Between Resilience and Dependence: Sourcing Reconfiguration in the Spanish Fashion Industry During Slowbalization

Global value chains (GVCs) are undergoing significant reconfiguration in a context of slower trade growth, rising geopolitical tensions and repeated supply chain disruptions. This article examines how these pressures have shaped the sourcing geography of Spanish apparel imports between 1999 and 2023. Drawing on a panel of the 25 main supplier countries (625 country-year observations), it analyses the changing structure of sourcing through three restructuring dynamics widely discussed in the recent literature: nearshoring, diversification and friendshoring. The results show that diversification, rather than regionalization, has been the main response to recent disruptions. While Spain’s apparel sourcing has become less concentrated, this shift has not led to a sustained shortening of supply chains or to a clear reduction in dependence on Asia. Geopolitical alignment has limited explanatory power at the aggregate level, although it becomes more relevant among semi-proximity suppliers competing on the basis of speed, flexibility and political reliability. Overall, the findings suggest that post-pandemic restructuring in Spanish apparel is better understood as a selective form of risk management within an existing buyer-driven GVC than as a broad move toward nearshoring.