To achieve effective stakeholder governance in the context of international social accountability certification (SA8000) requires constructing a network of agreement. In a case study of a small-to-medium-sized enterprise (SME), we examine managers’ attempts at enrolling participants in the supply chain to investigate how they strive to engage these stakeholders. We adopt actor-network theory (ANT) and sensemaking theory to develop a novel approach to understanding social accountability (SA) standards’ certification in stakeholder networks. We argue that the design and operation of any SA standard across a network requires not only attempts at enrolling other participants in the supply chain but management contextualizing and problematizing the terms of their involvement.

为了在国际社会责任认证（SA8000）的背景下实现有效的利益相关者治理，需要构建一个协议网络。在对一家中小型企业 (SME) 的案例研究中，我们检查了管理者在招募供应链参与者方面的尝试，以调查他们如何努力吸引这些利益相关者。我们采用参与者网络理论 (ANT) 和意义建构理论来开发一种新方法来理解利益相关者网络中的社会责任 (SA) 标准认证。我们认为，跨网络的任何 SA 标准的设计和操作不仅需要尝试在供应链中招募其他参与者，还需要管理层将他们参与的条款背景化和问题化。