IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/hal/journl/hal-03944358.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

The interplay of contracts and trust: untangling between- and within-dyad effects

Author

Listed:
  • Liwen Wang

    (SAFTI - Shenzhen Audencia Financial Technology Institute)

Abstract

Purpose – Contracts and trust are two prominent governance mechanisms in buyer-supplier exchanges, yet controversy persists regarding the interplay between contracts and trust. This study provides a new perspective to understand the debate by differentiating between- from within-dyad effects of contracts–trust relationships. Design/methodology/approach – Based on survey data of 250 Chinese buyer–supplier relationships collected over two time periods, we employed two-level hierarchical linear modeling (HLM) with repeated measures to test the influence of contracts (trust) on trust (contracts) over time. Findings – We find that for major buyer–supplier exchanges, contracts and trust tend to complement each other when comparing across dyads, but they likely substitute for each other in within-dyad settings. Research limitations/implication – First, to illustrate the dynamic interactions between contracts and trust, we collected data at two time periods and assumed continuous linear relationships of time with both contracts and trust. Further research should collect multiple waves of data to explore the complex, varying changes that arise over time. Second, our findings are based on buyer–supplier relationships in China, whose unique cultural features may limit the generalizability of the results to other settings. Practical implications – Channel managers can structure exchanges by devising detailed contracts that align incentives and demonstrate commitment, which helps build trust in a relationship. Channel managers should also pay special attention to the contingency effects of their transactional and relational features. Originality – This study offers the first explicit test of the dynamic contracts–trust relationship, thereby establishing a more refined understanding of interplay between contracts and trust.

