Prelims

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CREATING A SUSTAINABLE COMPETITIVE POSITION

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INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS AND MANAGEMENT

Series Editor: Pervez N. Ghauri

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INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS AND MANAGEMENT - VOLUME 37

CREATING A SUSTAINABLE COMPETITIVE POSITION: ETHICAL CHALLENGES FOR INTERNATIONAL FIRMS

SERIES EDITOR

PERVEZ N. GHAURI

University of Birmingham, UK

EDITED BY

PERVEZ N. GHAURI

University of Birmingham, UK

ULF ELG

Lund University, Sweden

and

SARA MELÉN HÅNELL

Mälardalen University, Sweden

United Kingdom – North America – Japan – India – Malaysia – China

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Emerald Publishing Limited

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First edition 2023

Editorial matter and selection © 2023 Pervez N. Ghauri, Ulf Elg and Sara Melén Hånell.

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Contents

About the Authors

Fredrik N. G. Andersson is Associate Professor in Economics, LUSEM. His research focusses on the decarbonization of the economy and, in particular, the carbon-intensive and natural resource-based industries. He has been involved in several national and international research projects on climate change since 2008. He is currently Principle Investigator (PI) for an interdisciplinary research project on financing a decarbonization of the energy-intensive industries. His research has a strong policy focus, and he has, in combination with his research, worked closely with national, regional and local policymakers in formulating and evaluating climate policies. He has been member of the EVRACSI Initiative since early 2020. He is responsible for 20% of the research at the industry level and contribute to research on policy development. He works actively with the other researchers to formulate specific research questions and in implementing the research agenda. He also actively takes part in the interactions with the external partners.

Susanne Arvidsson is Associate Professor in Accounting and Finance at the School of Economics and Management at Lund University. She has extensive research experience in sustainability and sustainable finance and leads several successful interdisciplinary research projects. She publishes in impactful accounting and finance journals, including Accounting, Auditing and Accountability Journal, Journal of Business Ethics and Business Strategy and the Environment. She is Programme Director of the research programme Mistra BIOPATH (Pathways towards an efficient alignment of the financial system with the needs of biodiversity) and Coordinator of the interdisciplinary research project Nature by Number at the Pufendorf Institute for Advanced Studies. She acts as expert in sustainability and finance-related areas both within the academic world and outside. She is Chairman of the Swedish Corporate Sustainability Ranking and is Director of Sparbanken Skånes Center for Sustainable Enterprising.

Annette Cerne is a Senior Lecturer in Business Administration at the School of Economics and Management, Lund University, Sweden. In her research, she focusses on the relationship between business and society as expressed through morality, responsibility and sustainability. Here, she has a particular focus on the role of language and communication as a practice in markets, especially global, international and emerging markets. She has published her research in Environmental Economics and Policy Studies, International Journal of Managing Projects in Business, Journal of Interdisciplinary Economics, Journal of Business Strategy and Palgrave Research Monographies.

John Dilyard is a Professor in the Economics and Finance and Interdisciplinary Studies Departments at St. Francis College, Brooklyn, NY. He is the Copy Editor for the Journal of Eastern European and Central Asian Research and is Peer Reviewer for several international business journals including Management International Review and The International Journal of Emerging Markets. His research interests focus on the role the private sector, particularly multinational corporations, are playing in the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals. His work on this topic has appeared in several conferences and journals.

Noémie Dominguez is Associate Professor of International Business at IAE Lyon School of Management (University Jean Moulin Lyon). Her research focusses on the internationalization strategies of small- and medium-sized enterprises and the integration of refugees in Europe. She is Co-coordinator of the H2020 MERGING project and Co-director of the International Management Research team. She has published several articles in international business academic journals such as International Business Review, International Journal of Entrepreneurship, Management International or M@n@gement, among others.

Todd Drennan is a PhD candidate in Industrial Economics and Management at the Swedish Graduate Business School of Management and IT (MIT) and Mälardalen University with teaching and co-teaching responsibilities primarily in marketing and its methodologies. His research project is on the international e-consumer and the study of international consumer behaviour.

Ulf Elg is Professor of Business Administration with a specialization in international marketing, at the School of Economics and Management, Lund University, Sweden. His research areas are international marketing, market orientation, interorganizational collaboration, socio-political relationships, retailing and emerging markets. Among other places, his work has appeared in Journal of International Business Studies, Journal of Business Research, Journal of Organizational Behaviour, Long Range Planning, Industrial Marketing Management, Organization Studies and European Journal of Marketing.

Pervez N. Ghauri completed his PhD at Uppsala University, where he also taught for several years. He has worked in Manchester Business School and King’s College London (UK). Currently, he is Professor of International Business at University of Birmingham (UK). He was the Founding Editor of International Business Review that he edited for 30 years and is Consulting Editor for Journal of International Business Studies. He is a Fellow of the European International Business Academy and the Academy of International Business, where he was also Vice President between 2008 and 2010. He has published more than 30 books, including Research Methods in Business Studies (Cambridge University Press); International Marketing (McGraw-Hill); Doing Business in Emerging markets (Sage) and Business, Society and Politics (Emerald). He has authored more than 150 articles in top-level journals. He has been consulting with several companies such as BP, Ericsson and Airbus Industries.

Saad Ghauri is a postgraduate student at Lund University following the Innovation and Global Sustainable Development programme at the School of Economics and Management. Prior to these studies, he spent 10 years at the forefront of innovation in the technology industry working for both global software companies and emerging start-ups. With this background, he is interested in how company-led innovation can contribute towards sustainability.

