Journal of International Management
9 (2003) 193–213
The evolving contributions in international strategic
management research
Jane W. Lu*
Department of Business Policy, National University of Singapore, 1 Business Link, 117592 Singapore
Abstract
In this study, I systematically investigate the evolving contributions and gaps that exist in
the international strategic management (ISM) literature. The research I present here reviews
leading international business and strategic management journals from 1991 through 2000.
The research investigates the topics that have been examined in ISM research, theoretical
perspectives employed, outlets for publication, and the breadth of contributions to ISM research.
The article also highlights areas in the literature that may provide promising avenues for future
research.
D 2003 Elsevier Science Inc. All rights reserved.
Keywords: International management; Strategic management; Review
1. Introduction
International strategic management (ISM) research saw rapid growth through the 1980s
(Ricks et al., 1990) and the 1990s (Werner, 2002). Although efforts have been made to
review this growing literature, a systematic review and update of the international
management literature could help managers to alter and improve their management
activities and academics to build on existing research.
In this article, I review ISM studies to highlight areas in which key contributions have
been made and to identify areas in which further work could be conducted. I make
1075-4253/03/$ – see front matter D 2003 Elsevier Science Inc. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/S1075-4253(03)00006-1
* Tel.: +65-6874-1695; fax: +65-6779-5059.
E-mail address: [email protected] (J.W. Lu).
J.W. Lu / Journal of International Management 9 (2003) 193–213194
this review of ISM studies by examining several leading strategic management and
international management journals to highlight topics investigated in ISM studies. I
consider these topics in terms of the major research streams in strategic management,
which include the environment, leadership and organization, strategy, and performance
(Summer et al., 1990), to understand how ISM research has evolved in the past 10–15
years. I also examine the evolution of theoretical perspectives employed in these ISM
studies.
In this review, I also consider how different publication outlets have been used to develop
ISM research. My review next considers institutional and author contributions to ISM
research to identify leading institutions and authors and to examine the diversity of
contributors to ISM research. A wide and diverse base of scholars helps generate a
multiplicity of paradigms and avoids the development of strong cultural biases in ISM
research (Thomas et al., 1994).
After making this form of review, I try to identify areas of research that require further
work. I make this identification in the hope of providing some guide as to what directions
could prove to be promising for future ISM research to aid managers’ understanding of ISM
topics.
In the mid-1990s, Lohrke and Bruton (1997) (hereafter LB) completed a comprehensive
analysis of the ISM literature. I extend their work by adding five new years of data, with their
data and analyses from 1991 to 1995 used essentially ‘‘as is.’’ This article, thus, has
consistency in methodology, structure, and content, which enables a ready comparison of the
developments in ISM research to the year 2000.
2. Research domain
The Academy of Management provides the following definition of the domain of strategic
management.
Roles and problems of general managers—those who manage multi-business or multi-
functional business units. Major topics include: strategic formulation and implementa-
tion; strategic planning and decision processes; strategic control and reward systems;
resource allocation; diversification and portfolio strategies; competitive strategy;
selection and behavior of general managers; and the composition of top management
teams.
I used this definition to identify which strategic management journals to review for
international management related research. Using MacMillan’s (1991) survey of the
quality of several journals as outlets for strategic management research, LB identified
journals of ‘‘outstanding quality’’ as the ones for their review. Those of ‘‘significant
quality’’ and ‘‘appropriate quality’’ were not included. I followed the same classification
as journals rated as significant or appropriate quality have been shown to change their
ratings substantially over time (MacMillan, 1989, 1991). The six journals I reviewed for
J.W. Lu / Journal of International Management 9 (2003) 193–213 195
their ISM contributions were Academy of Management Journal, Academy of Management
Review, Administrative Science Quarterly, Harvard Business Review, Management Science,
and Strategic Management Journal.
Unlike the strategic management literature, the bounds of international management
research are not as well defined (Ricks et al., 1990). LB and I used the definition of
international management as provided by Ricks (1991).
. . .The core of international business research deals with the multinational enterprise
(MNE), the exporting or importing firm, and the problems encountered by these firm.
Topics of importance include: the theory of the MNE; the role of the MNE; MNE versus
domestic corporation issues; government–MNE issues; the problems of managing
international trade, and also functionally oriented topics such as international financial
management, international marketing management, international accounting manage-
ment, international strategy, international management, etc. . .Studies which describe
how business is done in one country are not considered international business research,
but comparative studies are.
As with the definition, journal rankings are not as clear-cut in international management
research as in strategic management research. In one sense, the growth of international
management research has been reflected positively in the proliferation of international
journals. In another sense, this proliferation creates concerns about the quality of journals
(Dunning, 1989). The quality of international management journals has improved, and is
improving, over time (Aulakh and Kotabe, 1993), but the number of high quality journals
devoted to international management research is less than that for strategic management
research. Aside from LB, several studies point to three leading international management
journals (Ebrahimi et al., 1991; Dubois et al., 2000; Aulakh and Kotabe, 1993; Madura and
McCarty, 1989; Morrison and Inkpen, 1991; Thomas et al., 1994). These journals are
(Columbia) Journal of World Business, Journal of International Business Studies, and
Management International Review.
After developing this list of nine journals, I looked for articles that could be included in the
sample. For an article to be included, it had to be published in one of these nine journals and
meet criteria for both strategic management and international management.
3. Methodology
The genealogy of the classification system I used for ISM research has its most
immediate forebear in Shrivastava’s (1987) review of the strategic management literature.
