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As the field of international business has matured, there have been shifts in the core unit of analysis. First, there was analysis at country level, using national statistics on trade and foreign direct investment (FDI). Next, the focus shifted to the multinational enterprise (MNE) and the parent's firm specific advantages (FSAs). Eventually the MNE was analysed as a network and the subsidiary became a unit of analysis. We untangle the last fifty years of international business theory using a classification by these three units of analysis. This is the country-specific advantage (CSA) and firm-specific advantage (FSA) matrix. Will this integrative framework continue to be useful in the future? We demonstrate that this is likely as the CSA/FSA matrix permits integration of potentially useful alternative units of analysis, including the broad region of the triad. Looking forward, we develop a new framework, visualized in two matrices, to show how distance really matters and how FSAs function in international business. Key to this are the concepts of compounded distance and resource recombination barriers facing MNEs when operating across national borders.

An emerging subfield of strategic management is that dealing with the natural environment as it affects corporate strategy. To analyze this we organize the literature on environmental regulations and corporate strategy into a new managerial framework. Next we develop a resource-based view of the interaction between firm-level competitiveness and environmental regulations, including the conditions for the use of green capabilities. Finally, we analyze the green capabilities of multinational enterprises within a standard international business model, using firm-specific advantages (FSAs) and country-specific advantages (CSAs). We then use this FSA/CSA configuration to explore hypotheses on environmental regulations, competitiveness, and corporate strategy.

All business contributes to environmental crises because of its focus on profit. We argue that international business (IB) contributes more than its fair share. IB's focus on cross-border arbitrage has led to the over-extraction of natural resources and the accumulation of waste. This is a problem because natural resources are limited in quantity and embedded in their local environment. It is time for IB researchers to step up and substantially and meaningfully address IB’s contribution to environmental crises by embracing the principles of natural systems processes within its core assumptions and improving its theorizing of natural resources. In this paper, we take a step forward in this direction by revisiting and refining the theoretical dimensions of country-specific advantages (CSAs) and firm-specific advantages (FSAs) to recognize natural resources more explicitly. We propose three natural resource-based strategies for multinational enterprises (MNEs): reducing, replacing, and regenerating. This article offers a new theoretical perspective on understanding how IB can create value and steward the natural environment, contributing to the sustainability of business, society, and the planet.

This article ties in directly with recently intensified interest in business models in international business (IB), using the energy transition as empirical context to explore their relevance in firm internationalization. The global energy transition presents a challenge for almost all industries, but some face specific difficulties particularly important from an IB perspective. We study a set of European firms that used to operate in a highly regulated context with (partial) state ownership, until government-directed market liberalization started to allow further competition and internationalization. Existing firms were prompted to adapt their business models to these changes, with new ventures entering the market to reap opportunities with novel energy-related technologies and business models. Linking insights from strategic management to the IB literature, we conceptualize business model-related specific advantages (BMSAs), and explore the role of BMSAs in the internationalization of the firms in our sample. We also uncover barriers to BMSA recombination in (potential) host countries, consider BMSA location-boundedness, and discuss implications for firms’ international expansion by presenting a new framework. Consequences for the energy transition and the actors already involved and (in)directly confronted with it are explicated, while outlining promising areas for further research, building on the insights and limitations of our study.

This research note links insights from the family firm literature with extant internalization theory-based studies on family firm internationalization to explain how family-owned multinational enterprises (MNEs) can leverage family resources for successful internationalization, and why some family firms are unable to do so. We identify examples of internationally relevant resources contributed by the founding family, namely, social capital, long-term orientation, and reputation. We then differentiate between pre-existing resources that reside at the family level, and firm-specific advantages (FSAs) that reside at the firm level. In order to derive FSAs from family resources, and to profitably exploit those across borders, family MNEs must engage in two types of recombination. First, family and non-family resources are recombined to create actionable FSAs. Second, family-derived FSAs are recombined with location-specific resources in order to respond to differences between home and host country environments. We discuss complementary resources required for each type of recombination and specific mechanisms utilized by family MNEs to integrate those resources. By investigating a potential functional contribution of a family to successful internationalization, we extend prior internalization theory-based work, which focuses predominantly on family firms’ propensity toward bifurcation bias and the constraining effect of this bias on efficient international governance.

