Navigating resilience in international business: organizational mechanisms, partners and ecosystems from a Central and Eastern European perspective

Resilience in international business is increasingly shaped by what happens within organizations, not only by shocks and public policy (Hillmann – Guenther 2021). For firms in and around Central and Eastern Europe (CEE), overlapping crises in the post-COVID period, the war in Ukraine, geopolitical tensions, and the accelerating digital and green transitions test their capacity to adapt. In this setting, governance, coordination, and innovation practices within firms have become central levers for implementing strategy and securing survival. This guest editorial introduces a special section that brings together four articles selected from contributions to the 10th anniversary AIB CEE Chapter Conference, held in Budapest between 18 and 21 September 2024. The papers form a thematic collection on organizational mechanisms, key international partners, and innovation ecosystems in international business. One of the four articles, on cooperative governance (Amon 2025), was published in Issue 4, Volume 47 of this journal due to a change in the journal’s publisher, but it is part of the same thematic set and is treated as such here.