Shrivastava’s classification system was drawn from Schendel and Hofer (1979). LB made
minor changes to eventually make Shrivastava’s and Schendel and Hofer’s classification
schemes relevant to ISM research. I took LB’s system as the base for my classification, but
extended it to include two new categories: ‘‘internal coordination’’ and ‘‘scenario devel-
opment.’’
J.W. Lu / Journal of International Management 9 (2003) 193–213196
4. Results
LB followed a system of multiple rater assessments of articles to identify articles falling
into the domain of ISM research. LB’s original review identified 222 articles, of which 170
were selected by both Lohrke and Bruton. Fifty-two articles were identified by one or the
other author. After reviewing these 52 articles together, LB considered 15 to be outside the
domain of ISM research, leaving a sample of 207 ISM articles, 134 of which were for the
1991–1995 period.
I followed a similar process for drawing articles for the 1996–2000 period. Two ISM
scholars reviewed all publications in the nine journals over this period. The two scholars
identified a total of 291 ISM articles. One hundred and ninety-two of these articles were
identified by both scholars for an agreement rate of 66%. This list was then reviewed by a
third scholar. First, a third scholar suggested that 14 of the 192 articles did not meet the
specified criteria, which was confirmed after discussions among all three scholars. Next, the
third scholar reviewed the 99 other articles that only one of the two initial scholars
originally selected as relevant. Another 18 articles were not considered to be in the domain
of ISM research, leaving an additional 81 articles to be added to the base of 178 for a total
of 259 articles. I added these 259 articles to LB’s 1991–1995 total of 134 articles for a
grand total to 393. Table 1 summarizes these articles and the categories to which they
relate.
4.1. Environment
The first category listed in Table 1 is the environment. LB define the environment
according to developments about ‘‘open-system’’ views of organizations (Andrew, 1971;
Katz and Kahn, 1966) in which environmental forces represent key variables for firms
(Summer et al., 1990). ISM studies examining environmental topics can be categorized into
three groups. The first group concerns studies about a firm’s general or industry environment
in which research has looked at perceived environmental uncertainty (e.g., Shrader et al.,
2000), environmental forces behind a firm’s success in a given location (e.g., Sanchez and
McKinley, 1995; Shaver and Flyer, 2000) and forces influencing a firm’s decision to invest in
a given location (e.g., Loree and Guisinger, 1995).
The second group concerns analysis of the cultural environment. This research stream has
been very rich. It involves both the identification of dimensions of culture relevant to
international operations, as well as tests of how cultural variance influences firm strategy and
performance.
The third group concerns political risk analysis. Political variance is greater cross-
nationally than subnationally (Boddewyn and Brewer, 1994). Political forces can have
adverse influences on a firm’s profitability or inhibit its pursuit of its goals (Clegg et al.,
1996).
The broad trend across these three groups has been from theory development to theory
testing, as one might expect, but the focus on the latter, even to 2000, has not been as
extensive as it could have been. Developments in the latter half of the 1990s have led to
Table 1
Summary of ISM literaturea
Environment
Environmental/industry
analysis
Birkinshaw and Hood (2000), Ghemawat and Ghadar (2000), Shaver and
Flyer (2000), Shrader et al. (2000), Thomas III and Waring (1999), Miller
and Reuer (1998), Anand and Kogut (1997), Tse et al. (1997), Hanon
(1996), Peng and Heath (1996), Rivoli and Salorio (1996), Werner et al.
(1996), Elenkov (1995), Loree and Guisinger (1995), Sanchez and
McKinley (1995), Miller (1993),Woodward and Rolfe (1993), Grant
(1991), Kogut (1988), and Rosenzweig and Singh (1991)
Culture (national) Makino and Neupert (2000), Salk and Brannen (2000), Steensma et al.
(2000), Steensma et al. (2000), Hennart and Larimo (1998), Morosini et al.
(1998), Gomez-Mejia and Palich (1997), Barkema et al. (1996), O’Grady
and Lane (1996), Franke et al. (1991), and Schneider and DeMeyer (1991)
Scenario development/political
risk analysis
Delios and Henisz (2000), Uhlenbruck and De Castro (2000), Nehrt (1998),
Rugman and Kirton (1998), Rugman and Verbeke (1998), Clegg et al.
(1996), Brouthers (1995), Vachani (1995), Boddewyn and Brewer (1994),
and Howell and Chaddick (1994)
Leadership and organization
Internal coordination Andersson and Forsgren (2000), Furu (2000), Gupta and Govindarajan
(2000), Hakanson and Nobel (2000), Lindqvist et al. (2000), Teigland et al.
