Research Published in Management International Review from 2006 to 2020: A Bibliometric Analysis and Future Directions.

The Management International Review (MIR) celebrated its 60th anniversary in 2020. In commemoration of this event, we use a bibliometric analysis to present a retrospective on the journal by analyzing its content for the years between 2006 and 2020. We find that the collaboration culture in MIR has risen over time with the increase in the median size of author teams. Moreover, the collaboration network has become more global over time. The methodology used in the journal is predominantly empirical and quantitative with archival data sources most commonly used. The bibliographic coupling of the MIR corpus reveals that the major themes in the journal revolve around "culture," "emerging economies," "innovation, knowledge transfer, and absorptive capacity," "internationalization process," "culture and entry modes," and "internationalization and performance." A comparison with other leading international business journals provides distinct pathways in which MIR may continue to grow. Finally, it is important to note that while the share of conceptual studies has decreased significantly in the last 15 years, the MIR editors want to see more novel and theoretically grounded conceptual articles in the journal.

Introduction

Founded in 1960, Management International Review (MIR) is one of the leading journals in the field of international management (IM). MIR publishes cutting edge research focusing on the topics related to IM, cross-cultural management, comparative management, and related international business (IB) issues. Thus, for more than 60 years, MIR has served as a platform for rigorous intellectual conversations in the aforementioned domains. The journal publishes six issues per year, one of which, on average, is a focused or special issue. For its prolonged and high-level contributions to the field, MIR has been recognized by several peer-reviewed and citation-based metrics.

According to Scopus, the journal has a CiteScore of 4.5, indicating that the publications between 2017 and 2020 received an average of 4.51 citations, and the source normalized impact per paper (SNIP) is 1.535, indicating that the MIR publications have received, on average, 1.535 times more citations than the average citations in their subject areas. The Social Science Citation Index (SSCI) impact factor of MIR, as of 2020, is 3.721,2 indicating that its publications in 2018 and 2019 received on average 3.721 citations in 2020 alone. The 5-year impact factor is 5.062, meaning that the publications between 2016 and 2020 received 5.062 citations, on average, in 2020. The peer-review-based rankings also position MIR highly, with Australian Business Deans Council (ABDC) ranking the journal as ‘A’3 and Chartered Association of Business Schools (CABS)4 rating the journal as ‘3’ in its Academic Journal Guide (AJG) 2021 list.

MIR’s success can be attributed to its status as one of the first journals in the field of IM and IB and the most diverse in terms of its author base (Oesterle & Wolf, 2011). The journal was founded in Germany with Louis Perridon as its first editor in chief. He held the position until 1980, when Klaus Macharzina took over and remained at the helm until 2006. The current coeditors in chief, Michael Jörg Oesterle and Joachim Wolf, started in 2006. Under these editorial regimes, MIR has become one of the leading journals by becoming widely known outside the continental Europe and, in 2008, was listed on Social Science Citation Index by Clarivate Analytics.

In this paper, we attempt to take a stock of MIR’s journey during 2006–2020. To this end, we use bibliometric analysis (Donthu et al., 2021a) to capture the evolution of MIR’s intellectual structure, uncover emerging methodological and theoretical trends, better understand the nuances of MIR’s impact on the field, and throw light on the journal’s competitive positioning when compared to similar scientific outlets in its domain. Our attempt to present this MIR retrospective is pertinent and timely given the commemoration of its 60th anniversary. Indeed, it is not uncommon to publish studies such as this one on a journal’s milestone year (Schwert, 1993), and many renowned journals, such as Journal of Business Research (Donthu et al., 2020), Journal of International Marketing (Donthu et al., 2021c), Journal of International Business Studies (García-Lillo et al., 2019), International Business Review (Rialp et al., 2019), and International Marketing Review (Donthu et al., 2021d), have benefited from similar endeavors. To present a comprehensive retrospective, we ask several key questions framed as research questions (RQs).

First, we examine the collaboration and methodological choices of MIR’s authors. Collaboration patterns enable understanding in the development of any field, as the contributing authors often form distinct groups across the institutional and intellectual lines, and studying such patterns help us to make sense of the underlying ties and emerging connections in a given field. Second, we explore authors’ methodological choices because knowledge and practice of dominant methodologies are important for a scholar’s success in academia (Hanson & Grimmer, 2007). Third, we evaluate the major themes in MIR corpus and identify the emerging ones, which helps us in paving the path for future scholars. Fourth, we investigate the drivers of MIR citations because citations, which indicate the impact of scientific publications, are a primary measure of a journal’s quality (Mingers & Yang, 2017). Finally, we present a comparison of MIR with other leading journals in the field of IM and IB, which is useful in identifying growth opportunities for MIR in the coming decades. The RQs are answered using a range of tools, such as coauthorship analysis, bibliographic coupling, network examination, and regression analysis. The RQs are framed as follows.

Research Question 1: What are the different collaboration patterns of MIR authors?

Research Question 2: What methodologies do MIR authors use in their research?

Research Question 3: What are the major themes explored by MIR authors?

Research Question 4: What factors drive MIR citations?

Research Question 5: How does MIR compare to other leading journals in the field?

The rest of the study is organized as follows. Section 2 provides an overview of bibliometric analysis as it pertains to the fields of IM and IB. Section 3 presents the overview of the study’s bibliometric methodology and analytical strategy. Section 4 presents the analysis of collaboration and methodological choices of MIR authors. Section 5 presents the analysis of major themes, and Sect. 6 presents the analysis of citations drivers. Section 7 compares MIR with other leading IB journals in terms of rankings and themes. Finally, Sect. 8 concludes the study.

The IB/IM Field and Bibliometric Analysis

IB as a field emerged in the 1950s with research being almost exclusively done by scholars from United States (Oesterle & Wolf, 2011). The research output of IB has steadily grown over the years; the field now has multiple and thriving subdomains. This is in stark contrast with the early 1970s, when it was argued that the entire IB research area could be summarized in a single volume (Wright & Ricks, 1994). However, the past two decades have witnessed tremendous growth in IB activities and related research outputs. Thus, the use of advanced techniques, such as bibliometric analysis, has become more common and frequent in IB research (Calma & Suder, 2020; Zhao et al., 2018). The extant bibliometric analyses point toward two important issues. First, IB research has increasingly become more variegated in terms of subdomains, themes, theories, methodologies, and author’s country of origin. Second, the corpus size in each of these areas is large enough to justify the application of bibliometric analysis (Donthu et al., 2021a).

Studies employing bibliometric techniques focusing on a single journal are becoming common. For instance, Rialp et al. (2019) examine International Business Review’s development in terms of citation and publication while also presenting major themes using the analysis of author keywords. Donthu et al., (2021c, 2021d) throw light on the international marketing (a subfield of IB) by focusing on Journal of International Marketing and International Marketing Review, respectively. The major takeaway from the abovementioned studies is that the use of bibliometrics in the IB field is becoming prevalent.

Methodology

In simple terms, bibliometric analysis is the application of quantitative techniques on bibliographic data (Donthu et al., 2021a). The main advantage of the technique is its ability to handle large amounts of bibliographic data (Ramos-Rodrígue & Ruíz-Navarro, 2004).

To identify the collaboration patterns, we conduct a coauthorship analysis of MIR, which includes study on the author team sizes in each period. In addition, we conduct a network analysis of the MIR country-level collaboration patterns to show how collaborative ties have developed in MIR.

To shed light on the methodological choices of MIR authors, we classified each article based on its methodology. The choice of methodology has been identified as one of the drivers of citations in previous research (Dang & Li, 2020; Stremersch et al., 2007; Valtakoski, 2019). Two of the authors independently read the full articles, coded them, and classified each article by its industrial focus, regional focus, research methods (i.e., empirical, conceptual, literature review, and modelling and analytical),5 research design (i.e., qualitative, quantitative, or mixed), data collection (i.e., case study, interview, archival, survey, or experiment), and data analytics method.6

To identify major themes in MIR’s corpus, we use bibliographic coupling. Bibliographic coupling assumes that the publications sharing literature references share common themes as well (Kessler, 1963), with a greater number of shared literature references indicating a higher degree of thematic similarity (Wallin, 2005). We use shared literature references to construct document clusters by using a variant of the algorithm by Newman and Girvan (2004). Here, each major cluster represents a major theme in the journal. The clusters were ordered based on the number of documents in them. We conduct cluster analyses of each major cluster to understand their major themes.

