Supply chain corruption practices circumventing sustainability standards: wolves in sheep's clothing

Abstract

PurposeA growing number of private, voluntary and mandatory sustainability standards have recently emerged. However, supply chain corruption practices as mechanisms to circumvent sustainability standards have also grown and occur regularly. This paper strives to elaborate theory on the intersection of institutional theory, business corruption and the sustainability standards literature by investigating factors that influence the emergence of supply chain corruption practices.Design/methodology/approachBased on secondary data, four in-depth case studies of supply chain corruption practices are investigated through the use of adaptive theory and the method of constant comparisons to elaborate theory on this important phenomenon.FindingsThe paper suggests that although sustainability standards can improve supply chain sustainability performance, if they are adopted only symbolically and not substantively, unanticipated outcomes such as supply chain corruption may occur. The study proposes a typology of supply chain corruption practices, further explores the symbolic adoption of sustainability standards in supply chains and proposes the novel construct of “social isomorphism for corruption.” Since focal companies play central roles in leading supply chain corruption practices, we reason that they can also play a pivotal role in preventing supply chain corruption practices by promoting the substantive adoption of sustainability standards across their supply chains.Originality/valueThis paper elaborates theory on the challenging phenomenon of corruption in supply chains by linking the supply chain management literature to the corruption and the sustainability discourses and offers important insights to aid our understanding on the topic. It generates six propositions and four contributions to the sustainable supply chain management theory, practice and policy.

The hidden side of sustainable operations and supply chain management: unanticipated outcomes, trade-offs and tensions

“…Although coming from different directions, the empirical and theoretical work of the selected papers for this special issue point out that unintended outcomes may arise when relevant interactions are disregarded. Overall, these studies indicate the reasons why they may vary between ignorance and self-interest (Nath et al, 2020;Silvestre et al, 2020;Glover, 2020) or, due to complexity, these interactions may be difficult to identify (Carter et al, 2020;Wontner et al, 2020;Ye et al, 2020). While these studies significantly contribute to describing the phenomena of trade-offs and unintended issues, it is still not clear how such problems emerge.…”

“…As a result, decision-making heuristics based on scientific evidence thus might not work. For example, in this special issue, Silvestre et al (2020) show that some sustainable SCM practices may have a hidden and symbolic rather than an explicit and sustainability improvement intent. Anticipated outcomes, however, may seem positive and desirable to certain actors, although they may seem negative to others.…”

“…Drawing on the institutional theory, business corruption and the sustainability standards literature, Silvestre et al (2020) propose a typology of supply chain corruption practices. They suggest that if sustainable SCM practices are adopted symbolically and not substantively, unanticipated outcomes such as supply chain corruption may occur.…”

“…In practice, such good intentions may be undermined by highly complex interactions among the myriad of sustainability parameters, and thus difficult to identify (Matos and Hall, 2007;Reiner et al, 2015;Carter et al, 2020, Wontner et al, 2020Ye et al, 2020). They may also be shaped by variances in ignorance and self-interest (Nath et al, 2020;Silvestre et al, 2020;Glover, 2020).…”

Modern slavery in supply chains: insights through strategic ambiguity

“…A firms' attention to social issues is identified as a crucial part of a supply chain's overall sustainability performance (Kang et al , 2018) and an antecedent for both basic and advanced sustainability practices (Croom et al , 2018). Yet, social sustainability remains under-researched in comparison to environmental issues (Meehan and Bryde, 2015; Silvestre et al , 2020a, b). Whilst SSSC has a potentially broad scope, there is a lack of research on socially responsible sourcing (Zorzini et al , 2015), and even less on modern slavery in supply chains specifically (Benstead et al , 2018).…”