(2000), Gupta et al. (1999), Lehrer and Asakawa (1999), O’Donnell (1999),
St. John et al. (1999), Zeira and Newburry (1999), Birkinshaw et al. (1998),
Nobel and Birkinshaw (1998), Birkinshaw (1997), Dasu and De La Torre
(1997), Anderson and Fredriksson (1996), Birkinshaw (1996), Apte and
Mason (1995), Birkinshaw and Morrison (1995), Gencturk and Aulakh
(1995), Johnson (1995), Kim and Campbell (1995), Murray et al. (1995),
Murray et al. (1995), Roth (1995), Zaheer (1995), Daniel and Reitsperger
(1994), Ghoshal et al. (1994), Sohn (1994), Kao (1993), Bartlett and
Ghoshal (1992), Roth (1992), Sundaram and Black (1992), Gupta and
Govindarajan (1991), Kobrin (1991), and Martinez and Jarillo (1991)
Boards of directors Daily et al. (2000), Athanassiou and Nigh (1999), Athanassiou and Nigh
(1999), Kedia and Mukherji (1999), Li et al. (1999), Beldona et al. (1998),
Murtha et al. (1998), Sanders and Carpenter (1998), Eriksson et al. (1997),
Geletkanycz (1997), Hitt et al. (1997), Krug and Hegarty (1997),
Sambharya (1996), and Kriger (1991)
Decision-making Baldauf et al. (2000), Mitchell et al. (2000), Seth et al. (2000),
Padmanabhan and Cho (1999), Shaver (1998), Kumar and Subramaniam
(1997), Calori et al. (1994), Kobrin (1994), Roth and Ricks (1994), Jones
et al. (1992), and Kriger and Solomon (1992)
Structure Beamish et al. (1999), Martin et al. (1998), Rubach and Sebora (1998),
Kuemmerle (1997), Allen and Pantzalis (1996), Liouville and Nanopoulos
(1996), Malnight (1996), and Habib and Victor (1991)
Culture (corporate) Very et al. (1997), Bates et al. (1995), Meschi and Rogers (1994), and
Nohria and Ghoshal (1994)
(continued on next page)
J.W. Lu / Journal of International Management 9 (2003) 193–213 197
Strategy
Strategy typologies Harzing (2000), Bensaou et al. (1999), Birkinshaw and Hood (1998),
Rugman and Verbeke (1998), Kutschker and Baurle (1997), Kutschker
et al. (1997), Taggart (1997), Carpano et al. (1994), Morrison and Roth
(1992), and Baden-Fuller and Stopford (1991)
Enterprise strategy (social issues) Nigh and Cochran (1994)
Corporate strategy formulation Calori et al. (2000), Peng and Wang (2000), Song et al. (1999), Burpitt and
Rondinelli (1998), Dunning (1998), Gedajlovic and Shapiro (1998),
Mudambi (1998), Peng and Ilinitch (1998), Taggart (1998), Yip et al.
(1997), Anand and Delios (1996), Leonidou and Katsikeas (1996),
Mascarenhas (1996), Taylor et al. (1996), Millington and Bayliss (1995),
Birkinshaw et al. (1995), Fleenor (1993), Leong and Tan (1993), Oxelheim
and Wihlborg (1991), and Sullivan and Bauerschmidt (1991)
Corporate strategy
implementation
Arnold (2000), Guillen (2000), Luo (2000), Madhok and Osegowitsch
(2000), Cantwell and Piscitello (1999), Kostova and Zaheer (1999),
Kostova (1999), McCarthy and Puffer (1997), Vanhonacker (1997), Grosse
(1996), Kim and Mauborgne (1996), Johansson and Yip (1994), Kim and
Mauborgne (1993a,b), Kim and Mauborgne (1991), and Nohria and
Garcia-Pont (1991)
International diversification Arora and Fosfuri (2000), Autio et al. (2000), Bartlett and Ghoshal (2000),
Brouthers and Brouthers (2000), Burton et al. (2000), Ellis (2000), Eriksson
et al. (2000), Geringer et al. (2000), Loree et al. (2000), Mottner and
Johnson (2000), Pan and Li (2000), Pan and Tse (2000), Ramamurti (2000),
Reuer and Leiblein (2000), Zahra et al. (2000), Brouthers et al. (1999),
Capron (1999), Delios and Beamish (1999), Delios and Beamish (1999),
Gomes and Ramaswamy (1999), Hoopes (1999), Kuemmerle (1999), Liesch
and Knight (1999), Luo and Peng (1999), Mascarenhas (1999), Mathews
and Cho (1999), Pan and Chi (1999), Pan et al. (1999), Sarkar et al. (1999),
Aulakh et tal. (1998), Barkema and Vermeulen (1998), Buckley and Casson
(1998), Chen and Chen (1998), Contractor and Kundu (1998), Cui (1998),
Katrishen and Scordis (1998), Lee and Caves (1998), Luo (1998),
Penner-Hahn (1998), Anand and Delios (1997), Anderson (1997),
Andersson et al. (1997), Hadjikhani (1997), Hennart and Reddy (1997),
Hitt et al. (1997), Ito (1997), Khanna and Palepu (1997), Madhok (1997),
Newburry and Zeira (1997), Oesterle (1997), Oviatt and McDougall (1997),
Qian (1997), Shaver et al. (1997), Swan and Ettlie (1997), Williamson
(1997), Banerji and Sambharya (1996), Fina and Rugman (1996), Nitsch
et al. (1996), Padmanabhan and Cho (1996), Tallman and Li (1996), Tan
and Vertinsky (1996), Brouthers et al. (1996), Aswicahyono and Hill
(1995), Chang (1995), Datta and Puia (1995), Fladmoe-Lindquist and
Jacque (1995), Kwon and Hu (1995), Li (1995), Malnight (1995), Mirza
et al. (1995), Sambharya (1995), Hennart and Park (1994), Li (1994),
Markides and Ittner (1994), Mitchell et al. (1994), Sullivan (1994),
Woodcock et al. (1994), Hennart and Park (1993), Kim et al. (1993), Kish
and Vasconcellos (1993), Mitchell et al. (1993), Agarwal and Ramaswami
(1992), Kim and Hwang (1992), Mascarenhas (1992), Mitchell et al.
