Export barriers for SMEs in emerging countries: A configurational approach

Due to the importance of exporting for firm survival and growth, this study aims to provide new insights into what impedes SMEs in emerging countries from exporting. To do this, we view export barriers as a configurational phenomenon and focus on the SMEs’ decision not to export from an emerging country to other emerging countries. This helps us capture the causal complexity surrounding the more fundamental SME export obstacles in emerging countries. We apply the fuzzy set Qualitative Comparative Analysis to a unique dataset of private manufacturing Russian SMEs. Our results highlight the importance of equifinality and complementary relationships between conditions relating to internal resources, relational assets, and home market context to understand export barriers. We also find that both the presence and the absence of a given condition (e.g., firm age or industry corruption) can be associated with non-export, which could explain contradictory findings in the extant export literature.