386 J.P.Murmann In my analysis of Child and Marinova's paper,I find tension regarding the level of generality of their interesting theoretical framework that tries to overcome the limitations of previous works on OFDI.At the outset,the authors select China and perhaps countries with a similar level of government intervention and a similar state of development as the domain of their framework.Yet when they articulate their theoretical framework,it is clearly meant to apply to all countries.Consistent with my earlier discussion on how we construct powerful theory,Ifind the paper by Child and Marinova most compelling when it stays at intermediate levels of generality- when their paper is about China and not about OFDI at all times and/or in all places.After all,their empirical arena is Chinese firms.Their framework is not informed by evidence on firms from other countries engaged in OFDI. At its core,the Child and Marinova(2014)paper attempts to explain why Chinese firms are more successful in making FDIs in some countries than in others. Reading the paper closely also makes it clear that their explanation does not work well unless the analysis becomes even more specific and recognizes in theoretical picture that there are distinct types of Chinese firms:even though one may not need to bring collectively owned enterprises(COEs)into the analysis,it is certainly necessary to distinguish between state-owned enterprises(SOEs)and private firms. Child and Marinova(2014)report that most OFDI (68%)has been carried out by SOEs and not private or collective firms.Furthermore,we learn that SOEs are the primary beneficiary of government policies facilitating OFDL,leading the authors to write that 'The relevance of home context for Chinese OFDI is there- fore conditional on the ownership of the internationalizing firm'(352).This implies that,in their view,the focal causal mechanism explaining the differential success of OFDI by Chinese firms(the relative congruence of home and host country context)operates in the case of SOEs but not in the case of private firms or at least very weakly in the case private firms,as they later suggest. I find Child and Marinova's(2014)paper richly stimulating when it is explaining concrete behaviour and differences in the performance of Chinese firms,differen- tiating between SOEs and private firms.In my view,the paper would have been even more compelling if the distinction between SOEs and private firms had been explicitly incorporated in the diagrammatic summary of their key argument (Fig.1).This would have made clearer that the most productive next step in the line of work started with the Child and Marinova(2014)paper is not to try to test to what extent their framework applies in all countries.I suggest that the paper should inspire us to develop a deeper understanding of the causal processes that are driving and transforming the patterns of Chinese OFDI before we try to ascertain how well conceptual machinery works in other countries. Although Child is clearly sympathetic to evolutionist arguments,having recently edited an entire volume on organization evolution (Child,2012),the framework articulated in the 2014 paper paints a rather static picture and seemingly generalizes across all time.This means it makes no differentiation 2014 The International Association for Chinese Management ResearchIn my analysis of Child and Marinova’s paper, I find tension regarding the level of generality of their interesting theoretical framework that tries to overcome the limitations of previous works on OFDI. At the outset, the authors select China and perhaps countries with a similar level of government intervention and a similar state of development as the domain of their framework. Yet when they articulate their theoretical framework, it is clearly meant to apply to all countries. Consistent with my earlier discussion on how we construct powerful theory, I find the paper by Child and Marinova most compelling when it stays at intermediate levels of generality – when their paper is about China and not about OFDI at all times and/or in all places. After all, their empirical arena is Chinese firms. Their framework is not informed by evidence on firms from other countries engaged in OFDI. At its core, the Child and Marinova (2014) paper attempts to explain why Chinese firms are more successful in making FDIs in some countries than in others. Reading the paper closely also makes it clear that their explanation does not work well unless the analysis becomes even more specific and recognizes in theoretical picture that there are distinct types of Chinese firms: even though one may not need to bring collectively owned enterprises (COEs) into the analysis, it is certainly necessary to distinguish between state-owned enterprises (SOEs) and private firms. Child and Marinova (2014) report that most OFDI (68%) has been carried out by SOEs and not private or collective firms. Furthermore, we learn that SOEs are the primary beneficiary of government policies facilitating OFDI, leading the authors to write that ‘The relevance of home context for Chinese OFDI is there￾fore conditional on the ownership of the internationalizing firm’ (352). This implies that, in their view, the focal causal mechanism explaining the differential success of OFDI by Chinese firms (the relative congruence of home and host country context) operates in the case of SOEs but not in the case of private firms or at least very weakly in the case private firms, as they later suggest. I find Child and Marinova’s (2014) paper richly stimulating when it is explaining concrete behaviour and differences in the performance of Chinese firms, differen￾tiating between SOEs and private firms. In my view, the paper would have been even more compelling if the distinction between SOEs and private firms had been explicitly incorporated in the diagrammatic summary of their key argument (Fig. 1). This would have made clearer that the most productive next step in the line of work started with the Child and Marinova (2014) paper is not to try to test to what extent their framework applies in all countries. I suggest that the paper should inspire us to develop a deeper understanding of the causal processes that are driving and transforming the patterns of Chinese OFDI before we try to ascertain how well conceptual machinery works in other countries. Although Child is clearly sympathetic to evolutionist arguments, having recently edited an entire volume on organization evolution (Child, 2012), the framework articulated in the 2014 paper paints a rather static picture and seemingly generalizes across all time. This means it makes no differentiation 386 J. P. Murmann © 2014 The International Association for Chinese Management Research