Purpose

Previous literature on sustainable supply chain management has largely adopted an instrumental view of stakeholder management and has focused on understanding the effect of powerful stakeholders who have a more decisive influence on an organization's supply chain decisions. Social enterprises have emerged as organizations that often aim to create impact by integrating marginalized stakeholders into their operations and supply chains. This study examines the trade-offs that social enterprises experience due to their moral stance toward stakeholder engagement, evidenced in their commitment to serving marginalized stakeholders, as well as the responses adopted to these trade-offs.

Design/methodology/approach

The study follows a theory elaboration approach through a multiple case study design. The authors draw on insights from stakeholder theory and use the empirical insights to expand current constructs and relationships in a novel empirical context. Based on an in-depth analysis of primary and secondary qualitative data on ten social enterprises, the authors examine how these organizations integrate marginalized stakeholders into various roles in their operations.

Findings

When integrating marginalized customers, suppliers and employees, social enterprises face affordability, reliability and efficiency trade-offs. Each trade-off represents conflicts between the organization's needs and the needs of marginalized stakeholders. In response to these trade-offs, social enterprises choose to internalize the costs through slack creation or vertical integration or externalize the costs to stakeholders. The ability to externalize is contingent on the growth orientation of the organization and the presence of like-minded B2B (Business-to-Business) customers. These responses reflect whether organizations accept the trade-offs at the expense of one or more stakeholders or if they avoid the trade-offs and find mutually beneficial solutions.

Originality/value

Building on the empirical insights, the authors elaborate on stakeholder theory with a focus on the integration of marginalized stakeholders by emphasizing a moral justification for stakeholder engagement, identifying the nature of the underlying trade-offs which can arise when various stakeholder needs are in conflict and examining the contingencies affecting organizational responses to these trade-offs.

中文翻译：

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走向利益相关者管理的道德方法：将边缘化利益相关者纳入社会企业运营的见解

目的

先前有关可持续供应链管理的文献大多采用利益相关者管理的工具性观点，并侧重于理解对组织的供应链决策具有更决定性影响的强大利益相关者的影响。社会企业已经成为旨在通过将边缘化利益相关者纳入其运营和供应链来产生影响的组织。本研究考察了社会企业由于其对利益相关者参与的道德立场而经历的权衡，这体现在他们致力于服务边缘​​化利益相关者，以及对这些权衡采取的应对措施。

设计/方法论/途径

该研究通过多个案例研究设计遵循理论阐述方法。作者借鉴了利益相关者理论的见解，并利用实证见解在新颖的实证背景下扩展了当前的结构和关系。基于对十个社会企业的主要和次要定性数据的深入分析，作者研究了这些组织如何将边缘化利益相关者融入其运营中的各种角色。

发现

在整合边缘化客户、供应商和员工时，社会企业面临着承受能力、可靠性和效率的权衡。每个权衡都代表了组织的需求和边缘化利益相关者的需求之间的冲突。为了应对这些权衡，社会企业选择通过松弛创造或垂直整合将成本内部化，或者将成本外部化给利益相关者。外部化的能力取决于组织的增长方向和志同道合的 B2B（企业对企业）客户的存在。这些回应反映了组织是否接受以牺牲一个或多个利益相关者为代价的权衡，或者是否避免权衡并找到互利的解决方案。

原创性/价值

基于实证见解，作者详细阐述了利益相关者理论，重点关注边缘化利益相关者的整合，强调利益相关者参与的道德理由，确定当各种利益相关者的需求发生冲突时可能出现的潜在权衡的性质，以及检查影响组织对这些权衡的反应的突发事件。