Abstract: In what context family firms tend to resort to non-market strategies? This academic issue has attracted wide attention, but there is no consistent conclusion. Based on the perspective of policy uncertainty, this paper examines the construction mechanism of family firms' non-market strategy during the change of officials by using the event of "quasi-natural experiment" such as the replacement of the secretary of the regional municipal party committee. An empirical analysis is carried out based on the panel data of listed companies in Shanghai and Shenzhen in China. The results show that policy uncertainty significantly increases the non-market strategic investment, but this role is also affected by corporate performance and media reports. Specifically, the response of those family firms in the state of aspiration gap will be more obvious, that is, with the increase of aspiration gap, the positive effect of policy uncertainty on family firm's non-market strategic investment will also increase. At the same time, this paper finds that media reports correct the positive effect of policy uncertainty on family firm's non-market strategic investment to a certain extent.
Further study finds that lower policy uncertainty (the municipal party secretary comes from the local or the implementation of anti-corruption policies) will weaken the non-market strategic motivation of family firms. The results of this paper show that the policy uncertainty caused by the change of local leaders is an important reason for the non-market strategic investment of family firms. However, the external governance and anti-corruption policies of the media can restrain the behavior of firms to a certain extent. The above research conclusions support the ongoing political system reform and anti-corruption policies.

Key words: policy uncertainty, non-market strategy, performance aspiration, media coverage, anti-corruption policy