Partnering in a fractured world: how political awareness and activism shape international business choices

This study examines how international political awareness (IPA) shapes international partner selection (IPS) in an increasingly fractured global economy. Specifically, it investigates the roles of geopolitical knowledge and political and trade activism in translating firms' political awareness into legitimacy-sensitive international partner choices. Drawing on institutional theory and the resource-based view, the study conceptualizes IPA as a dynamic political capability distinct from existing constructs such as political risk management and nonmarket strategy. Survey data were collected from 714 export–import firms operating in Malaysia, Thailand, India, and Bangladesh. The results show that IPA has a strong and positive association with IPS across all country contexts. Geopolitical knowledge mediates the IPA–IPS relationship, indicating that political awareness becomes strategically consequential when firms possess interpretive depth regarding geopolitical disruptions. Political and trade activism further moderates this relationship in India and Bangladesh, where activism pressures are more intense, but not in Malaysia and Thailand—a divergence attributable to differences in institutional maturity, global value chain exposure, and the salience of informal governance mechanisms. This study advances international business research by offering an integrative framework that links political capabilities, geopolitical knowledge, and activism to explain partner selection under conditions of geopolitical fragmentation.