(1992), Doz and Prahalad (1991), Erramilli (1991), Parkhe (1991), and
Vachani (1991)
Table 1 (continued)
J.W. Lu / Journal of International Management 9 (2003) 193–213198
Strategy
Strategic alliances Cullen et al. (2000), Dussage et al. (2000), Elg (2000), Hitt et al. (2000),
Isobe et al. (2000), Kotabe et al. (2000), Merchant and Schendel (2000),
Merchant (2000), Reuer and Koza (2000), Reuer (2000), Steensma and
Lyles (2000), Child and Yan (1999), Glaister and Buckley (1999), Hennart
et al. (1999), Hoon-Halbauer (1999), Tallman (1999), Tsang (1999), Walsh
et al. (1999), Wang et al. (1999), Yan and Zeng (1999), Chang et al. (1998),
Kashlak et al. (1998), Lin and Germain (1998), Luo (1998), Makino and
Beamish (1998), Osland and Cavusgil (1998), Parkhe (1998), Sim and Ali
(1998), Yan (1998), Barkema and Vermeulen (1997), Barkema et al. (1997),
Baughn et al. (1997), Brouthers and Bamossy (1997), Dacin et al. (1997),
Inkpen and Beamish (1997), Lei et al. (1997), Park and Ungson (1997),
Reuer and Miller (1997), Buckley and Casson (1996), Chi and McGuire
(1996), Hagedoorn and Narula (1996), Johnson et al. (1996), Lyles and
Salk (1996), Lyles et al. (1996), Makino and Delios (1996), Nordberg
et al. (1996), Pan and Tse (1996), Pan (1996), Bensaou and Venkatraman
(1995), Cullen et al. (1995), Demirbag et al. (1995), Dussage and Garrette
(1995), Elenkov (1995), Hagedoorn (1995), Kotabe and Swan (1994, 1995),
Kumar (1995), Lee and Beamish (1995), Luo (1995), Madhok et al.
(1995), Millington and Bayliss (1995), Beamish (1994), Hagedoorn and
Schakenraad (1994), Kvint (1994), Lyles and Baird (1994), Tallman and
Shenkar (1994a,b), Yan and Gray (1994), Abramson et al. (1993), Burgers
et al. (1993), Hurry (1993), Lawrence and Vlachoutsicos (1993), Parkhe
(1993), Schroath et al. (1993), Blodgett (1992), Hu et al. (1992), Hung
(1992), Shenkar and Zeira (1992), Bleeke and Ernst (1991), Blodgett
(1991), Geringer (1991), Geringer and Hebert (1991), Hamel (1991),
Hennart (1991), Parkhe (1991), Shan (1991), and Shan and Hamilton (1991)
Business-level strategy
formulation
Aulakh et al. (2000), Balabanis (2000), Brouthers et al. (2000), Davis et al.
(2000), Domke-Damonte (2000), Abramson and Ai (1999), Aggarwal
(1999), Buller and McEvoy (1999), Campa and Guillen (1999), Dawar and
Frost (1999), Erdener and Torbiorn (1999), Hagigi et al. (1999), Myers
(1999), O’Donnell (1999), Tsurumi and Tsurumi (1999), Beamish and
Inkpen (1998), Luo (1998), Miller and Parkhe (1998), Piercy et al. (1998),
Stroh and Caligiuri (1998), Yan (1998), Erramilli et al. (1997), Ferdows
(1997), Papanastassiou and Pearce (1997), Piercy et al. (1997), Tsang
(1997), Chen (1999), Craig and Douglas (1996), Lyles and Steensma
(1996), Nehrt (1996), Roth and O’Donnell (1996), Bird and Beechler
(1995), Kotha et al. (1995), Beamish et al. (1993), Dominguez and
Sequeira (1993), Reitsperger et al. (1993), Swamidass and Kotabe (1993),
Collis (1991), and Tallman (1991)
Business-level strategy
implementation
Lord and Ranft (2000), Weldon and Vanhonacker (1999), Dyer et al.
(1997), Holm et al. (1996), and Roth et al. (1991)
Turnaround/decline Mata and Portugal (2000), Benito and Welch (1997), Stopford and
Baden-Fuller (1994), and Parker and Helms (1992)
Performance
Relative performance Brouthers (1998), Hundley and Jacobson (1998), and Brown et al. (1994)a Reference information for the articles listed in this table can be accessed at: http://www.fba.nus.edu.sg/
depart/bp/bizluj/jim.htm.
Table 1 (continued)
J.W. Lu / Journal of International Management 9 (2003) 193–213 199
J.W. Lu / Journal of International Management 9 (2003) 193–213200
improvements in the quantification of heretofore difficult-to-operationalize items, which has
facilitated the development of theory testing. In the 2000s, research is likely to continue in
this direction.
4.2. Leadership and organization
The next category in Table 1 is leadership and organization. Leadership and organization in
ISM is most often equated with the first group of studies in this category, which is called
internal coordination. Studies in this group tend to look at challenges involved in managing
foreign subsidiaries. Such challenges include issues of the control (Nobel and Birkinshaw,
1998) and coordination (e.g., Martinez and Jarillo, 1991) of international subsidiaries.
Research has also examined knowledge flows in the organization (e.g., Ghoshal et al.,
1994; Gupta and Govindarajan, 1991) and a firm’s need for internal coordination (Roth, 1995).
