RESEARCH
PUBLICATIONS/ADVANCED PROJECTS
[1] The Half-Life of Political Capital: An Examination of the Temporal Effects of Board Political Connections (Hawk, A; Lahiri, D; Pacheco de Almeida, G; all authors contributed equally): Published in Strategic Management Journal
Does corporate political activity (CPA) help sustain performance? Prior literature does not address this question, only whether CPA increases profits – with mixed results over short timescales. We theorize about how political capital affects the regression-to-the-mean of profits through firm and industry persistence mechanisms. Using data on over 6,000 firms from 14 democratic countries, we estimate time-varying, firm-specific performance persistence coefficients with random-coefficient models – and profit volatility measures. Triangulation over various identification methods suggests that the half-life of political capital is shorter than expected, and also compared with other strategy interventions. Political connections are marginally effective at sustaining performance and reducing volatility, delaying profit convergence by only 0.180 years – and with no effect beyond seven years. These modest CPA benefits are further curbed by legislative constraints and political stability.
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[2] Social Movement Activism on Politically Connected Companies [Real Title Withheld] (Lahiri, D; Bonardi, J.P.): Preparing for submission
​Do board political connections (BPC) influence firms’ perception among social movement organizations? Our theory is premised upon the attention-based view of the firm which argues that not all events in the firms’ environment, including actions by social movement organizations, are considered worthy of attention by its decision makers. We argue that the presence of BPC increases the firms’ sensitivity to the demands of social stakeholders because politicians tend to be office motivated and relies on the support of the society for retaining their position. As a result, such firms are more likely to be responsive to activism – thereby making them a soft target for activists’ actions. Further, in line with the theorized mechanisms, we argue that firms with BPC affiliated with liberal political parties will face a higher risk of actions because the demands of social movement organizations tend to resonate more with the constituents of liberal political parties. However, societal polarization will negatively moderate the relationship between BPC partisan affiliation and likelihood of activist actions because polarization increases homophily between like ideologies and animosity between opposing ideologies. We test our predictions in the US context in the timeframe 2011 to 2019, using a database that reports extensively on actions initiated by several hundred social movement organizations. Triangulating over different identification methods and model specifications, we find broad support for our theoretical predictions.
[3] Firms' Public and Private Politics (Lahiri, D): Advanced analysis and drafting
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[4] Forms of CPA and Their Temporal Impacts on Firm Performance (Equal contribution by Hawk, A; Lahiri, D; Pacheco de Almeida, G): Advanced analysis and drafting
EARLY STAGE PROJECTS
[1] Shifts in firms’ Corporate Political Strategies in the face of Geo-political Tensions (Lahiri, D): Theorization and data cleaning.
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[2] Firms’ Internationalization Strategies in response to forces of Deglobalization: The Role of Corporate Political Activity and Organizational Political Ideology (Lahiri, D): Theorization and data cleaning.
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[3] The (Geo)politics of Accelerating Technology Transfer (equal contribution by, Hawk, A; Lahiri, D; Pacheco de Almeida, G): Theorization.
INVITED PRESENTATIONS
[1] Firms’ CSR Strategies in the face of Institutional De-prioritization of Sustainability Policies (Lahiri, D)
â–ª Annual Meeting of the Strategic Management Society, London, 2022
â–ª Sociology Colloquium, Texas A&M University, 2023 (Virtual)
â–ª Annual Meeting of the Academy of Management, Boston, 2023
[2] Incidence of Activist Actions on Politically Connected Companies: Examining a ‘Cost’ of Connection (Lahiri, D)
â–ª Annual Meeting of the Academy of Management, 2021 (Virtual)
â–ª Strategy seminar at Bocconi University, Milan, 2021 (Virtual)
â–ª Strategy seminar at Nova School of Business and Economics, Lisbon, 2021
â–ª Strategy seminar at IE Business School, Madrid, 2021
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[3] The Half-Life of Political Capital: An Examination of the Temporal Effects of Political Connections
(Hawk, A; Lahiri, D; Pacheco de Almeida, G; all authors contributed equally)
â–ª Strategy seminar at TUM School of Management, 2022 (Virtual; presented by co-author Pacheco de Almeida, G)
â–ª Strategy seminar at INSEAD, 2021 (Virtual; presented by co-author Pacheco de Almeida, G)
â–ª Strategy seminar at The Fuqua Business School, Duke University, 2021 (Virtual; presented by co-author Pacheco de Almeida, G)
â–ª Annual Meeting of the Strategic Management Society, 2020 (Virtual)
â–ª Annual Meeting of the Academy of Management, 2020 (Virtual)
â–ª Annual Meeting of the Academy of Management, Boston, 2019
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[4] IPRs and Innovation Concentration: A look at the Granular Nature of the Institutional Landscape (Lahiri, D; Quelin, B)
â–ª Annual Meeting of the Academy of International Business, Copenhagen, 2019
WORKSHOPS AND CONSORTIA
â–ª Participant, STR Junior Faculty Teaching Consortium, AOM Annual Meeting, Boston, Aug 2023
â–ª Participant, Formal Modelling Workshop, Bocconi University, Milan, Jan 2020
â–ª Participant, SMS Research Methods Community Consortium Series (Virtual), Apr 2021
â–ª Participant, AOM STR Dissertation Consortium (Virtual), Jul 2021
â–ª Participant, SEI Doctoral Consortium, ESADE, Barcelona, Oct 2021