Does the market value sustainable supply chain management? New evidence from the outbreak of COVID-19

This study aims to determine why a firm would ever engage in sustainable supply chain management (SSCM) during a turbulent era. Combining stakeholder theory, the resource-based view, and the literature on SSCM, we argue that SSCM can alleviate negative market reactions to severe external crises. Based on analyses of a sample of firms listed in China from 2019 to 2020, the results robustly display a positive relationship between SSCM and the abnormal returns surrounding the outbreak of COVID-19. The findings of this study extend the supply chain literature by constituting an important addition in external crisis times rather than only in normal times.JEL Classification: M14

Does the market value sustainable supply chain management? New evidence from the outbreak of COVID-19

This study aims to determine why a firm would ever engage in sustainable supply chain management (SSCM) during a turbulent era. Combining stakeholder theory, the resource-based view, and the literature on SSCM, we argue that SSCM can alleviate negative market reactions to severe external crises. Based on analyses of a sample of firms listed in China from 2019 to 2020, the results robustly display a positive relationship between SSCM and the abnormal returns surrounding the outbreak of COVID-19. The findings of this study extend the supply chain literature by constituting an important addition in external crisis times rather than only in normal times.JEL Classification: M14

Corporate Social Responsibility and Organizational Resilience to COVID-19 Crisis: An Empirical Study of Chinese Firms

Resilience captures firm capability to adjust to and recover from unexpected shocks in the environment. Being latent and path-dependent, the manifestation of organizational resilience is hard to be directly measured. This article assesses organizational resilience of firms in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic with pre-shock corporate social responsibility (CSR) performance as a predictor that positively influences the level of organizational resilience to the external shock caused by the pandemic. We develop three theoretical mechanisms based on stakeholder theory, resource-based theory, reputation perspective and means-end chain theory to explain how CSR fulfillment in the past could help firms maintain stability to adapt to and react flexibly to recover from the crisis. We examine the relationship in the context of the systemic shock caused by COVID-19, using a sample of 1597 listed firms in China during the time window from 20 January 2020 to 10 June 2020. We find that companies with higher CSR performance before the shock will experience fewer losses and will take a shorter time to recover from the attack.