How MNEs navigate the institutional landscape in emerging markets and developing countries

Firms operating in emerging markets and developing economies (EMDEs) typically encounter institutional factors such as weak legal and regulatory systems, indiscriminate enforcement of rules, corrupt government officials, and volatile political environments, which can pose significant challenges firms need to address and overcome, leading to increased uncertainty and relatively higher transaction costs (Peng et al., 2009; Khanna & Palepu, 2010). While the institutional voids perspective has dominated how researchers conceptual this phenomenon, this has increasingly been challenged, owing to growing interest in how formal and informal institutions interact to constitute the institutional framework in EMDEs (Doh et al., 2017). This thesis – a collection of four articles, is a response to the call to adopt a more nuanced approach to the study of how multinational enterprises navigate different institutional environments in EMDEs.