To analyze the drivers of MIR citations, we use negative binomial regression. As the chosen measure of article impact (i.e., the citation count) is a count variable with zero values and is over-dispersed, the negative binomial regression is a preferred method of analysis (Stremersch et al., 2007; Valtakoski, 2019). This is in line with the previous literature (Baker et al., 2020; Donthu et al., 2021b; Stremersch et al., 2007; Valtakoski, 2019) that has looked into identifying the major article attributes that drive future citations.

The search was conducted in May 2021 using the source search by name ‘Management International Review’ on Scopus, resulting in 503 documents between the years 2006 and 2020. After further cleaning the data by removing duplicates, notes, and other erroneous entries, 491 documents remained that were used for further analysis. To compare MIR with other leading IB journals, we use the list provided by Tüselmann et al. (2016) with the cutoff of AJG rating of ‘3.’ The journals short-listed this way were Journal of International Business Studies (JIBS), Journal of World Business (JWB), Global Strategy Journal (GSJ), International Business Review (IBR), Asia Pacific Journal of Management (APJM), Journal of International Management (JIM), and Management and Organization Review (MOR). We fetched the data for these journals from Scopus for the period 2006–2020. We then used the data as input for VOSviewer (van Eck & Waltman, 2010) and Gephi (Bastian et al., 2009) for network visualization. Figure 1 represents the research design for this study.

Fig. 1

Research design of the study (Adapted from Donthu et al., 2021c). This figure presents the research design for this study

Collaboration and Methodological Choices Among MIR Authors

The analysis of collaboration and methodological choices of MIR authors helps in understanding what research has taken place in MIR over time. Figure 2 shows the consistent increase in the author team sizes (RQ1). It is evident in the figure that, between 2006 and 2010, the publications with two authors held the share of publications for the journal at 41.32%, followed by articles with three authors at 29.94%. It is also evident that, at least since 2006, the journal has a strong collaboration culture with a share of single-authored articles remaining small throughout. However, the increase in collaboration culture may not be limited just to MIR as the increasing complexity of themes and the availability of newer methodological techniques have led to greater collaboration in the broader field of organizational research as well (Acedo et al., 2006). Between 2011 and 2015, the share of articles with two authors has decreased to 39.39%, while the articles with more than two authors has increased, with the share of three-author articles at 33.94% and four-author articles at 10.91%. This trend continues in the period between 2016 and 2020, during which the highest share of articles is commanded by articles with three authors (40.25%). The median author team size has shifted from two between 2006 and 2015 to three between 2016 and 2020. This may be driven by increased results of increasing complexities in research topics and methodology (Acedo et al., 2006). Furthermore, larger author teams garner more citations on account of the published article having greater social connectivity (Valtakoski, 2019). With increasing complexity in research and the benefits offered in terms of citations, the author team’s median size is expected to grow further.

Fig. 2

Authors’ collaboration patterns in MIR between 2006 and 2020. In this figure the x-axis represents the period, y-axis represents the number (%age) of articles and the legends represents the number of authors

Figure 3 shows the collaboration patterns at the country-level between 2006 and 2010. Here, the bubble size represents the number of connections any particular country has with other countries in the network, and the link thickness represents the number of times those two countries appear together in author affiliations. Between 2006 and 2010, USA, UK, Canada, and Netherlands appear to be the most important components of the network, with United States and Canada showing a particularly strong link. Between 2011 and 2015 (Fig. 4), the role of United Kingdom has grown significantly, showing a particularly strong coauthorship bond with China. Similarly, the roles of Australia and China have grown significantly between the periods with UK, USA, Australia, China and Canada, making a strong network in which author teams from these countries were common during the chosen time period. Between 2016 and 2020 (Fig. 5), the network became more complex, with USA and UK being the most important components but also sharing a strong link with each other. The prominence of USA as an MIR author-base does not come as a surprise as the region has been a fertile ground for IB research since the inception of this field.

Fig. 3

Country collaboration network between 2006 and 2010. This figure presents the county level collaboration network for MIR between 2006 and 2010

Fig. 4

Country collaboration network between 2011 and 2015. This figure presents the county level collaboration network for MIR between 2011 and 2015

Fig. 5

Country collaboration network between 2016 and 2020. This figure presents the county level collaboration network for MIR between 2016 and 2020

RQ2 sheds light on the methodological context and choices made by the MIR authors. Table 1 shows the industrial and regional emphasis of the research that has taken place in the journal. Panel A in Table 1 shows the industry focus of MIR research. In this table, the categories are listed in the alphabetic order, and notations depicting classification in multiple categories (‘both’) or lack of classification in any category (‘no focus mentioned’) are placed after other classifications in their respective panels. The research usually covers services and manufacturing sectors, but the attention has shifted toward services in the last 15 years for studies covering a single industry. For instance, research focusing on only the service industries increased to 15.72% between 2016 and 2020, from 8.33% between 2006 and 2010. At the same time, the share of articles focusing only on manufacturing industries has decreased from 20.83 to 18.87%. This is consistent with the increase in the importance of services in the world economy during the past two decades (Blagoeva et al., 2020; Merchant & Gaur, 2008). The country choices presented in Panel B shows that the research published in the journal usually focuses on a single country. Among the single-country articles, the focus has been put more on Asia, which has an overall research share of 54.10%. Though the majority of articles have focused on Asia, plenty of focus has been on Europe and North America, with the share of articles at 27.27% and 13.06%, respectively. A small but consistent attention has been on Australia, New Zealand, and South America. Studies on Africa has been almost nonexistent, with only a few articles published recently (e.g., Glaister et al., 2020). As firms from continental Africa continue to internationalize, it may be important for MIR to encourage further research to better understand African firms’ idiosyncrasies and heterogeneous nuances.

Table 1

The industry and regional focus in MIR articles during 2006–2020

	2006–2010 (%)	2011–2015 (%)	2016–2020 (%)	Total (%)
Panel A: Industry focus
Service	8.33	8.48	15.72	10.77
Manufacturing	20.83	16.97	18.87	18.90
Both	48.81	51.52	47.80	49.39
No industry focus mentioned	22.02	23.03	17.61	20.93
Panel B: Single/Multi country focus
Single country	54.76	50.91	57.86	54.47
Multi country	22.62	33.94	24.53	27.03
No country focus mentioned	22.62	15.15	17.61	18.50
Panel C: Regional focus of single country focus
Africa	0.00	0.00	1.09	0.37
Asia	48.91	57.14	56.52	54.10
Australia and New Zealand	4.35	2.38	2.17	2.99
Europe	26.09	23.81	31.52	27.24
North America	16.30	16.67	6.52	13.06
South America	4.35	0.00	2.17	2.24

Table 2 shows the pattern of methodological choices (RQ2). Panel A shows a research method pattern, and it is evident that the research that has taken place in the journal since 2006 has been empirical in nature. The share of conceptual studies has gone down from 19.64% between 2006 and 2010 to 8.18% between 2016 and 2020. The share of literature reviews has grown from 4.17 to 10.06% in the same period. The research design pattern shows that the research in the journal has primarily used the quantitative design, with its share at 86.18%. The share of qualitative research has shown a small decline from 11.31% between 2006 and 2010 to 10.06% between 2016 and 2020, while quantitative research design has gone from 86.31 to 88.68% in the same period. Panel C shows the data collection techniques. Here, the archival data has the dominant share at 60.77%. However, the share has gone down from 64.29 to 59.12%. On the other hand, the survey share has seen a rise from 27.98 to 32.08%. Qualitative interviews have risen too, with case studies showing a small decline. Data collection though experimentation forms a miniscule research share. It can be concluded that, while the data collection techniques in the journal have been diverse, these are heavily skewed in favor of archival data. Panel D shows the pattern of data analysis techniques used in the journal. The categories do not appear to be mutually exclusive in the table, as a single study may use multiple types of data analysis techniques. Here, the descriptive data analysis (e.g., measures of central tendency, t test, and f test) is most common at 73.78%, followed by correlation at 67.28% and regression at 55.28%. It is to be noted that descriptive analyses are used almost always to complement the main empirical models. The other analysis methods contain a range of techniques, such as ANOVA, MANOVA, MANCOVA, structural equation modelling (SEM), exploratory factor analysis (EFA), confirmatory factor analysis (CFA), and so forth. These techniques are varied in nature and indicate that the authors’ use of data analysis techniques have been diverse.

