Cultural issues and supply chain sustainability of multinational companies

Since its foundation, the debate regarding corporate social responsibility (CSR) has
been dominated by large companies (Carroll 1999) and strongly associated with
MNCs’ global strategy and their international development (Carroll and Shabana
2010; Collier and Wanderley 2005).
More recently, the literature has addressed the strategic role of suppliers in the
achievement and development of MNCs’ goals and their responsibility mandate
(Reuter et al. 2010). Hence, the importance of suppliers in the MNCs’ CSR policy
planning and its key role in the supply chain (Andersen and Skjoett-Larsen 2009;
Carter and Jennings 2004; Carter and Rogers 2005; Murphy and Poist 2002). Carter
and Rogers (2008) have clearly demonstrated the triple bottom line of economic,
environmental and social goals that lead supply relationships and the importance of
suppliers in improving the long-term success of companies and their partners.
Different authors (Krueger 2008; Preuss 2009; Wittstruck and Teuteberg 2012)
have stressed ethical sourcing as a social feature of companies’ sustainability and
suggested a definition of supply chain management sustainability (SSCM) that
emphasizes this aspect in the supply chain; others (Leire and Mont 2010;
Park-Poaps and Rees 2010) have focused on the strategic dimension of collaboration
with supply partners by emphasizing the importance of integrating internal
and external relationships for a more effective sustainability strategy.Some researchers (Pagell et al. 2010) have shifted their focus to the requirement
for efficiency in managing sustainable flows, stating that this aspect is essential
throughout the lifecycle of firms’ products or services. These studies have flourished
mainly within the environmental literature considering that firms have control
over environmental performance at each production stage, including the performance
of their main suppliers (Pagell et al. 2010).
Other researchers (Trent and Monczka 2003) have started to debate the effectiveness
of the conventional command-and-control approach of MNCs to sustainable
supply chain strategy. Studies from different authors have shown that major
suppliers’ compliance could not be achieved by strengthening MNCs’ monitoring
activities, which, on the contrary have often proven to be prejudicial to the so-called
buyer–supplier relationship over time. Moreover, suppliers’ involvement and
engagement have always been seen as crucial factors for successful MNC cooperation
(Russo-Spena and De Chiara 2012; Wiemer and Plugge 2007), since they
provide suppliers with the opportunity to demonstrate their contribution to and
increase their commitment towards the sustainability goals of multinational companies
(Fliess et al. 2007). Thus, MNCs best practice has generally focused on the
development of CSR strategies in consultation with salient suppliers and other
stakeholders.
On the other hand, many other MNCs noncompliant behaviours (e.g. the Mattel
case1) have resulted in poor CSR strategic planning due to underestimation of their
partners’ cultural differences (Roloff and Aßländer 2010). MNCs operate through
complex networks and globally dispersed units. This implies the need to find a
balance between diverse stakeholders’ environments and to increase the ability to
manage the diversity of values and social practices across countries (Husted and
Allen 2008).
At present, research has only marginally addressed the sociocultural issues
involving MNCs’ business relations with host countries (Logsdon and Wood 2002;
De Chiara and Russo Spena 2013). These studies focus on cultural conflicts,supporting the idea of MNCs using their power to improve the ethical standards of
the host country that provides the m