| name | jim-literature-positioning |
| description | Use when locating a Journal of International Marketing (JIM) manuscript inside the international marketing literature — mapping the conversation, building the positioning table, and pre-empting the "incremental extension" verdict. It positions the claim; jim-contribution-framing writes the payoff. |
Literature Positioning (jim-literature-positioning)
When to trigger
- The front end lists citations but does not name the conversation being advanced
- A reviewer could plausibly write "this is Cavusgil and Zou with newer data"
- The related-work section reads as an undergraduate survey of international marketing
- Coauthors disagree about which literature the paper primarily speaks to
Name the conversation, then the vacancy
A JIM front end must do two things in order: identify the specific stream within international marketing the paper joins, and show the vacancy in that stream the paper fills. Streams have recognizable anchors — use them:
- Export marketing & performance: the strategy–performance tradition since Cavusgil and Zou (1994, JM) and the performance-measurement discipline of Katsikeas, Leonidou, and Morgan (2000, JAMS); capability extensions in Morgan, Katsikeas, and Vorhies (2012, JAMS).
- Global marketing strategy: the standardization–adaptation debate consolidated by Zou and Cavusgil's (2002, JM) GMS framework.
- Global branding & country image: perceived brand globalness (Steenkamp, Batra, and Alden 2003, JIBS), global–local brand tension (Özsomer 2012, JIM), local vs. nonlocal origin (Batra et al. 2000, JCP).
- Cross-cultural consumer behavior: values-based segmentation, ethnocentrism/animosity, and the methodological spine of Steenkamp and Baumgartner (1998, JCR) on measurement invariance.
- International entrepreneurship: born globals (Knight and Cavusgil 2004, JIBS).
- Emerging markets: the rethink agenda opened by Sheth (2011, JM).
The vacancy must be a live gap: something the stream's recent papers explicitly flag, disagree about, or systematically fail to test — not merely "no one has studied Z in country Y."
Build the positioning table early
Draft the comparison table before writing the front end; it disciplines every claim.
| Column | Content | JIM-specific note |
|---|
| Study | 5–8 closest papers | at least 2–3 from JIM itself — show you know the house conversation |
| Theory lens | cultural / institutional / distance / GCC | reveals whether your lens is genuinely new |
| Countries & design | N countries, matched?, invariance tested? | the column where many rivals quietly fail |
| Level of analysis | consumer / firm / dyad / country | exposes cross-level gaps |
| Key finding | one line each | sets up the disagreement or silence you resolve |
| This paper | the differentiated row | must differ on ≥2 columns, one of them theoretical |
If your row differs only in the "Countries" column, the paper is a context extension — stop and return to jim-theory-development.
Three positioning moves that work at JIM
- Resolve a cross-national inconsistency. Show that published effects disagree across studies run in different countries, and offer the theorized moderator that reconciles them.
- Upgrade an assumed-universal mechanism. Take a mechanism the domestic literature treats as universal, show theoretically why it should be culture- or institution-bound, and test the boundary.
- Theorize a new cross-border phenomenon. Digital-era phenomena (cross-border platforms, global influencer endorsement, AI-mediated localization) that the canon predates — anchor them to the closest classic stream rather than claiming a literature-free novelty.
Placement discipline in the manuscript
JIM papers carry positioning in the introduction (the conversation, the vacancy, the answer — within the first two pages) and a compact theoretical background section; there is no separate "literature review" chapter. Every cited work must earn its place by shaping a hypothesis or a design choice. With a 50-page all-inclusive cap, a bloated front end is paid for with amputated robustness sections later.
Checklist
Anti-patterns
- "To the best of our knowledge, no study has examined X in country Y" — the vacancy JIM does not accept
- Positioning against the domestic marketing literature only, as if international work did not exist
- A wall of citations with no stated disagreement, silence, or inconsistency to resolve
- Misattributing canon papers (wrong venue or wrong claim) — reviewers in this field know these papers cold
- Claiming novelty over a stream while omitting the JIM papers already inside it
- Differentiating purely on sample geography
Output format
【Stream】named conversation + 2–3 anchor citations (venue-checked)
【Vacancy】the live gap: inconsistency / untested boundary / new phenomenon
【Positioning move】reconcile / upgrade universal mechanism / theorize new phenomenon
【Table status】this-paper row differs on: [columns]
【JIM engagement】recent JIM papers substantively engaged: [list]
【Next skill】jim-methods
