What is it about?
This study investigates how multi-tier fashion suppliers in the upstream supply chain deal with institutional pressure to implement environmentally sustainable practices. It adopts an exploratory multi-case study and interviews with 43 suppliers and 16 supply chain actors to understand the institutional pressure mechanisms, suppliers' response and strategies to implement environmentally sustainable practices. The research finds that different types of pressure affect how suppliers act, and that responses vary across supply chains. The study offers six propositions and a conceptual model to explain these findings. Although the study is empirically situated in the fashion industry, this study offers theoretical insights that are broadly applicable to multi-tier supply chains across diverse sectors. By examining how institutional pressures operate within complex supply chain environments, the research contributes to a wider understanding of sustainability implementation beyond the first tier. However, the scope of the study is limited to environmental practices.
Featured Image
Why is it important?
This study is important because it sheds light on how environmental sustainability unfolds beyond the first tier of the supply chain—a space that remains largely invisible yet highly impactful. By examining institutional pressures on multi‑tier fashion suppliers, the research highlights how power, expectations, and compliance mechanisms influence sustainability adoption in upstream contexts. Understanding these dynamics is essential, as meaningful environmental progress depends on the actions of suppliers often overlooked in global supply chains. The findings help clarify why sustainability implementation varies across supply networks and offer insights that can guide brands, policymakers, and practitioners aiming to drive deeper, system‑wide environmental change.
Perspectives
This study provides a nuanced perspective on sustainability implementation by recognising that multi‑tier suppliers operate within diverse, sometimes conflicting, institutional environments. By foregrounding suppliers’ voices, it challenges the common first‑tier–centric view and highlights the complex realities experienced further upstream. The research emphasises that pressures do not translate into uniform responses; instead, suppliers interpret, negotiate, and strategically adapt to them based on context and capability. The six propositions and conceptual model offer a lens through which to understand these variations, presenting a broader, cross‑sectoral perspective on how sustainability can be more effectively embedded across intricate, global supply chain structures.
Dr Mazed Islam
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Implementing environmentally sustainable practices in multi-tier fashion supply chains: the influence of institutional pressures, Supply Chain Management An International Journal, January 2026, Emerald,
DOI: 10.1108/scm-02-2025-0095.
You can read the full text:
Contributors
The following have contributed to this page
