由於中共國營企業對中共政權在政治象徵著立國的根本；在經濟上具有全民所有制的地位；在社會上則揭示階級剝削消失理想的到來，由此可知國營企業的重要性。中共對其改革的策略也一直在小心斟酌，避免引起政治上的不安，也不能導致人民的不滿。因此，國營企業的改革勢必對中國大陸各方面帶來巨大的影響。令人不解的是，當中國大陸經濟改革中已然包含了許多種類的所有制型態，那麼在城市經濟改革重要的一環—國營企業改革中，為什麼仍然必須維持公有制得所有制形態？而此又有何重要性？此外，由工業總產值來看，全民所有制工業所占的比例，由一九五五年開始，一直超過百分之五十，最高曾達百分之九十之多；但從中共改革之後，比例一路向下滑，直到一九九三年，已經降到約百分之四十三，在此背後，有可能隱藏了何種意義？本論文之目的便在於探討中共的國營企業改革的過程，也嘗試探討國營企業改革對中共政權有何影響。所採取的觀察方式則以產權形式的變革作為分析的判準，隨著國營企業的產權性質的逐步變化，是否會對中共政權造成影響。中共政權的基礎是否不必然與社會主義公有制的經濟形式相配套，並且真如鄧小平所言，中國大陸正走向中國特色的社會主義的過程中。

本文以鄉鎮政府的財政運作為例，解釋中國大陸地方政府在預算外收入增加的同時，也不斷在累積負債的現象。本文認為，當前中國大陸地方政府預算外收入和負債的增加是「軟預算約束」的表現，而「官僚協調機制」與「公有制產權」的交互作用則是導致地方政府軟預算約束的主要因素。特別是，官僚協調機制下縣級政府的刻意放縱，以及土地集體所有制事實上成為幹部所有制，使得鄉鎮政府可以不斷擴張預算外收入並且累積政府債務。在此種財政運作的情況下，改革地方財政面臨到環環相扣的問題，然而，由於官僚協調機制的制約和欠缺改革所需的正確財政資訊，使得環環相扣的問題難以被克服，這不僅阻礙了未來改革的可能性，也讓現行的改革方案難以收到真正的效果。

中國農村信用合作社屬於集體性質合作金融組織，以農業相關貸款為主要業務，前中國國務院總理朱鎔基在第九屆全國人大四次會議中強調「農信社是支持農村金融的主力軍」，農信社享有獨立法人資格並承擔推動農村金融發展責任，卻未履行應盡義務和金融功能，反而成為地方政府融通資金的「小金庫」。 本研究試圖解釋農信社的發展與改革，從制度角度探討其與地方政府、地方企業之間的互動關係。農信社成立於一九五零年代，自毛統治時期即扮演地方政府小金庫角色，改革開放後，中國政府嚴格禁止地方政府干預金融機構經營，並給予補貼及稅收優惠提升其營運績效，但農信社受制於歷史制度影響，被既有路徑鎖住無法擺脫過去包袱，導致其發展與改革始終處在出軌的狀態。 中國改革開放三十年，農信社歷經多次改革轉換依然被地方政府所掌控，本研究透過分析農信社內部黨系統成員名單與地方政企之間的重疊關係，觀察出地方政府如何躲避中央政策及法律限制，持續箝制農信社的發展與金融功能，試圖補充農信社相關文獻在此議題上的不足，並解釋農信社在地方—特別是以農業為主的貧困縣地區與地方政府和地方企業間的運作模式。 / Chinese Rural Credit Cooperatives (RCCs) is a collective-owned and cooperative financial institution, and its major business is to provide loans for agriculture-based projects. “The RCCs is the main force of agrian finance,” as such claimed by the former Chinese Premier Zhu, Rongji in the fourth session of the ninth National People’s Congress regarding the function and status of RCCs. Nonetheless, despite the RCCs is a separate legal entity and aims at promoting the development of agrian finance, it fails to do its work but becomes a private coffer of local governments. This study investigates the trajectory of development and reforms of RCCs first, and then explores the process from an institutional perspective by addressing the dynamic interactions between the RCCs, the local governments and the local enterprises. RCCs was first established in the 1950s, and has served as a private coffer for local governments since then. After launching the reform and opening-up policy in the late 1970s, the central government attempted to prohibit the local governments to intervene the operation of RCCs on the one hand, and provided fiscal subsidies as well as tax reliefs to RCCs on the other. Yet the operation of RCCs has been locked into the pre-existing institutional practices shaped in Mao’s era and been “out of track” regardless of various reform attemps by the central government. This study argues that the organizational overlap between the branches of Chinese Communism Party in the local governments and RCCs largely explains why local governments could survive those reform attemps and persistentally gained the control of RCCs in the past 30 years. By examining the name lists of the party branches in the local governments and RCCs, I demonstrate that the local governments transferred the control of RCCs from administrative system to party system, thus they successfully circumvented the constrains of administrative policies and rules in various reform attemps by the central government. The finding also helps to explore the dynamic patterns of interaction among the local governments, RCCs, and local enterprises in those areas of agriculture-based economy, thus contributes to fill this gap in the literature of state-business research in China studies.

. / Corporate acquisitions are classified as part of “the market for corporate control” in which management teams are facing constant competition from other management teams. If the team that currently controls a company is not maximizing the value of the company’s assets, then an acquisition will likely occur and increase the value of the company by replacing its poor managers with good managers. This dissertation focus on two issues on mergers, the first compares the strategy between mergers and joint ventures. The second investigate how much liquidity should the acquirer preserve and what is the equilibrium price of the acquired firm in considering the merger strategy. Drawing upon the incomplete contract theory, I examine the criterion of the strategic choice between joint ventures (JVs) and mergers when two firms contemplate vertical integration. The model reaches the following conclusions: (1) some ownership provision to the acquired company after the mergers may prove to be more lucrative to the acquirer than 100% takeover; (2) given the same equity share arrangement for JVs and mergers I conclude that these two firms should choose to merge or be merged rather than JVs; (3) I derive the optimal equity share arrangement in both JVs and mergers when ownership provision is considered as a strategic means. In addition, I also compare the welfare and effort of both companies in JVs and mergers under symmetric cost structures, and find that mergers would provide greater social efficiency and welfare than 50-50 JVs when the acquirer’s equity share is between 30% and 65%. Firms are concerned that they may in the future be deprived of the funds that would enable them to take advantage of exciting growth prospects, strengthen existing investments or simply stay alive. I specifically examine a firm’s liquidity need in order to grasp any future opportunity of mergers and acquisitions. However, a firm’s manager (borrower) can shed his interim wrongdoings (misbehavior) under the pretext of further financial need for mergers and acquisitions because he knows that he can easily raise sufficient cash from lenders to cover any adverse shock. My study derives the conditions that when this soft-budget-constraint (SBC) problem will occur. It happens when the interim income is small. Moreover, I analyze how the purchase price of acquisition is affected by this soft-budget-constraint syndrome. If there is SBC problem, the acquisition price will be raised by the investors when the interim income is small. Besides, a firm with severe moral hazard problem will be merely able to offer a smaller purchase price for the acquisition. On the contrast, a firm with a stronger balance sheet will be able to secure a greater credit line and offer a more attractive price for the acquisition. The empirical study of U.S. firms during 1988 to 2006 supports my conclusions.