Table 2

Methodological choices among MIR authors

	2006–2010 (%)	2011–2015 (%)	2016–2020 (%)	Total (%)
Panel A: Research method
Empirical	73.21	84.85	81.13	79.67
Conceptual	19.64	6.67	8.18	11.59
LR survey and review	4.17	8.48	10.06	7.52
Modelling and analytical	2.98	0.00	0.63	1.22
Panel B: Research design
Qualitative	11.31	14.55	10.06	11.99
Quantitative	86.31	83.64	88.68	86.18
Mixed design	2.38	1.82	1.26	1.42
Panel C: Data collection methods
Case study	5.95	9.70	5.66	7.11
Qualitative interview	7.14	8.48	11.95	9.15
Archival	64.29	58.79	59.12	60.77
Survey	27.98	32.12	32.08	30.69
Experiment	0.60	0.00	1.89	0.81
No data reported/collected	0.00	0.61	2.52	1.02
Panel D: Data analysis techniques
Descriptive	70.24	75.76	75.47	73.78
Correlation	62.50	70.91	68.55	67.28
Regression	50.00	59.39	56.60	55.28
Others	46.43	42.42	51.57	46.75
Not mentioned	1.79	0.00	1.89	1.22

Others include Structured equation modeling, confirmatory factor analysis (CFA), explanatory factor analysis (EFA), discriminant analysis, cluster analysis, simulation, and various variance-based techniques (ANOVA, MANOVA, MANCOVA etc.)

Major Themes in MIR Corpus

To study the major themes within MIR corpus (RQ3), we used bibliographic coupling analysis. This technique works under the assumption that the shared literature references determine the thematic similarity between the articles. The application of bibliographic coupling on the MIR corpus led to the creation of nine document clusters. Among these, six are major clusters containing 488 of 491 documents (99.39% of the total corpus). The remaining three clusters contain one article each. We conducted a content analysis of six major clusters. Among these, Cluster 1 contains 135 articles (27.49% of the corpus) focusing on the topic of culture; Cluster 2 contains 121 articles (24.64%) focusing on emerging economies; Cluster 3 contains 84 articles (17.11%) focusing on innovation, knowledge transfer, and absorptive capacity; Cluster 4 contains 64 articles (13.03%) focusing on the internationalization process; Cluster 5 contains 46 articles (9.37%) focusing on culture and entry modes; and Cluster 6 contains 38 articles (7.74%) focusing on the topics related to internationalization and performance. Tables 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 present summaries of each cluster.

Table 3

Summary of document cluster 1 and potential future directions

	Author	Title			Year	TC
Cluster 1: Cultural (TP: 135, TC: 3442)
Most cited articles	Sinkovics, R. R., Penz, E., Ghauri, P. N.	Enhancing the trustworthiness of qualitative research in international business			2008	226
	Welch, D. E., Welch, L. S.	The importance of language in international knowledge transfer			2008	147
	Welch, C., Piekkari, R.	Crossing language boundaries: qualitative interviewing in international business			2006	143
	Hurmerinta-Peltomäki, L., Nummela, N.	Mixed methods in international business research: a value-added perspective			2006	129
	Sinkovics, R. R., Alfoldi, E. A.	Progressive focusing and trustworthiness in qualitative research: the enabling role of computer-assisted qualitative data analysis software (CAQDAS)			2012	126
Most frequent keywords	2006–2010		2011–2015	2016–2020
	China  Performance  Foreign Direct Investment  Global Teams  Language  Culture  New Zealand		National culture  China  Culture  Expatriates  Cultural differences  Indigenous management  Institutional theory  Psychic distance  Trust  Values	Offshoring  China  Cultural distance  Cultural values  Global sourcing  International assignments
Potential future directions	How do cross-cultural differences impact MNE and local firm strategies and resulting performances? How do cross-cultural differences give rise to unique organizational practices around the world (especially in under-explored regions such as Africa)?

TP total publications, TC total citations

Table 4

Summary of document cluster 2 and potential future directions

	Author	Title			Year	TC
Cluster 2: Emerging economies (TP: 121, TC: 2845)
Most cited articles	Buckley, P. J., Cross, A. R., Tan, H., Xin, L., Voss, H.	Historic and emergent trends in Chinese outward direct investment			2008	184
	Jormanainen, I., Koveshnikov, A.	International activities of emerging market firms: a critical assessment of research in top international management journals			2012	113
	Li, S., Fetscherin, M., Alon, I., Lattemann, C., Yeh, K.	Corporate social responsibility in emerging markets: the importance of the governance environment			2010	108
	Fortanier, F., Kolk, A., Pinkse, J.	Harmonization in CSR Reporting: MNEs and Global CSR Standards			2011	103
	Tracey, P., Phillips, N.	Entrepreneurship in emerging markets strategies for new venture creation in uncertain institutional contexts			2011	102
Most frequent keywords	2006–2010		2011–2015	2016–2020
	China  Foreign direct investment  Corporate Governance  Emerging Markets  Institutional Theory		Emerging Economies  Emerging markets  India  Strategy  China	China  Emerging markets  Foreign direct investment  Location choice  Emerging economy  Emerging market  Emerging market firms  Internationalization  Legitimacy  Liability of foreignness  Political ties
Potential future directions	What are the idiosyncratic aspects of EMFs and emerging economies and how such factors affect MNE theorization? What are the sources of within country variations in emerging economies?

TP total publications, TC total citations

Table 5

Summary of document cluster 3 and potential future directions

	Author	Title			Year	TC
Cluster 3: Innovation, knowledge transfer and absorptive capacity (TP: 84, TC: 2596)
Most cited articles	Rugman, A. M., Verbeke, A., Nguyen, Q. T. K.	Fifty years of international business theory and beyond			2011	212
	Minbaeva, D. B.	Knowledge transfer in multinational corporations			2007	177
	Augier, M., Teece, D. J.	Dynamic capabilities and multinational enterprise: penrosean insights and omissions			2007	118
	Ambos, T. C., Birkinshaw, J.	Headquarters' attention and its effect on subsidiary performance			2010	109
	Fu, P. P., Tsui, A. S., Dess, G. G.	The dynamics of Guanxi in Chinese high-tech firms: implications for knowledge management and decision making			2006	95
Most frequent keywords	2006–2010		2011–2015	2016–2020
	Multinational corporations  Knowledge transfer  Penrose  Globalization  Multinational enterprise  Performance		Absorptive capacity  Contingency theory  Control  Emerging markets  Firm performance  India  Multinational companies	Innovation  Absorptive capacity  Entrepreneurial orientation  Multinational corporations  Embeddedness  Internalization
Potential future directions	What are the antecedents and outcomes of knowledge transfer processes in GVCs? How does internalisation theory explain the knowledge transfer process in new age firms?

TP total publications, TC total citations

Table 6

Summary of Document Cluster 4 and Potential Future Directions

	Author	Title			Year	TC
Cluster 4: Internationalization process (TP: 64, TC: 2161)
Most cited articles	Johanson, J., Vahlne, J.-E.	Commitment and opportunity development in the internationalization process: a note on the Uppsala internationalization process model			2006	337
	Liesch, P. W., Welch, L. S., Buckley, P. J.	Risk and uncertainty in internationalisation and international entrepreneurship studies: review and conceptual development			2011	109
	Buckley, P. J.	International integration and coordination in the global factory			2011	107
	Galkina, T., Chetty, S.	Effectuation and Networking of Internationalizing SMEs			2015	100
	Child, J., Rodrigues, S. B., Frynas, J. G.	Psychic distance, its impact and coping modes interpretations of SME decision makers			2009	73
	Meyer, K. E., Gelbuda, M.	Process perspectives in international business research in CEE			2006	73
Most frequent keywords	2006–2010		2011–2015	2016–2020
	Foreign direct investments  Internationalisation  Services		International entrepreneurship  International new ventures  Internationalization  Psychic distance  Born global  Networks	Internationalization  Internationalization Process  Speed  International new ventures  Network  Small and medium-sized enterprise  Time  Uppsala model
Potential future directions	Do extant internationalization theories adequately explain firm internationalization processes in the digital age? What are the microfoundations of the firm internationalization process?

