Internationally experienced business leaders bring distinct human capital, social capital, and cognitive schemas into organizations, influence strategic orientation through their decision-making, and in turn shape organizations’ strategies and performance. The impact of the international experience (IE) of an organization’s upper echelon has been studied in various bodies of management literature, varying in terms of the theoretical perspectives, conceptualizations of the IE construct, and outcomes considered. However, the effects are not straightforward with regard to which elements of IE affect which aspects of organizational dynamics, and how. This review integrates separate streams of organizational research to develop a more holistic understanding of the role of the IE held by strategic leaders such as chief executive officers, entrepreneurial founders, top management teams, and boards of directors, and its impact on organizational strategies and performance. We refine the conceptualization of the IE construct at multiple levels of analysis and explore cross-level mechanisms suggested by multiple theories to develop an integrative framework that links strategic leaders’ IE to organizational decisions, strategies, and performance. On this basis, we propose an agenda for future research.

Research SummaryExecutives in state-owned enterprises (SOEs) are promoted differently from those in private firms due to the broader objectives of SOEs, which include non-economic considerations. Research on SOEs often attributes executive promotions to firms' economic performance, without sufficient attention to the role of political performance. We find that executives of SOEs aligned with a government's globalization mandate, especially those investing in countries with political affinity, are more likely to be promoted as these investments further the government's political objectives and enhance executives' legitimacy with the bureaucratic system. The study broadens the literature on executive compensation by arguing that political alignment with government objectives matters. It also enriches institutional theory by suggesting a state-firm-executive legitimacy transmission.Managerial SummaryWhen executives of SOEs align with a government's globalization goals and focus their investments in specific industries and countries, they often find more significant opportunities for career growth. Our detailed analysis, centered on SOEs directly overseen by the Chinese central government, supports our findings. This research offers valuable insights for the global strategy of SOEs. It suggests that while these investments can enhance the chances of advancing SOE executives who align with the state's political vision, promoting them based solely on political alignment, without considering long-term project performance, may lead to challenges, underscoring the need for a balanced approach.

Foreign multinational enterprises (MNEs) operating in emerging economies (EEs) face major challenges in attaining organizational legitimacy with local stakeholders, a precondition to successful operations in the country. This perspective explores the contingencies and perceptions that cause these legitimacy challenges and the actions MNEs employ to address these challenges, as identified in recent literature. We observe that legitimacy in EEs has many facets. Yet, it is often analyzed in a selective way - focusing on specific events or activities without considering the complexity of the phenomenon of how legitimacy is created, maintained and lost. We argue that organizational legitimacy is a very useful construct for international management research on EEs, and that the concept lends itself to more rigorous theoretical advancement than category-based concepts such as liability of foreignness. However, the IB literature has only partially embraced recent theoretical advances on the concept of legitimacy. We distinguish contingency, agency and judgement views of legitimacy to explore how applications of the concept may enhance our understanding of MNEs operating in EEs. This leads us to develop a future research agenda.

Competition policy establishes the institutional framework for competitive dynamics in market economies. Recently, the relevance and impact of traditional competition policy has been challenged by the rise of the digital economy, where we see a small number of large platform firms, frequent takeovers and mergers, and the potential for using customer data to join and dominate previously separate markets. We provide a framework to explain the basis for contemporary competition policy, and explore implications for company strategy within and beyond the digital sector. Some of the most radical thinking about how competition policy might address the challenge of the digital economy originates from Europe, itself a major market for technology firms. We illustrate this thinking with exemplars from the practice of the EU Commission. Although existing competition policy can provide a basis for addressing monopolistic abuses in digital markets, practices are shifting to address novel sources of market power, including the governance architecture of digital platform firms and their ecosystems, the transferability of personal data, and the interoperability of systems and standards. We consider implications for policymakers. Corporate strategists must also understand how the evolving competition policy framework is impacting competitive dynamics of both platform operator and platform complementing entrepreneurs.

