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This paper points out new directions for the deepening and broadening of the institution-based view, by drawing on three streams of research with which I have been involved recently: (1) outward foreign direct investment from emerging economies, (2) bankruptcy laws and entrepreneurship development, and (3) institution-based research focusing on Africa. Such deepening has been accomplished by enhancing our institution-based understanding of foreign direct investment with a focus on emerging multinationals, while broadening has been done both substantively by probing into the impact of bankruptcy laws on entrepreneurship development around the world and geographically by calling for enhanced research attention on Africa via an institution-based lens.

The extant research highlights the importance of understanding the micro-level mechanisms for the development of firm-level international business theories. One of them is institution-based view on strategy in emerging markets that highlights the importance of institutional factors for local actors' decision-making. It attracted significant attention of international business scholars, and it is timely to assess existing body of knowledge about how and why managers and entrepreneur respond to institutional forces. I argue that in this context, a better understanding of microfoundations of these responses is extremely useful for unveiling the complexity associated with institutional influence on emerging market firms' strategy. I undertake a problematizing review to critically examine the current state of research in this field. In doing this, I shed light on the role of managers and entrepreneurs from different national, generational and social backgrounds in shaping institution-based strategies and inform the talent management research about the capabilities and strategies that EM managers and entrepreneurs mobilize to address institutional pressures.

The conditions that are constantly changing and transforming by digital technologies in today's world have forced businesses to think strategically and to comply with the rules and processes of strategic management. Technologies, such as the internet of things, cloud computing, artificial intelligence, and big data, especially in the Industry 4.0 ecosystem, cause some conflicts or constructive and destructive effects on the management approaches and management strategies of businesses. Businesses need to understand these technologies and their effects to maintain their existence and manage their resources and capabilities effectively and strategically. In this chapter, it is aimed to examine the conflicts with destructive and constructive effects of digital technologies on the strategic management of enterprises. For this purpose, the literature was searched qualitatively, and a conceptual study was carried out. At the beginning of the chapter, strategic management literature was researched, and strategic management approaches and views were examined. In the next part, digital technologies in the Industry 4.0 ecosystem are explained. In the last part, digital technologies and their impacts in terms of strategic management approaches (position approach, resource-based approach, and complementing views of resources-based approach) have been examined.

Since the beginning of the 21st century, China’s outward foreign direct investment (OFDI) is growing steadily and Chinese multinationals (MNCs) are playing an increasingly important role in the global economy. Thus, the number of papers focusing on China’s OFDI and Chinese MNCs has been increasing during the last years. The aim of this chapter is to carry out a review of the empirical papers dealing with Chinese MNCs published between 2002 and 2012 in high-impact international business and management journals.

This chapter reviews 43 empirical papers focusing on Chinese MNCs that were published in nine major scholarly journals between 2002 and 2012.

We report individual and institutional contributions, the theories and methods used, the research topics, and the main findings. We also discuss implications for future research.

Some previous literature reviews have dealt with research on China’s OFDI and Chinese MNCs. Nevertheless, none of the earlier reviews dealt specifically with empirical papers; neither did they provide an analysis of both individual and institutional contributions.

Adaptation of foreign market strategy and its performance outcomes have been among the key research topics in international business and international marketing. The present chapter provides new evidence on the contingent nature of the adaptation-performance relationship. Drawing from the institution-based view, we argue that adaptation increases legitimacy in the foreign market, hence improving foreign market performance. This relationship can be expected to gain importance for higher levels of institutional distance. Conversely, we expect that a successful development of foreign market relationships can be an alternative way of gaining legitimacy. These statements are supported with quantitative data from 284 firms and qualitative evidence from 8 firms.

This chapter compiles and summarizes the various strategies in the literature about emerging markets (EMs). Moreover, competitive strategies, market entry strategies in the international market, developing marketing strategy, and Porter's competitive strategies are also presented and discussed. Competitive strategies, market entry strategies, developing marketing strategy, and Porter's competitive strategies don't directly deal with EMs but they are deemed to be helpful and relevant to the research problem in the study of the transformation of strategic alliances in Eastern and Central Europe. The reason for compiling the various strategies is because one can clearly understand from the literature that researchers do agree in the value of a strategy, but there is no shared view among researchers of what a strategy is, what its benefits are, and how it should be developed, implemented, and evaluated. At the end of the book, the authors have tried to assess how and to what extent those strategies are applicable and helpful for a firm operating in EMs.

This chapter examines the impact of national membership in international organizations on female entrepreneurship. Drawing on the institution-based view from global strategy and civil society theory from international relations, we show how international organizations can promote entrepreneurship opportunities for women with respect to the United Nations’ sustainable development goals (SDGs). This research has both practical and social implications. From a practical perspective, it provides important insights for policy makers and entrepreneurs. Policy makers can use the findings to understand how the international organizations that countries join affect entrepreneurship, particularly the United Nation’s SDGs Entrepreneurs can also use the findings to advocate mutually beneficial conditions for host environments, particularly those dedicated to female empowerment. A sample of 44 countries, 5 years of data, and 130 country-year observations finds robust support for our assertions.

In this paper, we conduct a conceptual and bibliographic analysis of the literature that deals with the international strategy of state-owned enterprises (SOEs), with particular attention to SOEs from emerging economies (EEs). We first review the state of the art in defining the concepts of EEs and SOEs. We then conduct a detailed bibliographic analysis of the literature pertaining to SOEs’ involvement in international activities, whether as outward foreign investors or as potential local partners of inward-investing multinational enterprises. The analysis covers general trends in the literature, prominent research questions and outcome variables, use of theories, and choices pertaining to methodology (type of research and effects, empirical contexts). We document a literature that is fast-growing and well balanced in some respects. In other respects, we advance recommendations pertaining to (a) consistency and precision in the use of the concepts of “state-owned enterprise” and “emerging economy”; (b) search for specific evidence on the outward activities of EE SOEs in less-developed economies and even in other EEs, and on their performance; (c) understanding of relative propensities of local SOEs and inward investors to collaborate, and what happens when SOEs encounter each other across borders; (d) opportunities to strengthen the theoretical foundations and contributions of this research; and (e) minding the mix of home and host countries in studies and avoiding undue generalization from what has become a predominantly China-centric literature.

Our study proposes a resource environment view (REV) of competitive advantage by unpacking the environmental origins of a firm’s competitive advantage. The key tenet of the REV is that the heterogeneity and imperfect mobility of strategic factor markets and institutions across countries explain how firms based in different countries would likely both create and sustain a competitive advantage. In particular, our study introduces the notion of “the paradox of environmental embeddedness.” The paradox lies in the fact that the same environmental conditions – in terms of strategic factor markets and institutions – that enable firms to create a competitive advantage can paradoxically also create a situation in which it is more difficult for these firms to sustain an advantage. Another important aspect of our study is that, to enhance our understanding of how firms manage the paradox of environmental embeddedness, our study specifies the resource environmental conditions under which firms’ internal and external resource-oriented strategies – that is, the development of dynamic capabilities and interventions in the country resource environment – are more beneficial when managing the environmental paradox. Overall, our theorizing has important implications for strategic management theory and practice.