This paper investigates control mechanism and accounting information used for control mechanism, shaped by government incentives for business. Using a sample of China's state-owned enterprises (SOEs) from 2001 to 2005, it finds that the likelihood of top management turnover in China's SOEs, which is an important aspect of corporate control mechanism, is inversely associated with two types of accounting information of firm performance, firm-specific accounting performance and relative accounting performance, which is induced by the interests of Chinese government for the economic performance and political competition. Further, this paper finds that relative accounting performance, especially regional relative accounting performance, receives more weight in turnover decisions if a SOE is a local monopolistic firm or in local monopoly, because relative performance measure could offer a relatively simple benchmark for local government to assess manager's quality and provide stronger incentive scheme in China's political environment. By seeking deeper understanding into government incentives, the findings imply that induced by government incentives, effective corporate governance which is based on distinguished characteristics of accounting information exists in an economy highly involved by government.

We investigate how the market for corporate control (external governance) and shareholder activism (internal governance) interact. Looking at equity prices from 1990 to 2001, we find that these mechanisms are strong complements. A portfolio that buys firms with the highest level of takeover vulnerability and shorts firms with the lowest level of takeover vulnerability generates an annualized abnormal return of 10 - 15% only when public pension fund (blockholder) ownership is high as well. A similar portfolio created to mimic the importance of internal governance generates annualized abnormal returns of 8%, though only in the presence of ‘high’ vulnerability to takeovers. Further, we show that the complementary relation exists for firms with lower industry-adjusted leverage and is stronger for smaller firms. The complementary relation is confirmed using accounting measures of profitability. Using data on acquisitions, firm level Q’s and accounting performance, we explore possible interpretations, providing preliminary evidence for a risk effect as well.