Der Straßenverkehr bleibt weltweit ein zentrales Feld für die Dekarbonisierung. Dass beinahe die Hälfte der globalen Ölproduktion im Straßenverkehr verbraucht wird [1], macht deutlich warum. Die Dekarbonisierung des Straßenverkehrs sollen also Elektro- und Hybridfahrzeuge für den Güter-, Geschäfts- und Privattransport herbeiführen. Während die Marktdurchdringung von E-Fahrzeugen auf dem gesamten Automobilmarkt vor zwei oder drei Jahren noch relativ gering war, hat sich dieses Bild in den letzten Jahren geändert.

As China’s economy rose to become the second largest in the world, its institutions did not converge with those of other advanced economies as predicted by many Western observers; instead, China developed a distinct form of state-led capitalism. As a result, how multinational enterprises (MNEs) engage with China’s changing institutional context needs to be revisited. To this end, we review 331 papers on MNE strategies and operations in China published in top international business and management journals between 2001 and 2022. We first introduce the path of institutional change and the opportunities and challenges it created for MNEs in China. We focus on six aspects of MNE strategies and operations: market entry, strategic alliances, innovation and knowledge sharing, global value chain strategies, guanxi and relationship management, and non-market strategies. Our analysis of China’s institutional trajectory and of MNE strategies and operations points to three persistent institutional mechanisms of concern for MNEs: challenges to organizational legitimacy, protection of property rights, and the enabling and directing aspect of institutions created by industrial policies. Insights from this analysis point to future research needs on institutional nonlinearities and discontinuities, linkages between inward and outward investments, and geopolitical influences on national institutions.

Nation-states are designing their industrial policies increasingly to not only enhance national competitiveness, but also to simultaneously address “Green Challenges”, concerns about the natural environment that require concerted action among different actors in society, including domestic and foreign multinational enterprises (MNEs). This blending of global and national policy objectives is leading to a new wave of industrial policies in advanced economies that are informed by scholarly discourses in evolutionary economics, innovation systems, and 'wicked problems'. We discuss the implications of these sustainability-oriented industrial policies for MNEs. They operate in increasingly diverse local ecosystems shaped by local actors and local policies as we illustrate for two such ecosystems in Nordic countries: circular economy and energy transition. Many MNEs face a tension between capabilities they could use to help nations achieve their sustainability goals and incentives to protect existing rents and business models. They may thus engage pro-actively or reactively in both market and nonmarket realms in each country in which they operate. We discuss the interactions between MNEs, governments, and other actors in host countries pursuing both sustainability and competitiveness objectives, and outline how ensuing tensions create new challenges and opportunities for international business scholarship.

Purpose Trust is an important facilitator of successful B2B relationships. The purpose of this study is to investigate affect-based antecedents of both interpersonal and interorganizational trust, and their impact on the performance of buyer–supplier relationships. The authors ask two research questions: (1) What are affect-based dimensions of interpersonal and interorganizational trust? (2) How do interpersonal and interorganizational trust influence buyers’ operational performance? Design/methodology/approach The authors use data from an original survey of 156 buyer–supplier relationships between multinational enterprise subsidiaries and local suppliers in the Thai manufacturing sector to develop a structural model in which the authors test the hypotheses. Findings Consistent with social exchange theory and social psychology, the empirical analysis shows that affect-based dimensions at the individual level, namely, likeability, similarity and frequent social contact, and at the organizational level, namely, supplier firm willingness to customize and institutionalization of cooperation, are important for establishing trust. In addition, interpersonal trust enhances buyers’ operational performance indirectly via interorganizational trust. Practical implications Buying and selling firms may develop organizational trust by developing processes that enhance organizational trust. Individuals with purchasing or sales responsibilities may enhance trust in their personal relationship. However, such interpersonal trust needs to be translated to the organizational level to benefit organizational performance. Originality/value The findings contribute to the literature on affect-based antecedents and outcomes of trust. Specifically, the authors offer theory and empirical evidence regarding the contribution of salespersons toward affect-based dimensions of trust and its impact on buyer’s operational performance.

How much does the host country matter in explaining foreign affiliate performance? Using a global sample of 34,708 foreign affiliates operating in 91 host countries, we revisit the relative importance of the host country effect as a performance determinant. Our variance decomposition results suggest that the host country effect is less salient than previously identified, often explaining a small portion of affiliate performance differences. We offer implications for future international strategy research on foreign affiliate performance, advancing an understanding of the relative importance of external and internal determinants. We direct scholarly attention to other effect classes, namely the affiliate effect.

