Seyda Deligonul

Curbing Foreign Distributor Opportunism: An Examination of Trust, Contracts, and the Legal Environment in International Channel Relationships

Many tenets of cross-border governance arrangements are broad-brush projections of domestic findings. To explore such generalizations, this study uses data from a large set of U.S.-based manufacturers to formulate and test propositions about limiting the potential opportunistic behavior of foreign distributors. The findings challenge two generalizations about governance arrangements in the cross-border context. The first is that a manufacturer is often handicapped disproportionately by its level of brand and scale prominence. Formal contracts as prescribed by transaction cost analysis, though negatively related to opportunism, do not have a significant effect on the alleviation of foreign distributor opportunism. The second generalization is that the joint use of trust and formal contracts is not significantly associated with opportunism. Trust and formal contracts serve different purposes. Trust makes the relationship function, and contracts institute and legitimize it. Furthermore, previous studies investigate opportunism in isolation, whereas this study points to the influence of legal hostility on the management of opportunism in the export market.

Firm-Specific Assets, Multinationality, and Financial Performance: A Meta-Analytic Review and Theoretical Integration

Drawing upon internalization theory, this study investigates the complex relationships involving firm-specific assets, multinationality, and financial performance. Through a meta-analysis of 120 independent samples reported in 111 studies, we test the predictions of internalization theory in the context of the multinationality-performance relationship. Moreover, we further develop and refine our understanding of internalization theory with a focus on the effects of firm-specific assets on the multinationality-performance relationship. Findings suggest that while advertising intensity fully mediates the relationship between multinationality and performance, R&D intensity has both direct and indirect effects on firm performance. In addition, the results delineate the conditions under which firm-specific assets have the strongest impact on the extent to which multinationality relates to performance. Meta-analytic evidence also suggests that multinationality has intrinsic value above and beyond the intangible assets that firms possess after controlling for firms’ international experience, age, size, and product diversification.

International Marketing as a Field of Study: A Critical Assessment of Earlier Development and a Look Forward

Fundamental changes taking place in the global business environment and in the business enterprise itself compel international marketing scholars to reexamine the progress being made by the fields scholars in developing knowledge. In this article, the authors critically evaluate progress in international marketing as a field of study through ontological, thematic, and methodological lenses. They also offer a portfolio of research topics that they believe are worthy of scholarly attention.

A Multilevel Examination of the Drivers of Firm Multinationality A Meta-Analysis

Significant research has been devoted to studying the factors that affect firm multinationality. In this study, the authors organize the vast multinationality literature by levels of analysis using a multilevel framework based on the interaction paradigm and conduct a meta-analysis that aggregates the empirical findings from 154 independent samples reported in 145 studies. The cumulative evidence provides strong support for the upper echelons theory that emphasizes the central importance of executives’ characteristics as major determinants of firm multinationality. Moreover, the results indicate that the accumulation of the international experience embedded in human and relational capital is the most significant firm-level factor that affects firm multinationality. The meta-analytic results also reveal that the measurement and sample characteristics of original studies explain the inconsistent findings pertaining to the effects of firm size, firm age, and top management team size on multinationality. On the basis of the meta-analytic findings, several directions for future research are provided.

What Drives Performance in Globally Focused Marketing Organizations? : A Three-Country Study

In marketing, compared with other organizational dimensions such as leadership, culture, structure, and processes, relatively scant attention has been devoted to the effect of strategy on firm performance, especially in the global context. Rapid globalization of markets, along with ever-increasing dynamic demands on the marketing organization, necessitates a new examination. This article reports on a study that examines the role of strategy and other organizational forces on the performance of globally focused marketing organizations headquartered in Norway, Sweden, and the United States. The general findings indicate that (1) the constructs of leadership, strategy, and culture precede the globally focused marketing organizations structure; (2) strategy precedes structure; and (3) organizational structure and processes influence marketing and financial performance. Many relationships appear to be consistent across countries, and some are uniquely tied to the home-country markets.

Strategic re‐structuring by born‐globals using outward and inward‐oriented activity

Purpose – Current conceptualizations of born‐globals lack a full theoretical explanation of strategic re‐structuring through the use of outward and inward‐oriented activity and the processes of de‐internationalization and re‐internationalization. Strategy and internationalization processes are created by entrepreneurial behaviour. If one wants to understand various international behaviours and strategic changes in firms one needs to focus on entrepreneurs – individual managers. The purpose of this paper is to unify the theoretical framework on born‐globals by addressing two questions. How do managers move through the de‐internationalization (exit) to re‐internationalization (re‐entry) process? How do they choose their patterns of internationalization?Design/methodology/approach – To address these research gaps, this study draws on 26 in‐depth interviews with senior managers across nine Australian born‐globals.Findings – Moving between outward and inward‐oriented activity as they de‐internationalize and re...

Legal versus relational ordering in channel governance: the case of the manufacturer and its foreign distributor

Given the confluence of opportunism, bounded rationality, and asset specificity in a partnership, the participants may attempt to expropriate certain rents. This type of rent is called the quasi-rent, and it is the reason for participating in the relationship in the first place (Alchian & Woodward, 1988). A quasi-rent is the excess above the returns necessary to sustain the current use of resources. It can be the means to recover sunk costs, such as investments in assets in general, and relational assets in our context. A relational quasi-rent is that portion of the quasi-rent generated by a resource that depends on the partners resources (Hill, 1990). It stems from investment in specialized assets to support a partnership. Also this rent is the amount, which a partner can expropriate without destroying the relationship.

Exogenous risk analysis in global supplier networks: Conceptualization and field research findings

Country risks are macro level risks. As exogenous risks, these ripple down from country to company level, embodied in strategy, relationships, collaboration, operations, and cultural patterns. This chapter examines the process of risks as they transit with a domino effect from macro level to company level. We consider the misalignment to be at the heart of such risk rippling. Alignment or misalignment between the two partners, operating from two different countries, represents the underpinnings of risk spills and shifts which we refer as risk debasement in the overall workings of a supply network. The chapter is based on several considerations. First, we establish the literature and theory pertaining to this topic. Second, we examine the observations that are gathered through field study of suppliers in Turkey and Italy involved in a globally created complex product --the U.S. Joint Strike Fighter F-35. We then delve into the discussion of consequent hazards when the risk issues are not resolved.

Reflections on Czinkota and Ronkainen's International Marketing Manifesto: A Perspective from North America

lish boundaries around its inquiry. International marketing (IM) is no exception. There has been a considerable dispute whether IM has been able to fence its inquiries in a distinct area of study or simply has muddled through as an application ground for marketing theories. With questions about its maturity, some scholars doubt whether IM even deserves the status of distinction. Accused of being fragmentary and atheoretic (Albaum and Peterson 1984), simplistic (Samiee 1997), nonanalytical incomplete in insight (Bradley 1987), and nonintegrative (Cavusgil 1997), IM is also described as a potpourri of functional fields with occasional theorizing and conceptualizing (Cavusgil 1997; Samiee 1997). Czinkota and Ronkainen (2003) also find the field “stagnant.” The pessimism about the progress of the field shows that the process of maturing as a distinct discipline is certainly a slow evolution.

An Epistemological Cross-Perspective for Positioning Team Research

This publication contains reprint articles for which IEEE does not hold copyright. Full text is not available on IEEE Xplore for these articles.