Navigating the Regulatory-Legitimacy Nexus: The Role of Institutional Voids and Weak Regulatory Enforcement in Shaping Sustainable Petroleum Supply Chains in Emerging Economies

• Abi cit

  Lautech

  Author

institutional voids and weak regulatory enforcement create significant barriers to sustainable supply chain management (SCM). Despite increasing global pressure for environmental, social, and governance (ESG) compliance, petroleum firms in developing nations struggle to implement sustainability practices due to fragmented regulatory frameworks, corruption, and legitimacy challenges. This study investigates how institutional voids and weak enforcement shape sustainability outcomes in petroleum supply chains, drawing on institutional theory and legitimacy theory as analytical lenses. Using a mixed-methods approach combining survey data from 144 oil and gas firms in Nigeria and qualitative content analysis of annual reports from 15 global petroleum titans spanning 10 years, the research identifies coercive and normative pressures as significant drivers of sustainability adoption (p < 0.01), while mimetic pressures show no significant effect. The findings reveal that regulatory enforcement gaps account for approximately 67.3% of the variance in sustainability practice adoption, with firm size not moderating institutional pressure effects. The study contributes a regulatory-legitimacy framework explaining how petroleum firms navigate competing pressures in weak institutional environments. Key implications include actionable recommendations for policymakers to strengthen enforcement mechanisms and for practitioners to develop legitimacy-enhancing SCM strategies. The research establishes a replicable framework for assessing sustainability performance in resource-dependent emerging economies.

• pdf

Copyright (c) 2026 Abi cit (Author)

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.