Multinational corporations and their global suppliers are increasingly expected to employ sustainability practices throughout their supply chains. As such, the global scope of corporate sustainability – including the notion of ‘full-chain responsibility’ – is a concern for firms, governments, NGOs, and other stakeholders. We evaluate the state-of-the-art of sustainability research on multinational firms and global supply chains, bringing together insights from two literatures that have examined this topic: international business and supply chain management. The articles in the Special Issue advance the research frontier by highlighting both macro impacts of legal and societal pressures as well as micro-processes of bargaining power, managerial sensemaking, and transparency to inform the relationships between global firms and their suppliers. Collectively, the research included in this Special Issue reflects a notable shift in focus from the former (macro) to the latter (micro). We elaborate on the benefits of incorporating additional notions such as power, opportunism, and negotiation in global supply chain research against the background of cross-country variation in legal and societal pressures. This would allow a more in-depth understanding of the dynamic relationships between multinational corporations, their multi-tier supplier networks, and other stakeholders that jointly shape the sustainability agenda.

人们越来越期望跨国公司及其全球供应商在整个供应链中采用可持续发展实践。因此，企业可持续发展的全球范围——包括“全链责任”的概念——是企业、政府、非政府组织和其他利益相关者所关心的问题。我们评估了跨国公司和全球供应链可持续发展研究的最新水平，汇集了研究该主题的两篇文献的见解：国际商业和供应链管理。特刊中的文章通过强调法律和社会压力的宏观影响以及讨价还价能力、管理意识和透明度的微观过程来推进研究前沿，以了解全球公司与其供应商之间的关系。总的来说，本期特刊中包含的研究反映了焦点从前者（宏观）到后者（微观）的显着转变。我们详细阐述了在法律和社会压力存在跨国差异的背景下，在全球供应链研究中纳入权力、机会主义和谈判等其他概念的好处。这将使我们能够更深入地了解跨国公司、其多层供应商网络以及共同制定可持续发展议程的其他利益相关者之间的动态关系。