Young management scholars often wonder to what extent they should emphasize international business scholarship in their career. In this commentary, we argue that, in addition to its intellectual merits, publishing in the leading outlet in the field, Journal of International Business Studies ( JIBS ), also pays financially on a par with publishing in other top management journals. Our claim is based on an analysis of the impact of JIBS publications on a strategy faculty’s nine-month salary for a sample of 396 strategy professors from the business schools of 59 research-oriented US public universities from 2015 to 2019. Employing multilevel modeling, we find that publishing in JIBS significantly increases faculty’s annual salary by, on average, more than US$3,000, which is equivalent to the salary gains for publishing in leading general management and strategy journals. Thus, the recognition of JIBS is on par with that of other top management journals, and IB as a field of study is a financially rewarding career path. Moreover, JIBS may offer a blueprint for other business and management journals to build reputation by continuously publishing papers with high standards that continuously develop insights and theory relevant to contemporary business.

Digital technologies are changing how businesses strategize and organize internationally. They not only enable cost reduction in businesses crossing national boundaries but also enable novel types of products and business models. Yet, barriers to cross-border businesses persist or even re-emerge, such that the study of international business remains important in the digital age, but may have to shift focus. We argue that businesses operating internationally develop digital business strategies that are interdependent with their internationalization strategies. In doing so, they have to account for differences across national contexts including informal institutions, formal institutions, and resource endowments. We offer a conceptual framework linking external and internal antecedents to digital business and internationalization strategies. We focus in particular on three digital strategies: owning digital platforms, participating in digital platforms, and transforming traditional businesses for the digital world. On this basis, we discuss the contributions of the papers in this special issue and conclude by outlining an agenda for future research.

Sanctions are a tool used by political actors to induce foreign countries, firms or individuals to alter their behavior. As nonmilitary coercive measure, they have the potential to disrupt the international business environment, often on short notice, and change the rules of the game. Synthesizing the available evidence on the economic and political impacts of sanctions, we explore how sanctions disrupt the institutional framework for international business and how firms respond to sanctions. Based on a review of available scholarly evidence, we discuss how theories of international business, such as institution-based view, resource- and knowledge-based view, resource dependency theory, and behavioral theories of the firm, can contribute to explaining the impact of sanctions. At the same time, we discuss how sanctions, as politically motivated disruptions, challenge some assumptions underlying these theories. Going forward, our research agenda on sanctions is likely to help firms and governments to strategize in a geopolitically sensitive world.

Research SummaryState-controlled acquirers face a liability of stateness (LoS) because host country stakeholders consider them less legitimate and as representatives of foreign political power. We argue that due to LoS, state-owned enterprises (SOEs) face more regulatory scrutiny in cross-border acquisitions than comparable private-owned enterprises (POEs). Applying a voting behavior perspective, we further posit this increased regulatory scrutiny is reduced when acquisitions occur via intermediaries, and in host communities less averse to state ownership due to local labor conditions. Using a sample of cross-border acquisitions with acquirers from 44 economies and targets in 50 US states, we find that SOEs are 9% more likely to attract additional regulatory scrutiny than POEs. However, this likelihood decreases with indirect acquisitions and in host regions with high unemployment.Managerial SummaryState-owned enterprises experience challenges in their cross-border acquisitions because people in host societies do not trust them. As a result, regulatory authorities, such as CFIUS in the United States, subject foreign SOE acquirers to greater scrutiny. However, by acquiring foreign firms through subsidiaries rather than through parent organizations, the state influence becomes less visible, resulting in less regulatory scrutiny. Moreover, local stakeholders are concerned with economic opportunities in their local area, which they prioritize over ideological concerns at time of economic crisis. Consequently, SOE acquirers face less additional scrutiny in local communities with high unemployment. Thus, SOE acquirers can work with local communities to overcome the negative perception they encounter when entering foreign markets.