The second and third group of studies in this category are boards of directors and decision-
making. Research on decision-making has focused on the effectiveness of planning (Jones et
al., 1992), sometimes as contingent on the profiles and effectiveness of boards of directors
(Kriger, 1991). The fourth group in this category is called structure, which is effectively
organizational structure in which studies have investigated the performance implications of
different structures (Habib and Victor, 1991). The final group has parallels with one of the
groups from the environment category, culture, but this time concerns corporate culture issues
(Very et al., 1997).
The most significant development in this category in the 1990s has been on internal
coordination and boards of directors issues. In the case of internal coordination, this attention
likely results from practitioner and academic interest in the challenges associated with
managing international subsidiaries. In the case of board of directors, the quantifiable nature
of the data (e.g., directors’ ages and backgrounds) has no doubt helped stimulate empirical
research in this area.
4.3. Strategy
The next category is the largest and most vibrant areas of research among all the
categories of research listed in Table 1. Strategy, defined as the combination of a firm’s
present and planned resource deployments and its environmental interactions (Ansoff,
1965; Hofer and Schendel, 1978), can be analyzed at three different levels. The first level
is ‘‘enterprise strategy’’ (Schendel and Hofer, 1979), which includes research topics such
as social responsibility (Meznar et al., 1991) and stakeholder analysis (Freeman, 1984).
The second level is ‘‘corporate strategy,’’ which includes research topics such as
diversification, vertical integration, mergers and acquisitions, and internal venturing
(Summer et al., 1990). The third level is ‘‘business strategy,’’ which includes research
topics such as the choice of competitive weapons (e.g., cost, differentiation, focus) and
product/market selection (Summer et al., 1990). Given the prevalence of environmental
effects such as the Asian financial crisis, I have added a new group called ‘‘turnaround
strategy’’ to classify studies investigating firms experiencing financial trouble.
J.W. Lu / Journal of International Management 9 (2003) 193–213 201
Across these groups and levels of research, corporate strategy was among the most vital
areas of research in the 1990s. Research concerned with corporate strategy typologies,
corporate strategy formulation and implementation, international diversification, and strategic
alliances accounted for about half of all ISM research between 1991 and 2000, with
international diversification and strategic alliances representing the two largest research
streams.
The choice and performance of diversification mode had been one of the most popular
areas of research in the field of international business in the 1990s. Studies investigating
diversification mode have focused on whether firms chose to diversify via internal
development, licensing, joint venture, or acquisition (Barkema and Vermeulen, 1998; Pan
and Tse, 2000). These studies have examined transaction cost (e.g., Agarwal and Ramas-
wami, 1992), cultural (e.g., Brouthers and Brouthers, 2000), and strategic (Delios and
Beamish, 1999) effects on diversification mode.
One notable trend is that much of the research on entry mode choice had moved its focus
from the choice between foreign direct investment and licensing to the choice of foreign
direct investment mode. Within this stream, several researchers have focused on the choice
between greenfield and acquisition entries (e.g., Barkema and Vermeulen, 1998; Hennart and
Reddy, 1998; Brouthers and Brouthers, 2000), while others have focused on the choice of
subsidiary ownership structure (Makino and Beamish, 1998; Hennart and Larimo, 1998;
Delios and Beamish, 1999; Makino and Neupert, 2000). A handful of researchers have
examined the financial performance and survival implications of entry mode choice
(Woodcock et al., 1994; Nitsch et al., 1996; Barkema et al., 1996; Makino and Beamish,
1998; Pan and Chi, 1999).
A recent area of emerging research is on the timing of international diversification. This
stream draws from a well-established literature in marketing, as it emerged in the 1990s in the
field of international business (e.g., Mascarenhas, 1992; Mitchell et al., 1992, 1993, 1994;
Tan and Vertinsky, 1996; Luo, 1998; Pan and Tse, 1999; Isobe et al., 2000).
Studies investigating strategic alliances have examined the advantages and disadvantages
of forming alliances as well as fundamental aspects of managing alliances (e.g., Beamish,
1994; Tallman and Shenkar, 1994). Researchers have increasingly turned to look at alliance
formation by Western businesses in emerging markets, such as China (Luo, 1995; Shan,
1991), Russia (Lawrence and Vlachoutsicos, 1993), Turkey (Demirbag et al., 1995),
Hungary, and Poland (Lyles and Baird, 1994).
In business strategy studies, researchers have examined the performance implications of
strategic choices (e.g., Beamish et al., 1993; Dominguez and Sequeira, 1993; Reitsperger et
al., 1993). Business strategy research has also looked at strategy implementation issues (e.g.,
Roth et al., 1991). Meanwhile, research on enterprise strategy is considerably less dense
(Nigh and Cochran, 1994).
4.4. Performance
Research in ISM and strategy has the goal of understanding the performance implications
of strategic choices to improve firm performance (Summer et al., 1990). Firm performance
J.W. Lu / Journal of International Management 9 (2003) 193–213202
thus constitutes the fourth major category of research. There is much debate about what
constitutes performance (Venkatraman and Ramanujam, 1986), and studies in this vein
account for the majority of the research in this category. Comparative performance studies
have looked at the performance of U.S. firms and firms from other countries. For example,
Brown et al. (1991) compared financial statements of U.S. and Japanese firms using the
COMPUSTAT and NEEDS databases. As can be noted by the presence of only few articles
in this area, however, ISM studies have not yet examined this topic closely. Even so, the lack
of studies in this category does not mean that researchers in ISM have not been concerned
with performance. Indeed, it is the opposite case. A review of the other three categories
shows that performance frequently emerges as key dependent variables in studies concerned
with corporate strategy, business strategy, leadership, organizational, and environmental
issues.
