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This study aims to explore how operational resilience can be achieved within supply ecosystems in the delicate yet harsh natural environments of the Arctic.

An in-depth, multiple qualitative case study of offshore supply operations in Arctic oil and gas field projects is conducted. Data from semi-structured interviews, personal observations and archival materials are analysed through institutional work and logics approaches.

The findings suggest that achieving social-ecological resilience depends on the interaction between social and natural (irreversible) systems, which are shaped and influenced by various institutional dynamics. Different resilience solutions were detected.

This study develops a comprehensive understanding of how social-ecological resilience emerges in supply ecosystems through institutional dynamics. The study’s empirical basis is limited to offshore oil and gas projects in the Arctic. However, due to anticipated future growth of Arctic economic activities, other types of supply ecosystems may benefit from the study’s results.

This research contributes with empirical knowledge about how social-ecological resilience is created through institutional interaction within supply ecosystems to prevent disruptions of both social and ecological ecosystems under the harsh natural conditions of the Arctic.

The purpose of this paper is to explore how supply chain strategies emerge and evolve in response to contextual influence.

A qualitative single-case study presents the journey of a supply chain strategy, conceptualised as the idea of transport independence in the Russian Arctic context. Data from 18 semi-structured interviews, personal observations and archival materials are interpreted through the institutional concepts of translation and editing effects.

The study reveals how supply chain strategies evolve over time and can affect institutional factors. The case study further reveals how contextual conditions make a company reconsider its core competencies as well as the role of supply chain management practices. The findings show that strategy implementation through purposeful actions can represent a powerful resistance to contextual pressures and constraints, as well as being a facilitator of change in actual supply chains and their context. During the translation of the idea of transport independence into actions, the supply chain strategy transformed itself into a form of strategic collaboration and thereby made supply chains in the Russian Arctic more integrated than before.

More empirical studies on strategy implementation in interaction with contextual and institutional factors are suggested. An institutional process perspective is applied in this study but the authors suggest that future research should include a human dimension by an exploration of day-to-day routines and challenges that employees face when strategising and the actions they take.

The study provides an understanding of how a new supply chain strategy emerges and how it changes during implementation. In this process-oriented study – merging context, process and strategy content – it is further shown that a supply chain strategy may affect the context by responding to contextual and institutional challenges.

This study explores how human actions affect existing supply chain management (SCM) practice.

Using a narrative approach, this qualitative in-depth case study looks at micro-human activities in SCM practices in the Russian Arctic. Data from personal observations, 13 semi-structured interviews and archival materials are interpreted through the concepts of institutional work and institutional logics.

The study reveals how human actions and institutions affect each other and change existing SCM practice constrained by institutional order and logics. The findings identify two forms of institutional work, initiated by the presence of conflicts of interest between practitioners engaged in different organisational routines, that become an essential driver for logic change. Social action, often invisible in practice, is indicated by finding compromises and informal arrangements that shape interactive activity among practitioners. The findings show that changes enacted by human actions in SCM practice have envisioned new forms of collaboration among supply chain members, thereby making supply chains in the Russian Arctic more integrated than before.

This study involves a limited number of supply chain practitioners, making it imperative to study larger samples, specifically from various empirical contexts.

This study suggests an alternative approach focusing on SCM practice as consistent patterns of human actions, to reflect on supply chain integration problems. It provides an understanding of how practitioners are influenced by and active in producing institutional change. An issue of practitioners' responsibility and morality regarding the consequences of their decisions when exerting change in existing SCM practice is further emphasised.