Abstract
When multinational enterprises operate,they need to consider the influence arisen from the environment where they are located. The corruption phenomenon may take place in any country,and the corruption issue gradually attracts more attention in recent years. Hence,this thesis investigates how and to what extent the corruption expe-rience of the parent company will cause influence on the corruption behavior of a multinational enterprise’s subsidiary in a corrupt foreign environment. In addition, this thesis examines whether briberybehaviors can improve enterprises’ performance. Based on the 1999 Business Environment and Enterprise Performance Survey (BEEPS), we use two empirical approaches. First, we utilize the ordered probit model when we investigate if the parent company would transfer the corruption experiences to its subsidiaries and affect the subsidiaries’ corruption behaviors. Second, we utilize the OLS model when we examine the influence of an enterprise’s bribery behaviors on its performance. This thesis herein finds several key results. First, multinational enterprise’s subsidiaries tend to have a higher probability of engaging in bribery when they are located in the countries of high corruption. Second, the influence of the parent company’s corruption experiences on its subsidiaries’ bribery is influenced by the types of corruption. A subsidiary is more likely to be influenced by its parent company’s corruption experiences if the subsidiary pays bribes to affect the enforcement of law and policy. Third, an enterprise cannot significantly improve its performance by engaging in state capture. However, when the enterprise engages in bribery to affect the enforcement of policies, namely administrative corruption, it significantly improves its performance. Fourth, regarding the purpose of bribery, multinationalenterprises tend to pursue the growth of sales while local enterprises tend to pursue higher profits.