TP total publications, TC total citations

Table 7

Summary of document cluster 5 and potential future directions

	Author	Title			Year	TC
Cluster 5: Culture and entry modes (TP: 46, TC: 1014)
Most cited articles	Demirbag, M., Tatoglu, E., Glaister, K. W.	Factors affecting perceptions of the choice between acquisition and greenfield entry: the case of western FDI in an emerging market			2008	92
	Ragozzino, R.	The effects of geographic distance on the foreign acquisition activity of US firms			2009	73
	Harzing, A.-W., Pudelko, M.	Do we need to distance ourselves from the distance concept? Why home and host country context might matter more than (cultural) distance			2016	64
	Arregle, J.-L., Hébert, L., Beamish, P. W.	Mode of international entry: the advantages of multilevel methods			2006	62
	Wang, H., Schaan, J.-L.	How much distance do we need? revisiting the "national cultural distance paradox"			2008	52
Most frequent keywords	2006–2010		2011–2015	2016–2020
	Entry mode  Foreign direct investment  Cultural distance  Ownership strategy  Performance  Turkey		Cultural distance  Foreign direct investment  Labour cost  Multinational corporations  Performance	Entry mode  Meta-analysis  Performance  International experience  Joint venture
Potential future directions	What is the role of added-cultural distance in determining MNE entry modes? Do the entry modes of SMEs and family firms differ from their counterparts in cross-cultural settings?

TP total publications, TC total citations

Table 8

Summary of document cluster 6 and potential future directions

	Author	Title			Year	TC
Cluster 6: Internationalization and performance (TP: 38, TC: 1576)
Most cited articles	Hennart, J.-F.	The theoretical rationale for a multinationality-performance relationship			2007	236
	Bausch, A., Krist, M.	The effect of context-related moderators on the internationalization-performance relationship: evidence from meta-analysis			2007	151
	Contractor, F. J.	Is international business good for companies? The evolutionary or multi-stage theory of internationalization vs. the transaction cost perspective			2007	150
	Ruigrok, W., Amann, W., Wagner, H.	The internationalization-performance relationship at Swiss firms: a test of the S-shape and extreme degrees of internationalization			2007	117
	Rugman, A. M., Verbeke, A.	A new perspective on the regional and global strategies of multinational services firms			2008	112
Most frequent keywords	2006–2010		2011–2015	2016–2020
	Performance  Internationalization  Multinationality  Firm performance  Geographic diversification  Globalization		Internationalization  Performance  Multinationality  Firm performance  International diversification  Ownership structure	Internationalization  Multinationality  Performance  Degree of internationalization
Potential future directions	What are the boundary conditions affecting internationalization-firm performance relationship? What factors affect the performance of service MNEs?

TP total publications, TC total citations

Cluster 1: Culture

The themes of this cluster are related to culture. Table 3 presents the cluster summary. The focal point of the studies in this area seems to be the cross-cultural management issues, with particular attention on the cultural differences, expatriates, cultural values, trust, and psychic distance. Throughout the years, the MIR authors have explored the relationship between the IM strategies in national and sociocultural contexts. The most cited studies in this particular cluster focus on the topics related to language (Welch & Welch, 2008) and qualitative and mixed research methods in the field of cross-cultural management and IM (Hurmerinta-Peltomäki & Nummela, 2006; Sinkovics & Alfoldi, 2012; Sinkovics et al., 2008; Welch & Piekkari, 2006).

The period-wise cluster analysis shows that, between 2006 and 2010, the MIR authors explored the topic of culture with a focus on language (Table 3). The cultural contexts of China emerge as a prominent topic, along with home country brand image (Zeugner-Roth et al., 2008), role of managers in multinational enterprises (MNEs) (Vora et al., 2007), cross-border mergers and acquisitions (Søderberg, 2006), diversity in top management teams (Gong, 2006), human resource practices (Kwon et al., 2010), host country influence on top management teams (Bhardwaj et al., 2007), and cultural accommodation (Akkermans et al., 2010). In sum, the themes during this period focused primarily on a range of factors related to cultural context and its impact on organizational outcomes.

The themes of cultural context have been further developed in the next period (2011–2015), with MIR authors dealing with the topics of national culture, expatriates, cultural differences, indigenous management, and psychic distance. During this period, China remained a dominant research context. This is consistent with the rise of China as one of the leading economies and increased IB activities occurring in and out of the country. The authors explored these key themes through their impacts on corporate governance (Daniel et al., 2012), offshore outsourcing (Manning et al., 2011), gender and cultural stereotyping (Hutchings et al., 2013), global supply chains (Sinkovics et al., 2011), and other institutional factors relating to compliance with local laws, politics, and cultural values. The themes of cultural issues have been explored in the contexts of offshoring, global sourcing (Lin, 2020), and international expatriates. This suggests that, during this period (2016–2020), MIR authors explored topics related to outsourcing and IM issues. The authors have continued to develop an understanding of culture (Taras et al., 2016) and cultural values (Jintae et al., 2016). In addition to the cultural values, other key themes explored by MIR authors during this time include knowledge sharing (Sinkovics et al., 2019) and R&D (Lee et al., 2020a, 2020b) in a cross-cultural context. The journal continued to explore the different themes on cross-cultural context, and more recent research points toward several topics that may be explored in the future. These include the expatriates, with attention on HRM in a cross-cultural context, the effect of cultural differences on knowledge connectivity and R&D, and the process of offshore outsourcing with focus on the role of cultural differences.

While the Hofstede cultural dimensions (see Taras et al., 2016 for a meta-analytic review) and GLOBE study (Dorfman et al., 2012; House et al., 2004) have had most impact on the field, it will be important for IB scholars to explore other cultural dimensions further, such as Trompenaars (1993) and Triandis (1994), to obtain more nuanced understanding of different cultures and their impacts on IB activities. Moreover, while cross-cultural IB research has proliferated and has gone beyond the initial Anglo-Saxon focus, many regions, such as Latin America, Africa, and the Middle-East, remain under-researched and, thus, underrepresented in comparative IB studies. Relatedly, most cross-cultural IB studies rely on quantitative techniques. It is imperative for IB scholars to employ ethnography and other qualitative methodologies to obtain fine-grained, contextual information as to how cross-cultural variations may influence MNE and local firm behavior. Thus, we put forth the following two broad future research questions:

Cluster 2: Emerging Economies

The studies in this cluster primarily deal with the topics related to the emerging economies, specifically focusing on the rapid internationalization of emerging market firms (EMFs) (Jormanainen & Koveshnikov, 2012). Table 4 presents the cluster summary. The central themes, as expressed in the top keywords in each period, suggested that the authors focused on such topics as the corporate governance, strategy, and operations in the institutional environment of emerging economies and markets. Other factors influencing the strategy have been examined. These included the study of political ties and liability of foreignness issues of MNEs. Many keywords between this and cluster 1 were similar, but one must appreciate the fact that some topics, such as FDI and the institutional context of China, have been studies from different vantage points. For instance, while in cluster 1, such topics were studied with regards to culture, this cluster focuses more on the institutional context of emerging economies. This is in line with the rising prominence of the institution-based view as one of the important paradigms in IB literature (Lahiri et al., 2020; Peng et al., 2008). As for the most-cited articles in this cluster, the focus was on topics such as corporate social responsibility in emerging markets (Fortanier et al., 2011; Li et al., 2010), internationalization and (Jormanainen & Koveshnikov, 2012), outward FDI by EMFs (Buckley et al., 2008), and entrepreneurial strategies in an emerging market context (Tracey & Phillips, 2011).

The period-wise theme analysis suggested that the MIR authors between 2006 and 2010 focused more on the institutional context of emerging markets. These included the CSR issues in emerging markets and EMF internationalization. Other key topics included brand positioning and anti-counterfeit measures (Yang & Fryxell, 2009), response of MNEs to the low-cost imports in their home countries (Kaufmann & Körte, 2010), and trade disputes (Lindeque & McGuire, 2007). The research conducted during this time focused on the perspective of emerging markets and emerging market MNEs (EMNEs), rather than the developed market firms doing business in and with them.

The major keywords between years 2011 and 2015 suggest that the focus of the MIR authors remained on the strategic choices of emerging markets in the institutional context, with a focus on emerging economies, such as India and China. The subject of entrepreneurship in emerging markets (Tracey & Phillips, 2011) gained significance during this time, with topics such as knowledge sharing (Kedia et al., 2012), acquisitions (Rabbiosi et al., 2012), and other strategic choices made by EMFs.