Suggested Citation

  • Liwen Wang, 2023. "The interplay of contracts and trust: untangling between- and within-dyad effects," Post-Print hal-03944358, HAL.
    • Handle: RePEc:hal:journl:hal-03944358
    DOI: 10.1108/EJM-12-2021-0934
    Note: View the original document on HAL open archive server: https://audencia.hal.science/hal-03944358
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://audencia.hal.science/hal-03944358/document
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1108/EJM-12-2021-0934?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Bart S. Vanneste & Phanish Puranam & Tobias Kretschmer, 2014. "Trust over time in exchange relationships: Meta-analysis and theory," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 35(12), pages 1891-1902, December.
    2. Malhotra, Deepak & Lumineau, Fabrice, 2011. "Trust and collaboration in the aftermath of conflict: the effects of contract structure," MPRA Paper 38358, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    3. Yanfeng Zheng & Haibin Yang, 2015. "Does Familiarity Foster Innovation? The Impact of Alliance Partner Repeatedness on Breakthrough Innovations," Journal of Management Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 52(2), pages 213-230, March.
    4. Maurizio Zollo & Jeffrey J. Reuer & Harbir Singh, 2002. "Interorganizational Routines and Performance in Strategic Alliances," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 13(6), pages 701-713, December.
    5. Lui, Steven S. & Wong, Yin-yee & Liu, Weiping, 2009. "Asset specificity roles in interfirm cooperation: Reducing opportunistic behavior or increasing cooperative behavior?," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 62(11), pages 1214-1219, November.
    6. Julie Juan Li & Laura Poppo & Kevin Zheng Zhou, 2010. "Relational mechanisms, formal contracts, and local knowledge acquisition by international subsidiaries," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 31(4), pages 349-370, April.
    7. Rekha Krishnan & Inge Geyskens & Jan-Benedict E. M. Steenkamp, 2016. "The effectiveness of contractual and trust-based governance in strategic alliances under behavioral and environmental uncertainty," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 37(12), pages 2521-2542, December.
    8. Jeffrey J. Reuer & Africa Ariño, 2007. "Strategic alliance contracts: dimensions and determinants of contractual complexity," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 28(3), pages 313-330, March.
    9. Armstrong, J. Scott & Overton, Terry S., 1977. "Estimating Nonresponse Bias in Mail Surveys," MPRA Paper 81694, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    10. Kyle J. Mayer & Nicholas S. Argyres, 2004. "Learning to Contract: Evidence from the Personal Computer Industry," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 15(4), pages 394-410, August.
    11. Akbar Zaheer & Bill McEvily & Vincenzo Perrone, 1998. "Does Trust Matter? Exploring the Effects of Interorganizational and Interpersonal Trust on Performance," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 9(2), pages 141-159, April.
    12. Dong Chen & Seung Ho Park & William Newburry, 2009. "Parent contribution and organizational control in international joint ventures," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 30(11), pages 1133-1156, November.
    13. Daniel W. Elfenbein & Todd R. Zenger, 2014. "What Is a Relationship Worth? Repeated Exchange and the Development and Deployment of Relational Capital," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 25(1), pages 222-244, February.
    14. Bill McEvily & Vincenzo Perrone & Akbar Zaheer, 2003. "Trust as an Organizing Principle," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 14(1), pages 91-103, February.
    15. Michael D. Ryall & Rachelle C. Sampson, 2009. "Formal Contracts in the Presence of Relational Enforcement Mechanisms: Evidence from Technology Development Projects," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 55(6), pages 906-925, June.
    16. Akbar Zaheer & N. Venkatraman, 1995. "Relational governance as an interorganizational strategy: An empirical test of the role of trust in economic exchange," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 16(5), pages 373-392.
    17. Ranjay Gulati & Jack A. Nickerson, 2008. "Interorganizational Trust, Governance Choice, and Exchange Performance," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 19(5), pages 688-708, October.
    18. Oliver Schilke & Karen S. Cook, 2015. "Sources of alliance partner trustworthiness: Integrating calculative and relational perspectives," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 36(2), pages 276-297, February.
    19. Nicholas S. Argyres & Janet Bercovitz & Kyle J. Mayer, 2007. "Complementarity and Evolution of Contractual Provisions: An Empirical Study of IT Services Contracts," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 18(1), pages 3-19, February.
    20. Sarah E. Wolfolds & Jordan Siegel, 2019. "Misaccounting for endogeneity: The peril of relying on the Heckman two‐step method without a valid instrument," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 40(3), pages 432-462, March.
    21. Min‐Ping Kang & Joseph T. Mahoney & Danchi Tan, 2009. "Why firms make unilateral investments specific to other firms: the case of OEM suppliers," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 30(2), pages 117-135, February.
    22. Thomas Mellewigt & Adeline Thomas & Ingo Weller & Edward J. Zajac, 2017. "Alliance or Acquisition? A Mechanisms‐Based, Policy‐Capturing Analysis," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 38(12), pages 2353-2369, December.
    23. Bart S. Vanneste & Phanish Puranam, 2010. "Repeated Interactions and Contractual Detail: Identifying the Learning Effect," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 21(1), pages 186-201, February.
    24. Vlaar, P.W.L. & van den Bosch, F.A.J., 2006. "Coping with Problems of Understanding in Interorganizational Relationships: Using Formalization as a Means to make Sense," ERIM Report Series Research in Management ERS-2006-034-STR, Erasmus Research Institute of Management (ERIM), ERIM is the joint research institute of the Rotterdam School of Management, Erasmus University and the Erasmus School of Economics (ESE) at Erasmus University Rotterdam.
