Power, value and supply chain management

TLDR

Supply‑chain management thinking has traditionally focused on operational effectiveness and efficiency, but is criticized for being atheoretical and descriptive, prompting a shift toward an analytical framework grounded in power and value appropriation. The paper reviews dominant supply‑chain management ideas, argues for a strategic and operational perspective, critiques the current atheoretical approach, and proposes a more analytically robust framework based on power and value appropriation.

Abstract

Explains some of the thinking that informs both the case study articles that appear in the same issue of Supply Chain Management: An International Journal and the EPSRC funded research project currently being undertaken at the Centre for Business Strategy and Procurement. A review is provided of the dominant ideas that currently inform “supply chain management thinking”. This paradigm is characterised as operational effectiveness and efficiency. A case is made for understanding supply chains from a strategic as well as from an operational perspective. Current supply chain management thinking is criticised for being atheoretical and descriptive, and a case is made for an analytical approach to supply chain thinking based around the concepts of power and value appropriation. A more analytically robust way of understanding supply chains is laid out.