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Building theory in supply chain management through "systematic reviews" of the literature part 2
Edited by Richard Wilding and Beverly Wagner
1. Introduction
A company is no more sustainable than the suppliers from which it sources ([41] Krause et al. , 2009). This puts purchasing and supply management in a central position on the road to achieving sustainability. However, fully understanding a company's sustainability profile requires a view of not only the company's direct suppliers but also its extended supply chain or even the wider network in which it operates. A growing amount of research on sustainability concerns purchasing and supply management, such as ethical sourcing ([64] Preuss, 2009; [69] Roberts, 2003), corporate social responsibility in the supply chain ([18] Faisal, 2010; [50] Maloni and Brown, 2006), socially responsible buying ([49] Maignan et al. , 2002; [60] Park and Stoel, 2005) and green supply chains ([38] Kainuma and Tawara, 2006; [55] Mollenkopf et al. , 2010). While significant progress has been made in these areas, it is important to make further advances and consolidate systemic issues that exist at the interface of sustainability and purchasing and supply ([47] Linton et al. , 2007).
One difficulty with studying sustainability in this field is the problem of levels of analysis. Authors often describe their research as addressing supply chains when, in fact, the level of analysis is restricted, for example, to an internal or dyadic buyer or supplier perspective. In adopting a purchasing and supply management perspective, this paper seeks to identify those sustainability issues that have been researched that primarily concern purchasing and supply management and, simultaneously, the different levels of analysis. A second significant concern in studying sustainability in purchasing and supply is the topic focus. Previous reviews have identified a typical division in research in this area between environmental and social issues ([73] Seuring and Muller, 2008; [74] Srivastava, 2007). However, a general view of sustainability research in this area reveals that many studies have adopted an environmental, or green, perspective. These studies concentrate on issues of buying green inputs, or managing waste and pollution ([35] Holt and Ghobadian, 2009; [36] Hong et al. , 2009; [85] Zhu and Sarkis, 2007; [87] Zhu et al. , 2005a). Relatively few studies have explicitly adopted...