On sustainability, resilience, and the sustainable–resilient supply networks

Abstract

Strategy focused supply chains, in general follow an evolutionary sequence as observed from literature. This evolutionary sequence extends from lean to green and to sustainable supply chains; as well as from agile to leagile and to resilient supply chains. In this research, the sequence of evolution of resilient and sustainable supply chains has been investigated with respect to the positioning of partition line in supply networks. Partition line, which is a point of separation of strategic objectives, can be sensibly positioned in a supply network to fetch the benefits of sustainability and resilience together. Aligning the objectives of sustainability and resilience in a supply network is explained through multiple case analyses of manufacturing networks. Case analysis, as elaborated in this research could help managers in matching and scrutinizing their supply networks by finding analogy of the pertinent case from the explicated model cases. Positioning the partition line in a supply network and assigning strategic objectives on either sides of it open insights into a new category of both sustainability and resilience oriented networks, which is the concept of discussion in the paper.