    25. Kevin Zheng Zhou & Laura Poppo, 2010. "Exchange hazards, relational reliability, and contracts in China: The contingent role of legal enforceability," Journal of International Business Studies, Palgrave Macmillan;Academy of International Business, vol. 41(5), pages 861-881, June.
    26. Laura Poppo & Kevin Zheng Zhou & Sungmin Ryu, 2008. "Alternative Origins to Interorganizational Trust: An Interdependence Perspective on the Shadow of the Past and the Shadow of the Future," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 19(1), pages 39-55, February.
    27. Yadong Luo, 2008. "Structuring interorganizational cooperation: the role of economic integration in strategic alliances," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 29(6), pages 617-637, June.
    28. S. Trevis Certo & Michael C. Withers & Matthew Semadeni, 2017. "A tale of two effects: Using longitudinal data to compare within- and between-firm effects," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 38(7), pages 1536-1556, July.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Fang, F., 2019. "When performance shortfall arises, contract or trust? A multi-method study of the impact of contractual and relational governances on performance in public – private partnerships," Other publications TiSEM 473840ee-6945-4a93-9326-5, Tilburg University, School of Economics and Management.
    2. Vanesa Solís-Rodríguez & Manuel González-Díaz, 2019. "Prior interactions and contractual completeness in Spanish franchising," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 53(3), pages 795-812, October.
    3. Bart S. Vanneste & Onesun Steve Yoo, 2020. "Performance of trust-based governance," Journal of Organization Design, Springer;Organizational Design Community, vol. 9(1), pages 1-28, December.
    4. Wang, Yu & Chen, Yongqiang & Wang, Wenqian & Tang, Yinqiu, 2019. "Differentiating two types of learning in contract design: Evidence from the construction industry," Scandinavian Journal of Management, Elsevier, vol. 35(1), pages 1-11.
    5. Oliver Schilke & Karen S. Cook, 2015. "Sources of alliance partner trustworthiness: Integrating calculative and relational perspectives," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 36(2), pages 276-297, February.
    6. Wang, Lei & Zhang, Chun & Jiang, Fuming, 2019. "Matching governance mechanisms with transaction-specific investment types and supplier roles: An empirical study of cross-border outsourcing relationships," International Business Review, Elsevier, vol. 28(2), pages 316-327.
    7. Han, Shaojie & Su, Jingqin & Lyu, Yibo & Liu, Qing, 2022. "How do business incubators govern incubation relationships with different new ventures?," Technovation, Elsevier, vol. 116(C).
    8. Bart S. Vanneste & Douglas H. Frank, 2014. "Forgiveness in Vertical Relationships: Incentive and Termination Effects," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 25(6), pages 1807-1822, December.
    9. Vanesa Solís-Rodríguez & Manuel González-Díaz, 2017. "Differences in contract design between successful and less successful franchises," European Journal of Law and Economics, Springer, vol. 44(3), pages 483-502, December.
    10. Laura Poppo & Kevin Zheng Zhou & Todd R. Zenger, 2008. "Examining the Conditional Limits of Relational Governance: Specialized Assets, Performance Ambiguity, and Long‐Standing Ties," Journal of Management Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 45(7), pages 1195-1216, November.
    11. Weber, Clarissa E. & Maurer, Indre, 2023. "Knowledge acquisition from host-country partners: The interplay of trust and legal safeguards," Journal of World Business, Elsevier, vol. 58(2).
    12. Reuer, Jeffrey & Devarakonda, S.V., 2015. "Mechanisms of hybrid governance : Administrative committees in non-equity alliances," Other publications TiSEM 063d9ccc-59c8-4e76-a77d-8, Tilburg University, School of Economics and Management.
    13. Lumineau, Fabrice & Jin, Jason Lu & Sheng, Shibin & Zhou, Kevin Zheng, 2022. "Asset specificity asymmetry and supplier opportunism in buyer–supplier exchanges," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 149(C), pages 85-100.
    14. Lumineau, Fabrice & Malhotra, Deepak, 2011. "Shadow of the contract: how contract structure shapes inter-firm dispute resolution," MPRA Paper 38359, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    15. Henri C. Dekker & Alexandra Van den Abbeele, 2010. "Organizational Learning and Interfirm Control: The Effects of Partner Search and Prior Exchange Experiences," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 21(6), pages 1233-1250, December.
    16. Guo, Shiau-Ling, 2023. "The governance implication of the geographic concentration of franchise activities for franchise relationships," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 157(C).
    17. Bill McEvily & Akbar Zaheer & Darcy K. Fudge Kamal, 2017. "Mutual and Exclusive: Dyadic Sources of Trust in Interorganizational Exchange," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 28(1), pages 74-92, February.
    18. George Chondrakis & Mari Sako, 2020. "When suppliers shift my boundaries: Supplier employee mobility and its impact on buyer firms' sourcing strategy," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 41(9), pages 1682-1711, September.
    19. Daniel W. Elfenbein & Todd R. Zenger, 2014. "What Is a Relationship Worth? Repeated Exchange and the Development and Deployment of Relational Capital," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 25(1), pages 222-244, February.
    20. Laura Poppo & Kevin Zheng Zhou & Julie J. Li, 2016. "When can you trust “trust”? Calculative trust, relational trust, and supplier performance," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 37(4), pages 724-741, April.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    trust; contracts; buyer–supplier exchanges; asset specificity; exchange history;
    All these keywords.

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:hal:journl:hal-03944358. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: CCSD (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.