Debtanu Lahiri

[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]  Activists' actions on politically connected companies [Real Title Withheld] (Lahiri, D): 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]  Firm partisanship and social behaviour amidst heightened societal polarization (Lahiri, D): Advanced analysis and drafting

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[4]  Forms of CPA and their differential impact on sustaining competitive advantage (Equal contribution by Hawk, A; Lahiri, D;                Pacheco de Almeida, G): Advanced analysis and drafting