Corporate Governance Reform through Internationalization: Case Study of a State Owned Insurance Company, China Life

Weak corporate governance has long been regarded as a major impediment for Chinese state owned enterprises to improve their international competitiveness. Although a number of reforms have taken place in China to address this issue, the policy result remains moderate. This paper discusses how some innovative Chinese SOEs use international listing as a springboard to overcome institutional constraints and take advantage of current financial globalization to secure highly sought after capital for both domestic and international expansion. This leads most importantly to better corporate governance practices, thereby improving their international competitiveness. This research is drawn from the in-depth study on the internationalisation trajectory of China Life, currently the world’s largest insurance company in terms of capitalization, and particularly looks at its preparation for IPO launch in the New York Stock Exchange and corresponding corporate restructuring. The paper argues that the case of China life has shown a type of internationalisation that differs from that detailed by current internationalisation theories used to explain Chinese firms ’ global expansion