The themes in this cluster were further developed during 2016 and 2020, with MIR authors focusing on topics such as location choices for plants (Jain et al., 2016). Authors also focused on topics related to political connections (Banerjee & Venaik, 2018; Liedong & Frynas, 2018), corruption (Jiménez et al., 2017), and political risk (Han et al., 2018). As IB research continues to examine contextual heterogeneity among emerging economies (Pattnaik et al., 2020; Scalera et al., 2020) and EMF internationalization issues (Kumar et al., 2020; Mukherjee et al., 2021; Nuruzzaman et al., 2020), future scholars may focus their attention on the following two broad directions:

What are the idiosyncratic aspects of EMFs and emerging economies and how do such factors affect MNE theorization?

What are the sources of cross and within-country variations in emerging economies?

Cluster 3: Innovation, Knowledge Transfer, and Absorptive Capacity

This cluster comprised 84 articles that had been cited 2596 times. Table 5 presents the cluster summary. The cluster’s central theme revolved around the topic of MNE knowledge transfer and the related outcomes. The cluster’s keywords indicated a focus on the topics related to the knowledge transfer, globalization, Penrosian theory on growth of firms, absorptive capacity, entrepreneurial orientation, and innovation. The keywords also suggested a focus on the institutional context of India. The cluster’s most-cited articles focused on topics such as MNE knowledge management (Fu et al., 2006; Minbaeva, 2007), dynamic capabilities of MNEs (Augier & Teece, 2007), subsidiary performance (Ambos & Birkinshaw, 2010), and the state of IB research (Rugman et al., 2011).

The temporal analysis shows that, between 2006 and 2010, the cluster focused on topics related to knowledge transfer, with knowledge management as a key theme, and globalization. In addition, the firm’s performance was explored through references to topics such as organizational learning (Mu et al., 2007), the role of MNE headquarters (Ambos & Mahnke, 2010), loss of competence due to outsourcing (Kotabe et al., 2008), and international R&D (Criscuolo & Narula, 2007).

These themes were further developed in the next period (2011–2015). The publication in the cluster seems to have decreased, with publications going from 42 between 2006 and 2010 to 27 between 2011 and 2015. The major themes explored during this time remained similar to the previous period, with authors continuing to focus on the topics related to organizational learning (Elango & Pattnaik, 2011), overseas R&D (D’Agostino & Santangelo, 2012), knowledge transfer processes (Nair et al., 2015; Najafi-Tavani et al., 2012; Perez-Nordtvedt et al., 2015), procedural justice (Verbeke et al., 2013), and other topics related to the management of firms in foreign markets. These topics, much like in the previous period, were studied with reference to their effects on firm performance.

During the latest period (2016–2020), the publications in this cluster reduced further to 15. Similar to the previous periods, the focus remained on the knowledge transfer (Ferreras-Méndez et al., 2019; Lind et al., 2017), absorptive capacity (Zeng et al., 2019), and R&D (Jha et al., 2018). Interestingly, the intellectual movement surrounding innovation and knowledge transfer shifted toward examining these concepts in the context of global value chains (GVCs), where a plethora of firms are interconnected and give rise to an ecosystem (Sinkovics et al., 2019; Soontornthum et al., 2020). This trend is also evident in the recent findings related to knowledge connectivity issues in GVCs and new age firms in other journals (Ambos et al., 2021; Mudambi et al., 2017). Thus, the aforementioned topics pave the way for future studies that may explore the following:

How does internalization theory explain the knowledge transfer process in new age firms?

Cluster 4: Firm Internationalization Process

The cluster’s central theme was the firm–internationalization process. Table 6 presents the cluster summary. The most frequent keywords appearing in this cluster’s articles primarily focused on the internationalization process, with exploration of such topics as international entrepreneurship, born global phenomenon, and the role of networks in internationalization. The cluster’s most-cited articles focused on topics related to the Uppsala internationalization process model (Johanson & Vahlne, 2006), risk and uncertainty in international entrepreneurship (Liesch et al., 2011), global factories (Buckley, 2011), networking in internationalization of SMEs (Galkina & Chetty, 2015), and the role of psychic distance in SME internationalization (Child et al., 2009).

As per the cluster’s temporal analysis, the central focus of authors in this cluster between 2006 and 2010 was on the topics related to the internationalization process and service. The focal point of this cluster’s MIR authors focused on the internationalization process from the perspective of the Uppsala internationalization process model (Johanson & Vahlne, 2006), psychic distance and its role in SME decision-making (Child et al., 2009), the relationship between social ties and entry modes in foreign markets (Zhao & Hsu, 2007), and service internationalization (Ball et al., 2008).

The coverage of topics somewhat increased during the next period (2011–2015), with authors focusing more on international entrepreneurship. MIR authors under this cluster focused on topics related to the risk and uncertainty in internationalization and international entrepreneurship (Liesch et al., 2011), coordination and integration of global factories (Buckley, 2011), networking practices of SMEs during internationalization (Galkina & Chetty, 2015), born global firms (Hagen & Zucchella, 2014; Nummela et al., 2014), and role of international experience in choice of establishment modes (Dow & Larimo, 2011). With the development of themes established during the previous period, the authors also focused on the topic of internationalization of new ventures and born global firms.

During the latest period (2016–2020), the MIR authors further developed the themes from the previous period. This is indicated by the focus on the relationship between internationalization speed and firm performance (Hilmersson & Johanson, 2016; Mohr & Batsakis, 2017) and, more recently, the learnings in SME internationalization (Lee et al., 2020a, 2020b) and the role of social identity in the internationalization of family firms (Mondal et al., 2021; Wei et al., 2020). Topics related to family firms (Arregle et al., 2021; Casprini et al., 2020; Xu et al., 2020), SME internationalization (Lahiri et al., 2020), and ownership issues (Scalera et al., 2020) also became predominant in other IB journals. As businesses rely more on digital technologies and are connected via digital platforms (Kim & Cavusgil, 2020; Makarius et al., 2020), it will be important to examine the extant internationalization theories in light of this new reality. Similarly, researchers are examining the managerial level attributes that impact firm internationalization process (Contractor et al., 2019; Kumar et al., 2021; Vahlne & Johanson, 2020). Thus, the potential future directions for this cluster could be as follows:

Cluster 5: Culture and Foreign Entry Modes

The cluster’s central theme was the foreign entry modes in relation to the culture. Table 7 presents the cluster summary. The most frequent keywords in the cluster suggested that the authors studied entry modes and their relationships with cultural distance. Along with this topic, joint ventures and ownership strategies have been discussed, as well as labor cost. The most-cited studies in this cluster focused on the factors driving the choice of entry (Demirbag et al., 2008), foreign market entry through acquisition (Ragozzino, 2009), multilevel methods of international entry (Arregle et al., 2006), and the concept of cultural distance (Harzing & Pudelko, 2016; Wang & Schaan, 2008).

The temporal analysis of this cluster revealed that, between 2006 and 2010, the cluster focused on themes related to entry modes, with focus on cultural distance and ownership strategies. The institutional context of Turkey gained prominence during this time. The choice of entry modes have been studied with special focus on acquisition (Demirbag et al., 2008; Ragozzino, 2009). In addition, international joint ventures gained attention (Burgers & Padgett, 2009), as did foreign subsidiaries and their performances (Dhanaraj & Beamish, 2009).

During the next time period (2011–2015), the themes were further developed. The keywords during this period suggested that the authors continued to focus on the concepts of cultural distance. In addition, authors explored the joint venture exit strategies (Nemeth & Nippa, 2013), exit strategy during times of financial crisis (Chung et al., 2013), divestment of subsidiaries (Song, 2014), and institutional barriers to international acquisitions (Moschieri et al., 2014).

During the latest period (2016–2020), the most prominent themes in the cluster still revolved around the entry modes with attention to join ventures. Cultural distance remained a central concept during this time (Harzing & Pudelko, 2016) along with exit strategies. At the same time, the concept of added cultural distance has become more prominent in the broader IB domain (Kim et al., 2020). Also, the more recent articles in this cluster pointed to the topic of control of FDI by family firms (Del Bosco & Bettinelli, 2020) which is in line with the emerging trends in the IB field (Mariotti et al., 2021). These pointed toward the following research directions:

Cluster 6: Internationalization and Performance

The cluster’s central theme revolved around internationalization strategy and form performance. Though the subject has been studied in various other contexts, the focus here was on strategic decision-making regarding internationalization, specifically on topics of geographical diversification, multinationality, and degree of internationalization. The most-cited articles in this cluster focused on topics such as multinationality (Hennart, 2007), internationalization and form performance relationship (Bausch & Krist, 2007; Ruigrok et al., 2007), transaction cost perspective (Contractor, 2007), and strategies of service MNEs (Rugman & Verbeke, 2008). The cluster summary is presented in Table 8.