When companies experience political disruptions to their global business, such as Myanmar 2020 or Russia 2022, challenges in the host economy may be compounded by home country pressures to disengage. How can MNEs navigate such economic and ethical complexity? We suggest that MNEs facing pressures to exit should organize their decision process in three steps: First, clarify the financial implications considering the implications of disengagement for operations outside the focal country. Second, assess the ethical implications of continuing operations in the country. Third, opting to disengage, assess the merits of alternative disengagement strategies, including partial and full exit.

What are the implications of finance and knowledge flows for MNE strategy? In this perspective paper, we discuss the antecedents and implications of HQ-subsidiary financial and knowledge flows. These flows differ, as the deployment of knowledge hinges on numerous contextual characteristics, whereas financial flows are relatively fungible. The complexity and diversity of knowledge resources make their transfer sensitive to several subsidiary-level characteristics such as R&D mandates, location, and inter-unit interdependencies. In contrast, financial resource flows are relatively easier to measure and directly compare across domains. Hence, they are likely to be allocated primarily on risk considerations, notably the equity control over the subsidiary. Both flows are needed for subsidiaries to succeed. Based on the interrelations of knowledge and financial resources flows into the subsidiaries, four types of subsidiary roles are categorized: strategic growth, interrelated, diversified, and independent. We discuss implications on subsidiary competitiveness and MNE risk and point to future research avenues addressing the dynamic and interrelated flows of both these resources.

The manager is often neglected in management scholarship. Although we are not the first to call for renewed attention to managers, given the rapidly evolving state of the environment in which firms operate, it seems an apropos moment to reflect on the importance of managers and remind ourselves to incorporate them into our ideas, relationships, and theories. We provide reasons for the current state of affairs and offer four actionable recommendations for making the manager a more central character in our research planning, execution, and dissemination: (1) listen to managers, (2) develop and test theories that include the manager explicitly, (3) conduct research at multiple levels of analysis and using multiple methods, and (4) find synergies across seemingly competing academic engagements.

Research Summary The global economy has recently entered a period of disruptions, increasing barriers to cross-border business and potentially inhibiting the merits and legitimacy of integrated global strategies. We explore how three major disruptions in the global economy (reduced people mobility, divergent national regulatory institutions, and anti-globalization populism) affect the strategies of multinational enterprises, and, in particular, the role of their foreign subsidiaries. These external disruptions call for a reassessment of theories regarding the nature of global strategy and the interaction between businesses and their political environment. Specifically, we argue that the international relations perspectives of realism, liberalism, and constructivism help explain the nature of the disruptions, and hence can inform strategy scholarship in explaining and examining strategic responses to such external disruptions. Managerial Summary Firms establish subsidiaries abroad in order to exploit the opportunities of globalization to the benefit of their shareholders and other stakeholders. However, the global economy has recently entered a period of disruptions that include reduced people mobility, divergent national regulatory institutions, and increased anti-globalization populism. We argue that these disruptions will not only create new operational challenges for global strategies and new needs for local adaptation but may even challenge the legitimacy of global business models. We turn to political science for explanations and find that three paradigms of international relations offer contrarian predictions not only on the big disruptions but also on the ability of MNEs to influence political processes driving the disruptions.

ABSTRACT This study examines the international performance of emerging economy multinational enterprises (EMNEs) from a strategic configuration perspective. We propose that the strategic patterns of EMNEs that deliver growth and/or profitability are characterized by different configurations of environment, strategy, and managerial resource factors. Therefore, identifying and assessing strategic configurations is key to understanding EMNEs’ international performance. Employing fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis, we analyze a multi-sourced dataset of Chinese firms’ outward investment and identify multiple equifinal strategic configurations that are associated with superior international performance in terms of sales growth and/or profitability. These findings inform the development of a taxonomy of EMNEs’ strategic configurations corresponding with three performance groups, namely profitable growth, profitable niche, and poor performers.

ABSTRACTThe ‘rivalry’ between India and China on the global stage is much ado about nothing. India and China both have huge potential to play a bigger role in global business than they do today. Both countries have experienced major growth domestically, which is not yet matched by their role in global business. MNEs from the two countries have been internationalizing along very different pathways, with few overlaps. Their ability to realize their potential depends on policies and institutions as well as entrepreneurial business leadership in their own country. Their future internationalization depends only to a small degree on the other of the two countries