The Influence Of Network Interaction On Community NGOs’ Service Perforamance: The Mediation Effect Of Autonomy

Under the background of system transformation governance in China, the pattern of state and society relation profoundly changes. Governments are main natural subject for providing public services, but can’t effectively meet the public demand which has become increasingly diverse and heterogeneous. At the same time, non-governmental organizations (NGOs) in the support of governments and academic got the good opportunity of development. The number of NGOs has become a blowout. If regarding NGOs as a role of supplement and optimization to provide public services to society, their function has been accepted generally by governments and residents. At the same time, the problem of NGO’s autonomy gradually was paid by the attention of some researchers. As a generally theoretical view, Autonomy can have a positive influence on service performance, however, judging from the results of empirical researches, NGOs through attaching to governments could also achieve good service performance. The contradiction in terms of theoretical and empirical researches, on the one hand, may have originated from that governments and NGOs relations are not simply described by "independent" or "attachment", but a complex and dynamic, so academic extension of the concept of autonomy has to be explored deeply, on the other hand, the mechanism of NGOs providing public services has not yet been fully revealed. We think of the provision of public services, regardless of governments, or NGOs, the "fragmented" time has been passing. They will face the collaboration change under network interaction. Network interaction exactly how to influence the autonomy of NGOs and the mechanism of service performance should be explored furtherly. Especially under the background of urban community network, the researches of community NGOs how to use the network interaction and autonomy characteristics, adopt corresponding strategies, improve services performance should be explored furtherly. Based on theoretical and practical background above, this research reference two theoretical perspectives of social network, state and society, combine with the researches of network interaction, autonomy and strategic response, put forward the core problem in this paper:the mediating effect of autonomy on network interaction and service performance relation, and divide into two studies:(1) Studying the mediating effect of autonomy on network interaction and service performance relation. (2) Exploring the moderating effect of strategic response on autonomy and service performance relation.Through the researches above, this paper concludes the following mainly conclusions:(1) Network interaction and autonomy have respectively impact on service performance. First, the network interaction has positive effects on service performance. Among them, the community network interaction has significant positive effects on service performance; Business network interaction has significant positive effects on service performance. Second, autonomy has positive effects on the service performance. Among them, the resource autonomy has significant positive effects on service performance; Decision-making autonomy has significant positive effects on service performance.(2) Network interaction has positive effects on autonomy. Among them, the community network interaction has significant positive effects on resource autonomy; Community network interaction has significant positive effects on decision-making autonomy; Business network interaction has significant positive effects on resource autonomy; Business network interaction has significant positive effects on decision-making autonomy. (3) Autonomy has the mediating effects on network interaction and serviceperformance relation. Among them, resource autonomy has mediating effects on community network interaction and service performance relation; resource autonomy has mediating effects on business network interaction and service performance relation; Decision-making autonomy has mediating effects on community network interaction and service performance relation; Decision-making autonomy has mediating effects on business network interaction and service performance relation. (4) Strategic response has the moderating effects on autonomy and serviceperformance relation. When community NGOs take active cooperation with governments, the positive correlation between resource autonomy and service performance may be strengthened; when community NGOs take active cooperation with governments, the positive correlation between decision-making autonomy and service performance may be strengthened.Due to autonomy is regarded as the premise of NGOs’ development and strategic subject, studies on how autonomy in the mechanism of network interaction and service performance play a mediation role show its important practical significance. Based on the above research questions, this article from the following aspects has carried on the innovation and contribution to the existing researches:First, in the perspectives of social network and state-society relation, constructing the theoretical model of the mechanism of network interaction impacting on service performance. Based on social network and the theoretical basis of state-society relation, integrating the perspectives, collecting the relevant literature of network interaction, autonomy, and strategic response, having multi-dimensional discussion, building the "network interaction-autonomy-service performance" theoretical, interpreting comprehensively the mechanism of the network interaction affecting on service performance, analyzing autonomy’s mediating effect on network interaction and service performance relation, and strategic response’s moderating effect on autonomy and service performance relation.Second, demonstrating autonomy’s mediating effect on network interaction and service performance relation, furtherly open the black box between them, and demonstrating the different autonomy leads to the differences of service performance. First of all, in theory, responding to the conclusion that service performance was influenced positively by autonomy, due to which, explaining general argument in empirical research that NGOs are attached to governments, their service performance are good. Secondly, providing the theoretical support and practical reference for the community NGOs according to their own network interactive situation, to reexamine the relationship between the government, so as to realize the effective matching of organization resources and capabilities, and ultimately achieve organizational advantage expanding and service performance improvement.Third, based on strategic response’s moderating effect, furtherly demonstrating the mechanism of autonomy and service performance, enriching the connotation of the empirical study of the concept of autonomy, which has an important practical significance on community NGOs being embedded in the network, during the interaction with other actors, based on their structural characteristics, make decisions so as to optimize the network structure of the organization, to obtain more resources, fight for greater degree of autonomy space, realize the organization goal.