This paper contributes to theory building efforts around the concept of knowledge connectivity and its relevance in buyer-supplier relationships in global value chains. We use the Pakistani IT industry as our study context. Pakistan suffered a significant adverse perception bias following terror attacks in 2008-09. We based our illustration on the experiences of 12 Pakistani offshore service providers (OSPs) who succeeded in offsetting the negative implications of the country’s adverse political environment. The case firms link into two distinct value chain configurations. In each configuration, we observe a distinct course of strategic action, which we term step-up and break-out, respectively. While these observations emerged from the Pakistani context, the implications of the resulting dynamic framework for theory and practice go beyond this particular adverse country setting.

中文翻译：

---

逆境中的知识连通性：全球价值链和巴基斯坦离岸服务提供商

本文为围绕知识连通性概念及其在全球价值链中的买者-供应商关系中的相关性的理论构建做出了贡献。我们使用巴基斯坦的IT行业作为研究背景。在2008-09年恐怖袭击之后，巴基斯坦遭受了严重的不良认知偏见。我们以12个巴基斯坦离岸服务提供商（OSP）的经验为基础进行了说明，这些经验丰富地抵消了该国不利政治环境的负面影响。案例公司链接到两个不同的价值链配置。在每种配置中，我们观察到战略行动的不同过程，分别称为逐步推进和突围。这些意见是从巴基斯坦的背景中得出的，