The major keywords in each of the three periods suggested that the MIR authors focused on the topic of internationalization and performance at different times. Between 2006 and 2010, the articles generally focused on topics related to the firm’s performance, its relationship to a firm’s internationalization and multinationality, the country of origin (Elango & Sethi, 2007), services outsourcing (Contractor & Mudambi, 2008), corporate diversification (Singh et al., 2010), and technological competence (Tihanyi et al., 2009). These have been studied with regards to their impact on internationalization and performance relationship.

Between 2011 and 2015, the themes of the previous period were developed further. During these times, the authors focused on the international diversification (Gaur & Delios, 2015; Majocchi & Strange, 2012), family management (Tsao & Lien, 2013), and global orientation (Cerrato & Piva, 2015). The studied topics remained connected to the central theme of internationalization and performance.

Between 2016 and 2020, the topics were further developed with the addition of the board’s co-working experience, the board’s influence on the director’s decision-making (Chen et al., 2017), home country political connection (Bai et al., 2019), and more recently, the degree of internationalization in service MNEs (Wei & Nguyen, 2020). The more recent themes have the potential for further development, with authors focusing on topics that examine boundary conditions of the internationalization and performance relationship and factors affecting the performance of service MNEs. Accordingly, the two broad research directions are as follows:

What are the boundary conditions affecting the internationalization–firm performance relationship?

Drivers of MIR Article Citations

As a scholar’s growth depends on publication in high-quality journals (Guffey & Harp, 2014) and such quality rankings often depend on citations (Mingers & Yang, 2017), exploration of the factors that drive citations of any journal is interesting. To determine the impact drivers of MIR articles, we used negative binomial regression. The model is suitable for studies when the dependent variable is a count variable that includes zeroes and is over-dispersed (Stremersch et al., 2007; Valtakoski, 2019). We based the choice of independent variables on previous literature (Chan et al., 2009; Dang & Li, 2020; Rosenzweig et al., 2016; Schwert, 1993; Stremersch et al., 2007; Valtakoski, 2019). We based our theoretical framework on that of Stremersch et al. (2007) and Meyer et al. (2018), drawing from theoretical perspectives of universalism, social constructivism, and presentation. Table 9 presents the variables in the model, as well as their definitions.

Table 9

Descriptive statistics

	Description	Min	Max	Mean	Std. dev
Dependent variable
Number of Citations	Number of citations received by the article	0	337	28.01	35.25
Independent variable
Age	Number of years between articles publication years and 2020	1	15	8.1	4.311
Demeaned age squared	The square of the difference between article’s age and mean of article age	0.01	50.20	18.55	16.47
Single country	Dummy variable takes value ‘1’ if article focused on single country, otherwise ‘0’	0	1	0.55	0.498
Multi country	Dummy variable takes value ‘1’ if article focused on more than one country, otherwise ‘0’	0	1	0.27	0.445
Service	Dummy variable takes value ‘1’ if article focused on service industry, otherwise ‘0’	0	1	0.11	0.311
Manufacturing	Dummy variable takes value ‘1’ if article focused manufacturing industry, otherwise ‘0’	0	1	0.19	0.393
Both	Dummy variable takes value ‘1’ if article focused on both services and manufacturing, otherwise ‘0’	0	1	0.5	0.5
Method	Categorical variable takes value ‘1’ for conceptual and review (conceptual, literature review and analytical articles), ‘0’ for empirical and ‘0.5’ for combination of both	0	1	0.2	0.399
Design	Categorical Variable takes value ‘1’ for qualitative articles, 0.5 for mixed research design and ‘0’ for quantitative	0	1	0.127	0.3266
Case study	Dummy variable takes value ‘1’ if article’s data source is case study, otherwise ‘0’	0	1	0.07	0.258
Interview	Dummy variable takes value ‘1’ if article’s data source is interview, otherwise ‘0’	0	1	0.09	0.289
Archival	Dummy variable takes value ‘1’ if article’s data source is archival, otherwise ‘0’	0	1	0.61	0.489
Survey	Dummy variable takes value ‘1’ if article’s data source is survey, otherwise ‘0’	0	1	0.31	0.462
Experiment	Dummy variable takes value ‘1’ if article’s data source is Experiment, otherwise ‘0’	0	1	0.01	0.09
Article length	Number of pages in the article	1	45	25.89	6.35
SI paper	Dummy variable takes value ‘1’ if article was published in a special issue, otherwise ‘0’	0	1	0.11	0.313
Paper order	Number at which articles appears in the issue it was published in	1	9	3.39	1.733
Lead paper	Dummy variable takes value ‘1’ if article appears first in the issue, otherwise ‘0’	0	1	0.18	0.388
Number of authors	Number of authors involved in the study	1	11	2.49	1.071
Number of references	Number of literature references in the article	22	1122	86.57	57.644
US author	Dummy variable takes value ‘1’ if at least one author is from US, otherwise ‘0’	0	1	0.32	0.468
Europe author	Dummy variable takes value ‘1’ if at least one author is from Europe, otherwise ‘0’	0	1	0.55	0.498
Asia Pacific	Dummy variable takes value ‘1’ if at least one author is from Asia Pacific, otherwise ‘0’	0	1	0.33	0.47
FT 100	Dummy variable takes value ‘1’ if at least one author is from FT100 institution, otherwise ‘0’	0	1	0.27	0.444
Title length	Number of words in the article’s title	3	25	12.33	3.849
Number of keywords	Number of keywords specified by authors	0	12	4.85	1.585
Abstract length	Number of words in the article’s abstract	44	291	149.76	44.293

Variable Definitions

Dependent Variable

As a measure of article impact, this study considered the number of citations received by an article. Citations are a common measure of article impact (Meyer et al., 2018; Stremersch et al., 2007; Valtakoski, 2019). Citations are recognized as an objective measure of an article’s impact (Hota et al., 2019). In the context of this study, citations served as a suitable measure of an article’s impact.

Control Variables

Researchers have consistently found “article age” to be a driver of citations in previous studies (e.g., Baker et al., 2020). Scholars have also noted that this article may not be linear (Stremersch et al., 2007). Therefore, we included the demeaned age squared variable, which is the square of the difference between an article’s age and the average of all citations (Meyer et al., 2018).

Independent Variables

According to universalism, an article’s impact is dependent upon its content (Meyer et al., 2018), including an article’s domain (e.g., regional focus and methodology) and quality. Under this perspective, the variables such as regional focus of the study, methodological choices, are operationalized as method, design, and data sources (e.g., case studies, interviews, archives, surveys, and experiments). For other variables indicative of content, we take into account the article length (indicative of the content amount) and special issues (indicative of an article having novel content). For operationalizing quality, we used paper order and lead article variables as indicative of an article’s quality.

According to social constructivism, an article’s impact is dependent upon the authors who are involved in writing the article (Meyer et al., 2018). According to this perspective, the major driver of citations is the authors’ social and intellectual connectivity. We used variables such as number of authors (indicative of social connectivity), number of references (indicative of intellectual connectivity), and author’s affiliation (US affiliation and affiliation with top institution).

According to the presentation perspective, an article’s impact is determined by the manner in which it is presented (Stremersch et al., 2007; Dontu et al., 2021c). Here, the focus as a citation driver is an article’s expositional clarity and its attractiveness to prospective citing authors. Accordingly, we used title length (indicative of articles attractiveness to prospective citing authors), abstract length, and number of keywords (indicative of its expositional clarity) as key variables.

Regression Analysis

Table 10 shows the correlation among the variables in our model. Because the relationships are too numerous, we focused only on the correlation of different independent variables with the dependent variable. We found that age had a positive correlation with total citations, which we expected because the older articles had more time to get cited. However, the relationship may not be linear (Baker et al., 2020), and the results of regression may be able to shed more light on it. Among the “universalist” variables, single-country focus had a negative correlation with citations, but “methods” had a positive correlation. Interviews and surveys had a negative correlation, but archival data had a positive correlation. Furthermore, article length had negative correlation. Among the social constructivist variables, the number of references and the author’s affiliation to Asia–Pacific countries had a negative correlation, but the affiliation to European countries had a positive correlation. Among the presentation variables, title length, number of keywords, and abstract length had a negative correlation.

