? Drawing on 272,000 articles from 1966 to 2003 in the People’s Daily, a newspaper known as the primary media outlet of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), this study makes contributions to theories of authoritarian responsiveness, shift of state discourse, and social movement. Qualitative archival research and computational analysis based upon Kullback-Leibler divergence, K-means clustering, and word frequency counting offer two interrelated findings. First, since the fall of the Cultural Revolution, within the Chinese government’s propaganda there has been a decline in the totalitarian discourses characterized by description of class-based struggles and communist utopias. Second, totalitarian discourses concur with domestic riots in the post-totalitarian period, suggesting that the state reverts to an old-fashioned but well-received totalitarian vocabulary in attempt to cope with political uncertainty, reaffirm government legitimacy, and solidify authoritarian system of the status quo.
Proximate Cohesion: Physical Copresence and Political Suturing in China’s Social Sector. In preparation for submission.
For organizational members with contrasting political preferences, how does political suturing – coordination for a common political agenda – become possible? Drawing on a multi-year matched ethnographic study of two social services organizations in China, this study explores the circumstances under which pro-state and liberal-minded workers manage to collectively formulate an organizational response to increasing penetration of the authoritarian state. As demonstrated by this article, political suturing is more likely to be achieved when organizational members with opposed political preferences have long been working in close physical proximity. Such physical copresence translates political division into lasting coordination, by urging members to 1) cultivate durable work interdependence through repeated encounters and 2) develop face-saving techniques of showing considerateness to one another in negotiations. These findings inform a micro-interactional perspective on consequences of political opinion division, with implications for research on intra-organizational political contestation, institutional change, and civil society.
Rustandy Center for Social Sector Innovation Best Dissertation Prize, 2021
Center for International Social Science Research Dissertation Fellowship, 2021
Center for East Asian Studies Dissertation Fellowship, 2021
Charles R. Henderson Research Grant, 2020
This dissertation explores why firms in China donate to grassroots nonprofit organizations that are not dependent organs of the state. This puzzle is a particularly intriguing one, given that prior research has established that companies primarily support state-led philanthropic initiatives in emerging economies where the government’s influence still pervades almost every corner of the business sector. Specifically, this three-paper dissertation asks three interrelated questions in detail: how corporate donations to grassroots nonprofits rather than state-controlled organizations create opportunity for firms to extend core business activities, what kinds of grassroots nonprofits tend to appeal to corporate donors, and finally what firms are less likely to allocate funds to state-led charities in the first place. In tackling these key questions, these papers not only elaborate a new corporate philanthropy strategy in emerging markets, but also identify stakes of corporate actors in social engagement beyond political and reputational gains. On the basis of a mixed methods approach drawing on interviews, participant observations, and quantitative analysis of original corporate donation datasets, this dissertation makes important contributions to theories of corporate sustainability, political connections, and commercialization.
Varieties of Competition: Nonprofit Status Hierarchies and Grassroots-Oriented Corporate Philanthropy in China. Job Market Paper.
Early Career Workshop Award, Society for the Advancement of Socio-Economics (SASE), 2021
Rustandy Center for Social Sector Innovation Research Funding, 2019-2021
Prior research has established that corporate philanthropic donations in emerging market economies are predominantly received by the government, yet little is known about why firms support grassroots nonprofit organizations that are not dependent organs of the state. Drawing on a comparative qualitative study of corporate donations flowing to three coastal cities of China, I document why this grassroots-oriented corporate philanthropy prevailed in some localities but not others. Rather than surrendering control over donation allocation to political authorities through collaborating with government-led charities, Chinese firms set up social initiatives as immediate extensions of core business activities when working with grassroots nonprofits. Such grassroots-oriented corporate giving was, nevertheless, conditioned by structural configurations of local nonprofit status hierarchies. In localities where constant exposure to nonprofit performance ratings systems induced intense interorganizational competition for higher standings, grassroots nonprofits were more incentivized to invest in technological and organizational capabilities that in turn provided means for firms to implement philanthropic programs on the ground. Besides, when local performance contests were characterized by ambiguous criteria, grassroots nonprofits were more amenable to corporate donors’ commercial goals which had been previously discounted by civil society. These findings inform a status hierarchy theory of social structure underlying corporate philanthropy, contributing more broadly to work on social status competition, corporate social responsibility, and political embeddedness.
The Make or Buy State: Cost Efficiency, Capacity Lock-In, and Partisan Asymmetry in Federal Contracting (with Elisabeth Clemens). In preparation for submission.
Social Sciences Research Center Research Support, 2019
Government contracting reconstitutes boundaries of the public sector through ever-deepening engagement of business firms and nonprofit organizations. Despite a legion of sociological accounts documenting implications of the contracting regime, it is rarely investigated in the first place when outsourcing of state functions is prioritized over “in-house” performing and how configuration of contracting award allocation varies over time. Regression analysis of U.S. federal contract spending across both granting administrative agencies and grantee states from 1979 to 2018 demonstrates that delegatory relationships are sustained by the need to incentivize contractors’ specialized capacities and to maneuver partisan politics. Instead of optimizing cost efficiency in service delivery, the federal government contracts out more responsibilities to nonstate organizations that are able to facilitate building of the administrative state and help absorb uncertainties within the political system. Furthermore, this capacity lock-in process is augmented by laissez-faire presidential administrations, which at the same time more readily leverage market transactions to expand electoral support for the presidential party.
Phantom of the Past: Resurgence of Totalitarian Discourses in Post-Socialist Propaganda (with Tong Ju). Working Paper.
In what circumstances do radical, ideology-infused discourses crafted by the totalitarian state re-emerge in its authoritarian successor’s propaganda agendas? Drawing on 272,000 articles from 1966 to 2003 in the People’s Daily, a newspaper known as the primary media outlet of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), this study makes contributions to theories of authoritarian responsiveness, shift of state discourse, and social movement. Qualitative archival research and computational analysis based upon Kullback-Leibler divergence, K-means clustering, and word frequency counting offer two interrelated findings. First, since the fall of the Cultural Revolution, within the Chinese government’s propaganda there has been a decline in the totalitarian discourses characterized by description of class-based struggles and communist utopias. Second, totalitarian discourses concur with domestic riots in the post-totalitarian period, suggesting that the state reverts to an old-fashioned but well-received totalitarian vocabulary in attempt to cope with political uncertainty, reaffirm government legitimacy, and solidify authoritarian system of the status quo.
Proximate Cohesion: Physical Copresence and Political Suturing in China’s Social Sector. In preparation for submission.
For organizational members with contrasting political preferences, how does political suturing – coordination for a common political agenda – become possible? Drawing on a multi-year matched ethnographic study of two social services organizations in China, this study explores the circumstances under which pro-state and liberal-minded workers manage to collectively formulate an organizational response to increasing penetration of the authoritarian state. As demonstrated by this article, political suturing is more likely to be achieved when organizational members with opposed political preferences have long been working in close physical proximity. Such physical copresence translates political division into lasting coordination, by urging members to 1) cultivate durable work interdependence through repeated encounters and 2) develop face-saving techniques of showing considerateness to one another in negotiations. These findings inform a micro-interactional perspective on consequences of political opinion division, with implications for research on intra-organizational political contestation, institutional change, and civil society.