Sarah Ku is a tenure-track Assistant Professor of Sustainable Business Management at Loyola University Chicago. This position is jointly appointed between the School of Environmental Sustainability and the Quinlan School of Business to bridge these disciplines together. Her research examines sustainability and equity in business, with a particular focus on organizational food waste and circular strategies. She explores how sustainable strategies can become standard business practice through mindful, equitable and cooperative collaborations that create value for all stakeholders.

Giovanna Magnani is Associate Professor of International Business at the Department of Economics and Management of the University of Pavia, where she is Deputy Director of the PhD programme in Applied Economics and Management and Director of the ‘ReValue Chains’ Observatory. She is member of the Board of Directors of the Italian Society of Management and Co-chair of the annual ENTERYNG Workshop (ENTreprenEurship Research workshop for YouNG scholars) in collaboration with EIASM and ECSB. She has been a visiting Scholar at UQ Business School (Australia), Georgia State University (US) and invited lecturer at IAE Lyon Management School (France).

Sara Melén Hånell is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Marketing and Strategy at the School of Business, Society and Engineering, Mälardalen University, Sweden. She is also a docent and research fellow in the Department of Marketing and Strategy, Stockholm School of Economics, Stockholm, Sweden. Her research focusses on the internationalization process of small- and medium-sized enterprises and the sustainability practices of multinational enterprises. She has previously published articles in Journal of World Business, International Marketing Review and Entrepreneurship and Regional Development.

Emilia Rovira Nordman is a Professor of International Marketing/International Entrepreneurship at the Department of Marketing and Strategy at the School of Business, Society and Engineering, Mälardalen University. Her fields of specialization include the international growth of small- and medium-sized enterprises and the internationalization of international new ventures.

Federica Sacco is a PhD candidate from the University of Pavia joint with the University of Bergamo and is currently a Visiting Scholar at CIBER – Georgia State University. Her main interests of research are international business, global value chain (GVCs), production networks and resilience. Her additional research interests are international marketing and heritage marketing. Her doctoral research investigates how GVCs can achieve resilience to minimize the impact of uncertainty. She has previous experience as a consultant for the internationalization of Italian firms in Middle East markets.

Aswo Safari is an Assistant Professor of Marketing at Mälardalen University. His research focusses on conceptual development of the concept of psychic distance in international business and management, multidimensional trust in marketing and a general theory of exchange. He has also conducted research about American Foreign Policy at MIT.

Sönnich Dahl Sönnichsen is with the Department of Marketing, School of Economics and Management, Lund University, Sweden. His main research areas concern the study of circular economy in areas of commercial enterprises, (public) procurement, marketization, dynamics in transformation, institutional perspectives, innovation and strategic management. Using qualitative and quantitative techniques, he studies the underlying processes and dynamics that enable effective implementation of the circular economy principles.

Veronika Tarnovskaya is Associate Professor and docent in Marketing at the School of Economics and Management, Lund University. After defending her doctoral dissertation ‘The mechanism of market driving with a corporate brand: A case of a global retailer’ in 2007, she has participated in three large international research projects conducted in cross-cultural contexts. The major foci of her research have been corporate branding in retailing, multinational enterprises’ (MNEs) market driving strategy in the emerging market context and corporate social responsiblity/sustainability challenges of MNEs in emerging markets. She has published articles in leading international journals such as the Academy of Management Executive, International Marketing Review, International Journal of Retail and Distribution Management, Journal of Brand Management, Industrial Marketing Management, Marketing Intelligence & Planning and Qualitative Market Research: An International Journal.

Daniel Tolstoy is an Assistant Professor and docent in marketing at the Stockholm School of Economics. His research focusses on international marketing in small- and medium-sized enterprises and multinational enterprises. He has published his works in journals such as Journal of World Business, International Marketing Review and International Business Review.

Shasha Zhao is Associate Professor (Senior Lecturer) of International Business and Innovation in the Department of Strategy and International Business, Surrey University. She is an Associate of Centre for International Business and Development at Sussex University, The Africa-Asia Centre for Sustainability at University of Aberdeen and Centre for Social Innovation Management at Surrey University. Her research focusses on global innovation strategy and knowledge management of multinationals in and from emerging economies and impact on sustainable development. She is the best paper award winner, senior journal editor and has published in Journal of World Business, International Business Review, UNIDO, among others.

About the Editors

Pervez N. Ghauri is Professor of International Business at University of Birmingham (UK). He was the Founding Editor of International Business Review that he edited for 30 years and is Consulting Editor for Journal of International Business Studies. He is a Fellow of the European International Business Academy and the Academy of International Business, where he was also Vice President between 2008 and 2010. He has published more than 30 books, including Research Methods in Business Studies (Cambridge University Press); International Marketing (McGraw-Hill); Doing Business in Emerging markets (Sage) and Business, Society and Politics (Emerald). He has authored more than 150 articles in top-level journals. He has been consulting with several companies such as BP, Ericsson and Airbus Industries.

Ulf Elg is Professor of Business Administration with a specialization in international marketing, at the School of Economics and Management, Lund University, Sweden. His research areas are international marketing, market orientation, interorganizational collaboration, socio-political relationships, retailing and emerging markets. Among other places, his work has appeared in Journal of International Business Studies, Journal of Business Research, Journal of Organizational Behaviour, Long Range Planning, Industrial Marketing Management, Organization Studies and European Journal of Marketing.

Sara Melén Hånell is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Marketing and Strategy at the School of Business, Society and Engineering, Mälardalen University, Sweden. She is also a docent and research fellow in the Department of Marketing and Strategy, Stockholm School of Economics, Stockholm, Sweden. Her research focusses on the internationalization process of small- and medium-sized enterprises and the sustainability practices of multinational enterprises. She has previously published articles in Journal of World Business, International Marketing Review and Entrepreneurship and Regional Development.

Acknowledgement

Most of the work involved in this volume was made possible by financial support from the Riksbankens Jubileumsfond.