Table 10

Correlations results of citations model

S No.	Variables	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10
1	Number of citations	1.000
2	Age	0.451***	1.000
3	Demeaned age squared	− 0.021	− 0.043	1
4	Single country	− 0.127***	− 0.075*	0.102**	1.000
5	Multi country	0.032	0.003	− 0.138***	− 0.668***	1.000
6	Service	− 0.033	− 0.098**	0.083*	0.067	− 0.005	1.000
7	Manufacturing	− 0.039	0.017	0.045	0.222***	− 0.049	− 0.168***	1.000
8	Both (service + manufacturing)	− 0.062	− 0.022	− 0.047	0.158***	0.157***	− 0.344***	− 0.478***	1.000
9	Method	0.158***	0.117***	0.065	− 0.486***	− 0.167***	− 0.059	− 0.241***	− 0.311***	1.000
10	Research design	0.010	0.015	0.019	0.021	0.031	0.097**	0.044	− 0.065	− 0.084*	1.000
11	Case study	0.009	− 0.022	− 0.014	0.094**	− 0.009	0.133***	0.169***	− 0.132***	− 0.099**	0.585***
12	Interview	− 0.078*	− 0.058	0.062	0.119***	− 0.019	0.049	0.008	0.052	− 0.140***	0.581***
13	Archival	0.089**	0.058	− 0.014	− 0.232***	− 0.026	− 0.110**	− 0.090**	− 0.062	0.350***	− 0.289***
14	Survey	− 0.076*	− 0.021	− 0.007	0.218***	0.031	0.024	0.072	0.126***	− 0.322***	− 0.245***
15	Experiment	− 0.035	− 0.075*	0.061	− 0.008	0.047	− 0.032	− 0.044	− 0.044	− 0.045	− 0.035
16	Article length	− 0.144***	− 0.398***	0.068	0.044	0.063	− 0.010	0.025	0.083*	− 0.171***	0.016
17	SI paper	− 0.027	− 0.191***	0.015	0.085*	− 0.053	0.108**	− 0.054	0.004	0.004	0.163***
18	Paper order	− 0.017	0.065	− 0.029	0.031	0.025	0.091**	0.025	− 0.059	− 0.090**	0.047
19	Lead paper	− 0.058	− 0.061	0.017	− 0.054	− 0.028	− 0.080*	− 0.027	0.057	0.093**	− 0.03
20	Number of authors	− 0.012	− 0.087*	− 0.012	− 0.006	0.037	0.000	0.016	− 0.02	− 0.062	− 0.055
21	Number of references	− 0.085*	− 0.29***	0.040	0.060	− 0.043	− 0.012	0.09**	− 0.036	− 0.049	− 0.072
22	US author	− 0.038	0.043	− 0.003	− 0.028	0.031	− 0.043	0.056	− 0.019	− 0.017	− 0.113**
23	Europe author	0.076*	− 0.128***	0.004	− 0.09**	0.088**	0.115***	− 0.087*	− 0.026	0.040	0.022
24	Asia Pacific	− 0.094**	− 0.073	0.009	0.193***	− 0.162***	0.037	0.028	− 0.032	− 0.11**	0.029
25	FT 100	0.036	0.030	− 0.077*	− 0.088**	0.103**	− 0.020	− 0.096**	0.066	0.005	0.017
26	Title length	− 0.130***	− 0.148***	0.099**	0.063	− 0.002	0.023	0.051	0.017	− 0.082*	− 0.009
27	Number of keywords	− 0.126***	− 0.283***	− 0.251***	0.020	0.021	0.021	0.001	− 0.007	− 0.087*	0.020
28	Abstract length	− 0.188***	− 0.448***	− 0.203***	0.031	0.034	0.034	0.015	0.003	− 0.096**	0.092**

*, **, and ***Indicate statistical significance at the 0.1, 0.05 and 0.01 levels

Table 11 presents the results of the negative binomial regression. The results of negative binomial regression suggest that the methodology-related variables might not play a role in driving citations. However, the citations were driven by the publication in a special issue, indicating that articles having focused and timely topics may receive more citations. Furthermore, European authors positively drove citations, indicating that the authors from this region may bring in more citations.

Table 11

Regression results

	Model: Negative binomial regression dependent variables: TC		Model: Linear regression dependent variables: C/Y		VIF
Parameter	B	Std. error	B	Std. error
(Intercept)	1.261	(0.532)**	74.110	(14.697)***	–
Age	0.197	(0.014)***	–	–	1.681
Demeaned age squared	− 0.018	(0.003)***	–	–	1.067
Single country	0.096	(0.263)	2.767	(8.536)	7.661
Multi country	0.120	(0.249)	5.457	(8.249)	5.705
Service	− 0.088	(0.249)	-8.845	(7.313)	2.199
Manufacturing	− 0.189	(0.247)	-6.430	(7.162)	3.343
Both	− 0.083	(0.22)	-6.682	(6.271)	4.169
Method	0.309	(0.203)	6.504	(7.002)	3.301
Design	0.303	(0.256)	9.370	(7.785)	2.778
Case study	0.155	(0.288)	5.044	(9.037)	2.296
Interview	− 0.250	(0.223)	− 10.232	(7.268)	1.877
Archival	0.222	(0.184)	6.299	(6.420)	4.182
Survey	0.099	(0.188)	1.417	(6.572)	3.914
Experiment	− 0.233	(0.593)	− 11.456	(18.27)	1.146
Article length	0.008	(0.009)	− 0.394	(0.277)	1.410
SI paper	0.327	(0.163)**	− 1.431	(5.246)	1.182
Paper order	− 0.029	(0.035)	− 1.246	(1.155)	1.699
Lead paper	− 0.031	(0.158)	− 11.031	(5.109)**	1.674
Number of authors	0.018	(0.049)	1.082	(1.532)	1.139
Number of references	0.002	(0.001)	− 0.005	(0.030)	1.257
US author	0.009	(0.123)	− 2.457	(3.993)	1.481
Europe author	0.311	(0.128)**	4.290	(4.109)	1.804
Asia Pacific	− 0.023	(0.124)	− 4.130	(3.997)	1.530
FT 100	0.071	(0.11)	2.842	(3.629)	1.104
Title length	− 0.010	(0.012)	− 0.901	(0.408)**	1.052
Number of keywords	− 0.001	(0.033)	− 1.524	(1.050)	1.208
Abstract length	− 0.001	(0.001)	− 0.119	(0.039)***	1.384
Akaike's information criterion (AIC)	4033.299		R-Squared	0.117***
Bayesian information criterion (BIC)	4150.742
Log likelihood	− 1988.65

*, **, and ***Indicate statistical significance at the 0.1, 0.05 and 0.01 levels

Robustness

We used the second model with “citations per year” to conduct a robustness check on our model. The variance inflation factors (VIF) in the model suggest that it does not suffer from a multicollinearity issue. The r-squared value at 0.117 is comparable to previous research (e.g., Baker et al., 2020; Donthu et al., 2021b). Further, we found the direction of relationships across both models, with the second model showing a significant effect for the lead paper, title length, and abstract length. Their directions remain the same though, indicating that the model is robust.

Comparison of MIR with JIBS, JWB, GSJ, MOR, IBR, JIM, and APJM

Table 12 shows the comparison of MIR with other leading IB journals. We took the list from the list of top IB journals by Tüselmann et al. (2016), with a threshold of a 3 AJG rating. Eight journals presented in the list have an AJG rating of 3 or greater. Here, only JIBS has a 4* rating, while JWB and GSJ are rated 4. This presents a list of journals with which MIR may want to compete in the future. JIBS and JWB, in particular, are the journals that it may want to emulate in terms of future performance. Similar to MIR, both journals are 50 years or older and, thus, present a viable comparison.