5. Theoretical perspectives
Transaction cost theory and internalization theory have been the mainstream theoretical
perspectives employed in ISM studies. Three other theoretical perspectives have emerged in
the 1990s: institutional theory, organizational learning/knowledge management (OL/KM)
theory, and the resource-based view of the firm (RBV).
The application of institutional theory to international business has become quite popular
in the 1990s. Many researchers have focused their attention to the institutional framework of
national environments (e.g., Rosenzweig and Singh, 1991; Peng and Heath, 1996; Elenkov,
1997; Khanna and Palepu, 1997; Kostova, 1999; Kostova and Zaheer, 1999; Davis et al.,
2000; Guillen, 2000).
OL/KM theories have been applied to the research of international market expansion
(Chang, 1995; Mathews and Cho, 1999), entry mode choice (Barkema and Vermeulen, 1998),
interorganizational learning in an international joint venture (Parkhe, 1991; Inkpen and
Beamish, 1997; Tsang, 1999; Dussauge et al., 2000), intraorganizational knowledge transfer
within a multinational company (Gupta and Govindarajan, 1991), and interorganizational
imitation in market entry (e.g., Martin et al., 1995; Shaver et al., 1997; Martin et al., 1998;
Padmanabhan and Cho, 1999).
A few researchers have adopted other newly emerging theories such as procedural justice
theory (Kim and Mauborgne, 1991, 1993, 1996), strategic option theory (Chi and McGuire,
1996), and network theory (Malnight, 1996).
The above observations suggest that the theoretical perspective adopted in the field of ISM
has been shifting from economic theories to multidisciplinary approaches. In addition to this
general trend, there existed several studies that ‘‘revived’’ the classic ideas in the field of
international business. Some researchers (e.g., Ito, 1997; Tsurumi and Tsurumi, 1999)
revisited the theory of oligopolistic competition (Knickerbocker, 1994; Flowers, 1976; Yu
and Ito, 1988). Other researchers (e.g., Chang, 1995; Malnight, 1995; Fina and Rugman,
1996; Eriksson et al., 2000; Cui, 1998) revisited internationalization theory (Johanson and
Vahlne, 1977).
J.W. Lu / Journal of International Management 9 (2003) 193–213 203
6. Outlets
In my review of the leading journals, I found the following distribution across the different
journals. The Journal of International Business Studies had 124 studies. Strategic Manage-
ment Journal had 80. This was followed by Management International Review (75),
(Columbia) Journal of World Business (49), Academy of Management Journal (26), Harvard
Business Review (15), Management Science (12), Academy of Management Review (12), and
Administrative Science Quarterly (1).
Recently, Werner (2002) reviewed international management research in 20 journals for
the 1996–2000 period. Among them, six journals were identical to this study (Journal of
International Business Studies, Strategic Management Journal, Management Science,
Academy of Management Journal, Academy of Management Review, and Administrative
Science Quarterly). Of the 158 articles included in this study in the same six journals for
the 1996–2000 period, 139 articles were also in Werner (2002), an 88% correspondence
rate.
The present findings indicate two encouraging points for scholars interested in conducting
ISM research. First, as might be expected the Journal of International Business Studies and
Management International Review, have been very receptive outlets for ISM research.
Between 1991 and 2000, these journals published approximately half of all ISM research.
Second, mainstream strategic management journals, in particular, Strategic Management
Journal, have become more readily accessible outlets for the publication of ISM literature.
7. Authors and school affiliations
To assess the breadth and diversity of contributions to the ISM field, I examined author and
institutional contributions. To review contributions, I adopted the method employed by other
discipline-based reviews (e.g., Heck and Cooley, 1988; Inkpen and Beamish, 1994; Morrison
and Inkpen, 1991) to construct absolute and adjusted count measures of authors and
institutions.
For the absolute appearance of authors, I accorded an author a one full credit as long as his
or her name appeared on the article published. Even if an author coauthored the article with
others, he or she takes one full credit. There is no distinction between the first author and the
second author; each takes one full credit.
For the adjusted appearances of authors, I adjust the author’s appearance based on the
number of authors in the article. If an author coauthored the article with one more author,
each takes 0.5 credit ( = 1 article divided by 2 authors). If an author coauthored the article
with two more authors, each takes 0.33 credit ( = 1 article divided by 3 authors). There is
no distinction between the first author and the second author; the authorship is equally
divided.
For the absolute appearance of institutions, an institution takes one full credit as long as its
name appears on the article published. Sometimes, however, an author was affiliated with two
different institutions at the same time. In this case, each institution takes 0.5 credit ( = 1
J.W. Lu / Journal of International Management 9 (2003) 193–213204
institution/co-affiliation = 1/2). Because of this dual institutional affiliation, we can see
decimal points (0.5) in the column. There is no distinction between the affiliation with the
first author and that with the second author. All practitioners’ affiliations are classified as
‘‘industry.’’
