Economic nationalism and the home court advantage

By Anand Nandkumar, Arnab Choudhury, Srividya Jandhyala
Strategic Management Journal | August 2024

DOI

doi.org/10.1002/smj.3658

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Citation

Nandkumar, Anand., Choudhury, Arnab., Jandhyala, Srividya. (2024). Economic nationalism and the home court advantage Strategic Management Journal doi.org/10.1002/smj.3658.

Strategic Management Journal, 2024

Abstract

Political and regulatory actors routinely adopt or enforce policies to protect domestic firms at the expense of foreign firms. However, since courts are expected to be neutral and act independently, a question arises whether (and why) they discriminate against foreign firms. We argue that the courts are nationalistic, which emanates from judges differentiating between in-group (domestic) and out-group (foreign) members. In a sample of 58,754 patent disputes adjudicated by US federal district courts between 1983 and 2016, we find domestic patent holders and challengers are more successful than their foreign counterparts. Rulings involving foreign firms are more likely to exhibit nationalistic rhetoric. Judicial ideology moderates the differential odds of success between domestic and foreign firms. Thus, the legal system is another source of economic nationalism.

Anand Nandkumar is an Associate Professor of Strategy, Executive Director of SRITNE at the Indian School of Business (ISB), and Associate Dean of the Centre for Learning and Teaching Excellence. He explores industry and firm-level phenomena that influence innovation - the generation of new ideas, and entrepreneurship - distribution and commercialisation of new ideas. His research focuses on high-technology industries such as pharmaceuticals, biotechnology, and software, and it falls in between industrial organisation (IO), economics of technological change, and strategy.

Professor Nandkumar’s current work in the innovation stream examines the effect of stronger intellectual property rights (IPR) on different aspects of innovation, such as the influence of stronger patents on long run incentives for innovation or the influence of stronger patents on the functioning of Markets for Technology (MFT). In the entrepreneurship stream, his current work examines the influence of venture capitalists on entrepreneurial performance.

Professor Nandkumar graduated with a PhD in Public Policy and Management, with a focus in strategy and entrepreneurship from Carnegie Mellon University in 2008. Prior to his PhD, he worked for 3 years with a startup in Silicon Valley, and prior to that, in New York City with one of the world’s largest financial services firms.

True to his expertise, at ISB, Professor Nandkumar teaches Strategic Innovation Management and Strategic Challenges for Innovation-based startups.

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