Table 12

Comparison of MIR with peers

Journal	Publisher	Age (in 2020)	AJG	ABDC	IF	5YIF	CiteScore	SNIP
Journal of International Business Studies	Palgrave	51	4*	A*	11.382	13.555	14.2	4.02
Journal of World Business	Elsevier	55	4	A*	8.513	9.965	10.8	3.607
Global Strategy Journal	Wiley	10	4	A	7.571	7.451	7.2	1.872
International Business Review	Elsevier	29	3	A	5.915	6.753	8.9	2.35
Asia Pacific Journal of Management	Springer	37	3	A	5.616	6.721	5.4	1.463
Journal of International Management	Elsevier	26	3	A	4.645	5.117	6.1	1.582
Management International Review	Springer	60	3	A	3.721	5.062	4.5	1.535
Management and Organization Review	Cambridge Journals	16	3	A	2.373	3.325	3.6	1.203

Here age refers to the number of years since journal’s publication. IF impact factor, 5YIF 5-year impact factor, ABDC Australian Business Deans Council, AJG rating given to the journal by Chartered Association of Business Schools (CABS) in its Academic Journal Guide 2021

In terms of aims and scope, MIR is similar to JIBS, JWB, and JIM as these journals have a global outreach, while covering topics related to IB and IM that span geographical, cultural, institutional, and organizational boundaries. GSJ, APJM, and MOR are comparatively narrower and more specific in their content. For instance, GSJ focuses primarily on the strategic aspects of IB, which is not surprising as it is published by the Strategic Management Society (their other journal being Strategic Management Journal). APJM, while being closer to MIR in terms of their themes, differs in its regional focus. APJM concentrates primarily on the issues related to the Asia–Pacific region (as its name suggests), while MOR focuses primarily on the regional context of China (and sometimes India). We believe that going forward, JIBS, JWB, and JIM should provide appropriate points of comparison for MIR.

Table 13 presents the period-wise list of keywords in combined corpus of the JIBS, JWB, GSJ, MOR, IBR, JIM, and APJM. The temporal list shows that, between 2006 and 2010, the leading journals focused on the topics related to internationalization, culture, institutions, knowledge transfer, offshoring corporate governance, and entrepreneurship. During this time, the dominant clusters in MIR were clusters 1, 2 and 3, dealing with the subject matter related to culture, emerging economies, innovation, knowledge transfer, and absorptive capacity, which lines up well with what the other journals were doing this time. However, there are topics, such as entrepreneurship, where the journal seems to have followed the field. The China institutional context has been popular in the area.

Table 13

Prominent keywords in JIBS, JWB, GSJ, MOR, IBR, JIM, and APJM

2006–2010			2011–2015			2016–2020
Keywords	TO	TLS	Keywords	TO	TLS	Keywords	TO	TLS
China	123	82	China	144	126	Internationalization	146	192
Foreign direct investment	69	60	Internationalization	75	84	China	146	183
Internationalization	49	46	Foreign direct investment	60	58	Institutional theory	73	114
Performance	47	34	Performance	53	47	Foreign direct investment	71	104
Culture	33	32	Institutional theory	42	49	Emerging markets	65	96
Institutions	32	40	Culture	41	45	Institutions	50	93
Institutional theory	32	32	Corporate governance	36	44	Innovation	50	76
Emerging markets	26	18	Innovation	36	39	Emerging economies	49	77
Trust	24	19	India	35	46	Performance	45	65
International joint ventures	23	30	Emerging markets	34	34	International business	36	35
National culture	23	22	Emerging economies	31	40	Corporate governance	32	43
Innovation	23	15	National culture	31	18	Institutional distance	32	37
Multinational enterprises	22	25	Institutions	30	37	Entrepreneurship	31	53
Emerging economies	22	23	Cultural distance	28	22	Culture	31	23
Globalization	21	13	Entrepreneurship	24	22	Agency theory	30	43
Cultural distance	19	19	Trust	23	18	Organizational learning	29	44
Corporate governance	19	13	Firm performance	23	12	SMEs	27	40
Entrepreneurship	18	17	Knowledge transfer	21	25	Multinational enterprise	27	35
Multinational corporations	18	5	Offshoring	21	21	Corporate social responsibility	27	26
International entrepreneurship	17	10	Agency theory	21	16	Firm performance	27	26
Knowledge	15	16	Absorptive capacity	20	21	MNEs	27	20
Offshoring	15	15	Multinational corporations	40	34	India	26	42
Knowledge transfer	15	9	Resource-based view	18	21	Absorptive capacity	25	37
networks	14	18	Leadership	18	20	Dynamic capabilities	25	27
Multinational enterprise	14	14	Liability of foreignness	17	18	Multinational enterprises	24	36

TO total occurrences, TLS total link strength in the keyword network

Between 2011 and 2015, the leading journals of IB focused on similar topics as before, with greater focus on IB cultural aspects, as indicated by the rise in the occurrence of keywords, such as culture and cultural distance, and the introduction of new keywords, such as liability of foreignness. The focus of MIR during this time kept up with the field in publishing topics related to international entrepreneurship, a topic that was not prominent in the previous period. The focus on the institutional context of China remained consistent during this period.

In the last 5 years (2016–2020), the topics pursued by the leading journals, while largely remaining similar, have focused more on the institutional aspect of IB, as indicated by keywords such as corporate governance and corporate social responsibility (Bhaumik et al., 2019; Jamali et al., 2020). The focus was on the internationalization in new firms and small firms. While the focus of MIR has largely been the same, the topics related to institutional aspects of IB may not have been given much attention. Similarly, the current COVID-19 pandemic has compelled firms worldwide to rethink their strategies at all levels (Donthu & Gustafsson, 2020). This is also reflected in the current call for papers or in published research in the leading IB journals. Thus, it will be important for future MIR scholars to re-examine the core IB issues in the backdrop of the pandemic.

Conclusion

In this study, we used a range of tools, such as coauthorship analysis, bibliographic coupling, and regression analysis, to conduct a comprehensive review of the MIR corpus between 2006 and 2020. We justified the use of these quantitative techniques by the largeness of the journal’s corpus (491 articles). Through these analytical techniques, we presented a MIR retrospective, while providing future directions. To provide a better structure, we divided the analysis into five RQs. The summary of findings for each of the questions is as follows.

RQ1 deals with the collaboration patterns among MIR authors. We find that, at times, the journal’s authors have chosen to collaborate more, with the author teams’ median size increasing consistently. Similarly, the collaboration network at the country level reveals that the network has grown to be more international over time.

RQ2 deals with the methodological choices of MIR authors. In terms of industry focus, we found a shift towards service industries. In terms of geographic focus, Asia seems to be the most popular choice among single-country studies. We found that the authors have chosen to conduct more empirical and quantitative studies. We also found that the archival data sources were the most popular in the journal, with regression and related techniques being the preferred methods of data analysis.

RQ3 deals with the major themes present in the MIR corpus. Using bibliographic coupling, we found that the authors focused on the themes related to “culture”, “emerging economies”, “innovation, knowledge transfer, absorptive capacity”, “internationalization process”, “culture and entry modes”, and “internationalization and performance”. We found that, over time, the journal’s focus has shifted more toward cross-cultural management issues.

RQ4 deals with the drivers of MIR citation. For this purpose, we used a negative binomial regression model and found that, while methodology and industry and regional focus did not have an impact on citation, the publication in a focused or special issue and affiliation to a European institution did have a positive impact on citations. The journal publishes at least two focused or special issues every year and is based in Europe, which may increase its citations.

Finally, RQ5 deals with MIR’s comparison with other leading journals in the field. We found that, while the journal enjoys a great reputation in the scholarly community, it has much room to grow. In this regard, JIBS and JWB can act as obvious benchmarks for the journal to reach in the future. In terms of themes, we found that the journal’s themes are largely in line with other leading journals in the field.

In sum, we attempted to present a retrospective of MIR on the occasion of its 60th anniversary. There was a limit on the availability of bibliographic data. As the data present on Scopus covers only approximately 15 years of the journal, we were only able to cover these years in the study. Second, there was a limitation at the source, and the errors at the source of data can affect the outcomes of the study. The comprehensive databases are not built specifically for bibliometric analysis and, therefore, may contain errors that might affect the study. Nevertheless, the contributions easily outweigh the limitations. Our analysis contributes to the scholarship in multiple ways. First, we carried out a performance analysis of the journal, which could help the editorial team to track the journal productivity. A mapping analysis of the journal’s performance may help the editorial team to discover ideas for the journal’s further intellectual evolution. The study of methodologies and theories used in journal articles may help the editorial board diversify the issues on which they publish contributions. The authorship analysis showed that the journal has expanded toward greater collaboration. Moreover, the contribution lies in analyzing central themes and the journal’s development in terms of the research topics covered. As MIR is one of the leading journals in its domain, these results may apply to the entire field, and future researchers may explore the broad research directions we provided.