Exporter-importer business relationships: Past empirical research and future directions

Bilge Aykol and Leonidas C. Leonidou

International Business Review, 2018, vol. 27, issue 5, 1007-1021

Abstract: We present a systematic and comprehensive review of the extant empirical literature on exporter-importer business relationships during the period 1975–2017. The review covers 196 articles published in academic journals, which were content-analyzed with their theoretical background, research design, scope of research, sampling/data collection methods, data analysis, and thematic areas covered. Our findings reveal that this line of research is characterized by: (a) a sound theoretical foundation, the most frequent theories being the behavioral paradigm, transaction cost economics, and relational exchange theory; (b) heavy emphasis on formalized, statistical, cross-sectional, and causal research designs; (c) focus on single-country studies, conducted mainly in Europe, Asia, and North America; (d) a tendency to employ probabilistic samples, of a relatively large size; (e) an adoption of relatively sophisticated methods to purify and analyze data collected; and (f) an emphasis on topics relating to behavioral and structural relational dimensions, followed by external and internal influences. Guidelines for researchers focusing on exporter-importer relationships are provided, as well as suggestions for potential new research topics.

Keywords: Exporter-importer relationships; Literature review; Exporting; Importing (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2018
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (7)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:iburev:v:27:y:2018:i:5:p:1007-1021

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DOI: 10.1016/j.ibusrev.2018.03.001

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