Interaction of home and host countries' institutional conditions: An analysis of greenfield projects by Latin American firms

Studying firms from emerging economies has been receiving more attention in recent decades. However, the host- and home-country perspectives have allowed understanding, to a significant extent, of the firms' expansion abroad. We argue the necessity of investigating the interaction of home and host-country institutional conditions to advance the understanding of the internationalization strategies of firms from emerging economies. Employing a sample of 1387 firms from 17 Latin American countries, we examine how their operations expanded from 2003 to 2019 by undertaking 2636 cross-border greenfield projects in 94 host countries. Results indicate that the interaction of home and host countries' weak institutional conditions drives the decision-making process for the internationalization of Latin American firms.