Effects of external uncertainties and power on opportunism in supply chains: evidence from China

This study examines the determinants of opportunism in supply chain relationships in emerging markets. Drawing on transaction cost theory and resource dependence theory, we propose that external uncertainties (environmental uncertainty and legal unprotectability) influence opportunism through power (coercive and non-coercive). The results, based on 240 companies in China, indicate that environmental uncertainty enhances supplier opportunism directly and indirectly through the buyer's use of coercive power over the supplier, while legal unprotectability enhances supplier opportunism directly, but reduces it indirectly through the buyer's use of non-coercive power. While buyer coercive power increases supplier opportunism, buyer non-coercive power decreases it.