Abstract
Existing studies assume that the value of political connections is homogeneous to different types of nonprofits and seldom consider their interplay with other accountability mechanisms. Based on a multilevel analysis of 2,085 foundations in China, this study builds and tests a theoretical framework of the contingent value of political connections to nonprofits, treating transparency as a moderator for the relationship between political connections and donations. Our findings suggest that while transparency is positively associated with the amount of donations obtained by foundations, political connections can help foundations obtain more donations only when their transparency score is higher than a certain threshold.
| Original language | English (US) |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 36-63 |
| Number of pages | 28 |
| Journal | Administration and Society |
| Volume | 53 |
| Issue number | 1 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - Jan 2021 |
Bibliographical note
Funding Information:The authors would like to thank the anonymous reviewers, editor-in-chief, Dr. Brian Cook, co-guest-editors, Dr. Chao Guo and Dr. Zhibin Zhang, as well as the participants of the 2019 ARNOVA-Asia Conference in Taichung and 2019 ARNOVA Conference in San Diego, for their helpful comments and suggestions. The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Keywords
- Chinese foundations
- moderation effect
- political connections
- private donations
- transparency