Leveraging the recent research interest in emerging economies, this Perspective paper argues that an institution-based view of international business (IB) strategy has emerged. It is positioned as one leg that helps sustain the ''strategy tripod'' (the other two legs consisting of the industry-and resource-based views). We then review four diverse areas of substantive research: (1) antidumping as entry barriers; (2) competing in and out of India; (3) growing the firm in China; and (4) governing the corporation in emerging economies. Overall, we argue that an institution-based view of IB strategy, in combination with industry-and resource-based views, will not only help sustain a strategy tripod, but also shed significant light on the most fundamental questions confronting IB, such as ''What drives firm strategy and performance in IB?''

for their helpful discussions and comments, Dev Jennings (action editor) and the three reviewers for editorial guidance, and Yuanyuan Zhou for research assistance.

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Using a sample of export intermediaries connecting domestic producers and foreign buyers, the study tests competing hypotheses on firm performance derived from the Austrian and transaction cost perspectives. Specifically, the Austrian perspective suggests that the more distant the export market and the more complex the product that the intermediary specializes in, the better its performance. Transaction cost theory, on the other hand, offers conflicting predictions. Our results indicate that these two theories are complementary to each other, and a contingency framework is proposed and discussed. The fundamental impulse which sets and keeps the capitalist engine in motion comes from the new consumers' goods, the new methods of production, the new markets, and the new forms of industrial organization that capitalist enterprise creates. ( Joseph Schumpeter, 1942, p. 83) One behavioral assumption holds that human agents will not reliably selfenforce promises but will defect from the letter and the spirit of an agreement when it suits their purposes . . . To be sure, suspicions and precautions can be and sometimes are taken to excess. But a healthy regard for opportunism is essential to an understanding of the purposes served by complex modes of economic organization. (Oliver Williamson, 1985, p. 388)

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