In this paper, we broaden the conceptualization of institutions beyond the nation-state and develop the concept of an institutional triality that represents two national institutional environments and the supranational level. While much of international business (IB) research has focused on national institutions and the differences between them, little attention and theorizing has been dedicated to the supranational institutions that form an integral part of the global institutional ecosystem. First, we conduct an interdisciplinary bibliometric survey on supranational institutions and a qualitative review of the central publications. Second, we initiate theory building and conceptualize supranational institutions from an IB point of view, distinguish them from related IB concepts, and discuss the conceptual properties of supranational institutions that are most relevant for MNCs. Building on these distinctions and properties, we provide a conceptual framework for understanding supranational institutions in the institutional triality. Third, we provide avenues for IB research building on the delineations, the conceptual properties, and the conceptual framework.

在本文中，我们将制度的概念化扩展到民族国家之外，并发展了代表两个国家制度环境和超国家层面的制度试验的概念。虽然大部分国际商业 (IB) 研究都集中在国家机构及其之间的差异上，但很少关注和理论化构成全球机构生态系统不可或缺的超国家机构。首先，我们对超国家机构进行跨学科文献计量调查，并对中央出版物进行定性审查。其次，我们从 IB 的角度启动理论构建和概念化超国家机构，将它们与相关的 IB 概念区分开来，并讨论与跨国公司最相关的超国家机构的概念属性。基于这些区别和属性，我们提供了一个概念框架来理解机构试验中的超国家机构。第三，我们为基于描述、概念属性和概念框架的 IB 研究提供了途径。