Abstract
Most of previous studies seek to understand buyer perspectives in green supply chain relationships and devote inadequate attention to the strategic role of upstream suppliers. Drawing on a market-oriented approach to sustainability, this paper examines the enabling factors and processes that underpin how export suppliers from emerging economies leverage their strategic intent to develop knowledge integration capacity for achieving improved export performance. The results from a sample of Chinese exporters show that the relational capacity of knowledge integration mediates the performance impact of market-oriented environmental sustainability, and such a mediating process of leaning is further enhanced by international buyer involvement. We reveal that relationship efforts should be directed at developing integrative capacity involving key partners for implementing proactive environmental strategy in international business-to-business (B2B) markets. This study contributes to the research of supply chain sustainability in a global context.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 724-735 |
| Number of pages | 12 |
| Journal | International Business Review |
| Volume | 26 |
| Issue number | 4 |
| Early online date | 30 Jan 2017 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - Aug 2017 |
Funding
sThe authors would like to thank the editor and the anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments and suggestions during the review process. Financial support from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC, 435-2016-1690) is greatly appreciated.
Keywords
- Buyer-supplier relationships
- Export performance
- International buyer involvement
- Knowledge integration
- Market-oriented environmental sustainability