For the adjusted appearances of institutions, an institution takes one full credit if the
author (who was affiliated with that institution) solely authored the article published. An
institution takes 0.5 credit ( = 1 article/2 different institutions) if the author (who is
affiliated with that institution) coauthored the article with one more author (who was
affiliated with a different institution). An institution takes 0.33 credit ( = 1 article/3
different institutions) if the author (who was affiliated with that institution) coauthored
the article with two more authors (with all different institutions). Note that an institution
takes one full credit if an author coauthored the article with one more author who was
affiliated with the same institution ( = 1 article/1 same institution with 2 different authors).
The same rule applies to the author team of 3 ( = 1 article/1 same institution with 3
different authors). As noted above, sometimes, an author was affiliated with two different
institutions at the same time. If an author was affiliated with two different institutions and
coauthored the article with one more author who was affiliated with a different institution,
the institution with which the former author was co-affiliated takes only 0.25 credit ( = 1
institution/co-affiliation/2 authors = 1/2/2). If a co-affiliated author coauthored the article
with two more authors (in all different institutions), the institution with which the former
author was co-affiliated takes only 0.167 credit ( = 1 institution/co-affiliation (2)/3
authors = 1/2/3).
My review generated a total of 517 authors affiliated with 238 institutions. The top 30
contributing institutions and authors in ISM research are listed in Tables 2 and 3, respectively
(expanded tables are available on request from the author).
Five observations should be noted from the tables. First ISM research has received
significant contributions from practitioners. Even when all authors citing joint academic and
business appointments are classified by academic appointment, industry remains the fourth
leading affiliation of ISM scholars. Given the applied nature of strategic management
(Summer et al., 1990) and growing concerns of the relevance of academic investigations
to practitioners, this finding that practitioners devote time and effort in helping bring such
research to fruition provides evidence that ISM research enjoys continued relevance to
business.
Second, comparing Table 2 with other surveys of international business research
demonstrates that it is not necessary for a school to be a center for all types of international
business research to be productive in ISM research (Inkpen and Beamish, 1994).
Third, in terms of contributor diversity, Table 2 provides evidence that contributions to
ISM research originate from institutions in a variety of countries. For example, 12 of the top
30 institutions (including the top 2) are outside the United States. This diversity provides
encouraging evidence that scholars investigate complex ISM topics from different cultural
perspectives and academic backgrounds.
Fourth, the number of appearances per author in Table 3 indicates that a wide variety of
authors have contributed to ISM research, providing further evidence that a diverse set of
Table 2
Author’s affiliations in ISM literature (1991–2000)
Affiliation Adjusted appearances Total appearances
1. University of Western Ontario 14.2 32.5
2. INSEAD 13.5 26
3. University of Pennsylvania 12.8 18.5
4. Industry 10.7 20
5. Harvard University 10.5 16
6. Rutgers University 9.4 14.5
7. University of South Carolina 9.3 17
8. University of Michigan 9.1 23.5
9. University of Hawaii-Manoa 8.6 13
10. Indiana University-Bloomington 8.1 13
11. Stockholm School of Economics 7.2 15
12. New York University 6.8 14.5
13. University of Utah 6.3 10.5
14. Boston University 5.5 9
15. Thunderbird-AGSIM 5.2 10
16. University of Illinois-Urbana-Champaign 4.8 9.5
17. Uppsala University 4.6 12
18. Chinese University of Hong Kong 4.3 9
19. University of Strathclyde 4.3 6
20. Hong Kong University of Science and Technology 4.1 9.5
21. Purdue University 4.0 7
22. University of Reading 4.0 6.5
23. Southern Methodist University 3.7 6
24. Tilburg University 3.6 9.5
25. London Business School 3.5 6
26. University of Limburg 3.3 6
27. Temple University 3.2 10
28. University of Minnesota 3.2 7
28. University of Bath 3.2 7
30. Georgetown University 3.1 5.5
University ranks are based primarily on the number of adjusted appearances and secondarily on the number of
total appearances.
J.W. Lu / Journal of International Management 9 (2003) 193–213 205
scholars contributes to ISM research. Of the 517 authors in the present review, only 38 have
adjusted appearance scores of 2.0 or greater.
Finally, even only 5 years after LB, the list of most prolific authors has changed
significantly. While there are a small number of ISM researchers who have consistently
remained at a high level (i.e., Beamish, Parkhe, Roth, Tallman), there are numerous scholars
who are now among those with high appearance levels (i.e., Luo, Birkinshaw, Pan, Delios,
Reuer, Taggart, L. Brouthers, Shaver, K. Brouthers, Makino), as well as those whose
contribution levels in these particular journals have not remained near the top (i.e., Kim,
Ghoshal, Kriger, Geringer, Contractor, Kogut, Grant).
Interestingly, while the list of major contributors has undergone fairly significant change,
the top institutional contributors have seen much less change. The top three institutions
Table 3
Author’s appearances in ISM literature (1991–2000)
Author Adjusted appearances Total appearances
1. Luo, Yadong 5.50 6
1. Parkhe, Arvind 5.50 6
3. Beamish, Paul W. 5.25 11
4. Birkinshaw, Julian 5.00 9
5. Roth, Kendall 4.17 7
6. Tallman, Stephen 4.08 7
7. Pan, Yigang 3.67 7
8. Hennart, Jean-Francois 3.33 6
9. Mascarenhas, Briance 3.33 4
10. Li, Jiatao 3.25 4
11. Delios, Andrew 3.00 6
12. Reuer, Jeffrey J. 3.00 5
13. Taggart, James H. 3.00 3
14. Brouthers, Lance Eliot 2.83 6
14. Shaver, J. Myles 2.83 6
16. Kotabe, Masaaki 2.67 7
17. Kim, W. Chan 2.67 6
18. Brouthers, Keith D. 2.67 5
19. Makino, Shige 2.50 6
20. Madhok, Anoop 2.50 3
20. O’Donnell, Sharon Watson 2.50 3
20. Sambharya, Rakesh B. 2.50 3
23. Mitchell, Will 2.33 7
24. Lyles, Marjorie A. 2.33 5
25. Peng, Mike W. 2.00 4
25. Rugman, Alan M. 2.00 4
27. Hagedoorn, John 2.00 3
27. Miller, Kent D. 2.00 3
27. Yan, Aimin 2.00 3
27. Zaheer, Srilata 2.00 3
Author ranks are based primarily on the number of adjusted appearances and secondarily on the number of total
appearances. If authors are tied on these two factors, they are given the same rank.
