Whole country-of-origin network development abroad

John P Berns (), Maria Gondo () and Christian Sellar ()
Additional contact information
John P Berns: University of Mississippi
Maria Gondo: University of Mississippi
Christian Sellar: University of Mississippi

Journal of International Business Studies, 2021, vol. 52, issue 3, No 7, 479-503

Abstract: Abstract The support that networks offer during the internationalization process is well documented in the international business literature. However, this work has primarily focused on firm-level networks while underappreciating the cooperative behaviors that may emerge among organizations in the pursuit of common network-level goals. To better understand these concerted and coordinated actions, we engaged in a qualitative examination of two clusters of Italian organizations abroad. We observed that goal-directed and governed networks emerged in these clusters, bounded by their common desire to support Italian firms’ internationalization. This insight underlies our contributions to the international business and whole network literatures. We offer a process model outlining the emergence of a particular type of whole network: the country-of-origin network. This process is much more distributed, emergent, and context-dependent than previously theorized. Our model illustrates that network development involves the active and coordinated efforts of diverse actors working to create infrastructure that can be accessed by and shared between new and existing organizations. Our finding that both networks were governed utilizing a distinct but context-appropriate governance structure provides new insight into how networks support internationalization. Furthermore, it illustrates that whole network-level support is distinct from, but complementary to, the firm-to-firm support highlighted in previous studies.

Keywords: networks; country-of-origin; internationalization; qualitative; process (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (5)

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1057/s41267-020-00379-x Abstract (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:pal:jintbs:v:52:y:2021:i:3:d:10.1057_s41267-020-00379-x

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer. ... nt/journal/41267/PS2

DOI: 10.1057/s41267-020-00379-x

Access Statistics for this article

Journal of International Business Studies is currently edited by John Cantwell

More articles in Journal of International Business Studies from Palgrave Macmillan, Academy of International Business
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().