We develop three sets of theoretical boundary conditions for the firm-specific advantages (FSA) and country-specific advantages (CSA) view of intellectual property rights (IPR) in international business. These conditions explain when and where MNEs’ FSAs accrued from IPR assets (IPR-FSAs) are larger or smaller. In terms of IPR assets’ structure, we explicate the conditions creating complementarity problems among MNEs’ IPR that make IPR-FSAs larger, and the conditions under which complementarity problems between MNEs’ IPR and closely related legal rights make IPR-FSAs smaller. In terms of IPR assets’ geographic deployability, we explicate the rare conditions under which certain IPR-FSAs are non-location bound. However, we also explain that most IPR-FSAs are quasi-location-bound, and sometimes can even be fully location-bound, and therefore are smaller for MNEs’ units abroad. In terms of IPR assets’ defensibility, we explicate the conditions allowing IPR to still afford FSAs to MNEs even if the IPR cannot be favorably enforced. We argue that integrating these conditions into the FSA–CSA framework enables it to more precisely explain when and where there are heterogeneities in the size of MNEs’ IPR-FSAs. We also explain how our work can facilitate the empirical study of IPR-FSAs in international business research and guide MNEs’ IPR strategies.

Multinational enterprises (MNEs) from different home regions now routinely confront one another in third markets. There is, however, little conceptual or theoretical literature on the determinants of outcome patterns in these contests. This paper offers a first attempt at systematic and parsimonious conceptualization of the issue. In Brazil, for instance, while U.S.-based MNEs such as Coca-Cola and IBM lead in their sectors, other leading U.S. MNEs including Citibank, GE, and Pfizer are outsold by European rivals that appear less competitive globally. Extending theory on the liability of foreignness and firm-specific advantages, we contend that (i) the MNE whose home nation has greater ties to the focal host nation (along geographic, colonial, immigration, linguistic, and institutional dimensions) will lead in that host nation; and (ii) ties notwithstanding, if an MNE's firm-specific advantages are so superior that it outsells a rival MNE in that rival's home market, then it will outsell that rival as well in the focal host market. Based on this we develop a conceptual framework, statistical analysis pertaining to MNE competition in Brazil, and three avenues for fruitful new research.

In responding to the Forsgren and Holm (2021) critique of internalization theory, we develop a capability-based model of internalization and quasi-internalization, highlighting the key role of the international recombination of assets. With external control mechanisms becoming more sophisticated, full internalization has become increasingly unnecessary. Rather, the capacity to orchestrate complex networks is an increasingly important source of competitive advantage. We demonstrate that internalization theory does not need to assume that the MNE is all powerful, or that it can dictate the choice of mode with its foreign business partners. We also disagree with the argument that internalization theory presumes perfect rationality. When managers’ perceptions deviate from reality, they do indeed make wrong choices (over- and under-internalization) that come with various types of efficiency penalties. We share the Forsgren and Holm view that a learning perspective can provide insights on the evolution of an MNE’s asset recombination mode, as it gains experience and knowledge. Furthermore, we show that internalization theory has been extended to incorporate such a learning perspective.

We consolidate and comprehensively review the international business (IB) literature on the firm-specific advantages (FSAs) of emerging market multinational enterprises (EM MNEs). We do so through a systematic examination of 88 empirical and conceptual articles published in top-ranked IB journals between 2011 and 2018. The results reveal that in the past decades, EM MNEs have acquired several of the same FSAs as their counterparts in developed countries (developed country enterprises or DC MNEs) - financial resources, technologies, marketing capabilities, brand equity, R&D intensity, and management competencies. However, more recently, EM MNEs have developed additional unique FSAs in the form of managerial capabilities - to cope with competition in uncertain and constantly changing environments; easy access to cheaper capital; a stronger commitment to networks, such as those with diaspora communities; and, political connections. These additional FSAs have catalyzed the internationalization of EM MNEs. Our study also shows that some hurdles remain in the IB literature on FSAs. For instance, while IB scholars agree that EM MNEs have different investment motives depending on whether they invest in other emerging economies or developed economies, scholars are silent on the exact FSAs necessary to make EM MNEs investments in the respective economies successful. To advance the IB literature, we present some promising future research areas and challenge scholars to pursue further empirical studies on the FSAs of EM MNEs.

We extend the internalization literature by theorizing on how public disclosure of corporate social irresponsibility (CSI) can damage reputation-based firm-specific advantages of multinational companies (MNCs) and how foreign subsidiary governance can subsequently be used as strategic responses. Specifically, we distinguish between two foreign subsidiary governance mechanisms – information control and ownership control – that the prior literature has often assumed operate in parallel, and posit that they function in divergent directions in this context. Furthermore, we explain how two hostcountry characteristics–press freedom and regulatory quality – amplify the need for MNCs to utilize different governance mechanisms as responses to CSI disclosure.