Corporate Governance and SHE Management: A Comparative Analysis of Chinese Enterprises

Abstract

This thesis seeks to provide theoretical explanations to answer the question: "Why do Chinese enterprises differ with regards to their SHE management practices?" The analytical objective is to explore the causal links between patterns of corporate governance and SHE management practices. The study is structured under an overall research strategy with qualitative orientation aiming at developing and expanding theory through comparative case study. This study contributes in terms of both theoretical debate and practical implications. The empirical concerns with observed cross-firm variations in SHE management practices motivate the researcher to measure the variations with a comparative framework for SHE management practices in terms of the "Leadership, Behaviour, Technique" dimensions, and to further seek explanations of the variations by examining factors that influence SHE management practices. If extraneous factors, suggested by some as rival and alternative explanations, are controlled, patterns of corporate governance are the valid explanatory factors for cross-firm variations in SHE management practices. Governance mechanism and power structure as the structural variable, and corporate value orientation as the ideational variable, are operationalized and configured with different combinations into a 2x2 matrix to present four patterns of corporate governance. An explanatory framework is developed and tested in a comparative case study of Company A and Company X. Based on the empirical results of spatial and temporal variations in SHE management practices, on changes in patterns of corporate governance, and on the in-depth analysis of the causal nexus between patterns of governance and SHE management practices across different time periods for Company A and Company X, a conclusion is made that supports the development of a theoretical explanatory framework with a central argument and validated propositions. I declare my central argument that patterns of corporate governance with different combinations of structural and ideational variables causally determine the variations in SHE management practices. Thus, changes in the patterns of corporate governance with different combinations of structural and ideational variables will causally lead to variations in SHE management practices.

Date of Award	31 Dec 2020
Original language	English
Awarding Institution	The University of Manchester
Supervisor	Xiaoke Zhang (Supervisor)