J.W. Lu / Journal of International Management 9 (2003) 193–213206
for ISM research continued to be Ivey (Western Ontario), INSEAD, and Wharton
(Pennsylvania).
8. Future directions
The review reported in this study identifies many ISM topics that have received
growing research attention in the 1990s. The bulk of this has been focused on but two
topics: international diversification and strategic alliances. Although a considerable
number of topics have been explored by ISM researchers, a review of Table 1 points
out that many of these topics have received minimal attention. Among these, enterprise
J.W. Lu / Journal of International Management 9 (2003) 193–213 207
and business strategies have received limited attention, with only one article investigating
enterprise strategy (Nigh and Cochran, 1994). Given increased importance of business
ethics and the management of stakeholder interests in both home country and host
countries, this topic requires additional research. Business strategy has received limited
attention, particularly relative to research conducted on business-level strategy in domestic
settings (e.g., Dess and Davis, 1984). Compared to the nine articles reported by LB,
the number of papers in business-level formulation has increased to 39; yet only six
articles investigating implementation have been published in leading journals. Develop-
ments in business-level taxonomies (e.g., Birkinshaw and Hood, 1998; Carpano et al.,
1994; Morrison and Roth, 1992), however, should help promote ISM research on this
topic.
A second area that has received minimal investigation is performance, with the caveat
that the minimal investigation of performance relates to topics concerned fundamentally
with understanding the dimensions of performance, not articles that examine the perform-
ance implication of a strategy. This lack of attention can be problematic as performance is a
fundamental dependent variable for strategy research. The problems associated with a lack
of attention are exacerbated by the greater number of potential performance variables in
ISM research as compared to general strategy research. As an example, the topic of
strategic alliances presents challenges for performance measurement that must be addressed.
Companies may form strategic alliances for several reasons consequently, traditional
performance measures employed in strategic management research (e.g., return on invest-
ment) may produce misleading results when applied to strategic alliances, but other
alternate performance measures need to be identified, defined, and accepted by the
academic community as standards for the field. Clearly, further research on the measuring
of performance is required.
Although some areas of research may lag when compared to corporate strategy research,
some of these areas have shown considerable growth. Top management team research, as an
example, has received dramatically increased attention. In the first half of the 1990s, there
was only one paper on this topic (Kriger, 1991). Yet, in the second half of the 1990s, the
number of top management team articles grew to at least 13.
This review has also noted a shift from the dominance of economic theories (transaction
cost theory, I/O theory, etc.) to multidisciplinary approaches. Therefore, opportunities exist to
study ISM topics through different theoretical lenses. Even for topics receiving substantial
research attention, employing different theories may prompt additional insights. For example,
in the international diversification literature, several studies have employed portfolio theory to
assess the performance implications of diversification (e.g., Collins, 1990; Michel and
Shaked, 1986; Shaked, 1986). Recent studies (e.g., Dess et al., 1995; Lubatkin and
Chatterjee, 1994), however, have questioned the relevance of modern portfolio theory to
the active management of business portfolios. Such debate presents an opportunity for future
research.
Before concluding, the limitations of this analysis should be noted. First, the time frame is
comprehensive and incorporates a great deal of contemporary research in ISM, but the
coverage of review was limited to nine journals. Significant contributions can and do appear
J.W. Lu / Journal of International Management 9 (2003) 193–213208
in books and journals that were not reviewed in the present study. In this sense, the study
works from a sample, which should be representative of the general trends in the field.
Second, the placement of relevant articles into individual categories relied on multiple
independent evaluations by researchers, but ultimately these are qualitative assessments in
which the inclusion (or exclusion) of individual articles within particular categories can be
debated. Although discrepancies might exist, the review does provide a useful review of ISM
research.
9. Conclusion
ISM research has developed significantly since Shrivastava’s (1987) review. This review
found that ISM scholars have devoted substantial efforts to understanding international
diversification and strategic alliances. The review also found, however, that several other
areas await investigation. These gaps in recent research represent limits to managerial and
academic understanding of the field that can be overcome by the pursuit of research into these
areas. Additionally, the review signals the health of the field of ISM in terms of the breadth of
contributing authors and institutions, the availability of multiple quality outlets, and the active
participation by practitioners in ISM research. All these should promote the continued
development of ISM research in the 21st century.
Acknowledgements
Invaluable assistance from Changwha Chung and Jaechul Jung is gratefully acknowl-
edged, as is the base material from F. Lohrke and G. Bruton, which the present article builds
upon. Thanks are also due to G. Bruton, M. Kotabe, and two anonymous referees for helpful
comments on earlier versions of this article.
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