Do social ties foster firms’ environmental innovation? The moderating effect of resource bricolage

While social ties are central to the field of innovation, the research on the relationship between social ties and environmental innovation is lacking. Based on the resource-based view and social network theory, we construct a research model for identifying the relationships between social ties, resource bricolage, and environmental innovation; we use this to examine the impacts of business, political, and research and development (R&D) ties on firms’ levels of radical and incremental eco-innovation, as well as the moderating role of resource bricolage. Multiple regression analysis using survey data from 289 Chinese manufacturing firms is conducted. The results show that political and R&D ties can effectively promote radical eco-innovation, while business and political ties promote incremental eco-innovation. Furthermore, resource bricolage plays a positive moderating role in the relationships between firms’ political ties and environmental innovation. These conclusions have certain implications for firms, offering useful insight on how to take full advantage of social ties to acquire various resources and harness resource bricolage strategies to support environmental innovation.