How Does Green Supply Chain Management Promote the Success of Crowdfunding Projects? Empirical Research Based on the QCA Method

Abstract

With the advancement of consumers’ awareness of environmental protection, the green supply chain, a modern management model considering environmental impact and resource efficiency, is increasingly valued by managers and consumers and has become an important determinant of crowdfunding success. Different from existing research on crowdfunding with symmetric thinking, this paper employs text mining and the QCA method to identify various configurations of crowdfunding success. Based on the data of the leading Chinese crowdfunding platform, JD Crowdfunding, this paper studies multiple configurations of the green supply chain, delivery time and funding goals of crowdfunding projects in the technology category. The results show that a crowdfunding project that adopts a green supply chain can succeed with a higher funding goal and longer delivery time, and a project without a green supply chain but with a lower funding goal is also a successful configuration. In addition, this study also explores the successful configuration paths of hedonic products and functional products in crowdfunding projects, respectively, and it finds that investors of hedonic products pay more attention to green supply chain management. These findings support complexity theory, deepen the understanding of the success of crowdfunding projects, and provide important management suggestions for fundraisers and crowdfunding platforms.