Sustaining Safe Harbors: The Mediating Roles of SARC and Safety Culture in the Relationship Between OHSMS and Safety Performance in the Port Industry: A Case of Korea

The sustainability of global maritime supply chains ultimately depends on the safety of frontline port workers, yet high-risk, multi-stakeholder port operations continue to face persistent occupational hazards that threaten this goal. Occupational Health and Safety Management Systems (OHSMS) serve as a core governance tool for sustainable safety management, but their effectiveness depends not on formal existence alone, but on workers’ cognitive recognition and cultural internalization, particularly under South Korea’s Serious Accidents Punishment Act. This study examined how OHSMS perception is related to safety performance (SP) among port workers, testing the parallel and serial mediating roles of Serious Accident Response Capability (SARC) and Safety Culture (SC) as pathways toward socially sustainable safety outcomes. Cross-sectional survey data from 432 South Korean port workers were analyzed using structural equation modeling. OHSMS perception was positively associated with both SARC and SC, and SC showed the strongest direct association with SP. In the main model, the direct paths from OHSMS and SARC to SP were non-significant, consistent with indirect-only mediation through SC, and the serial pathway (OHSMS → SARC → SC → SP) was significant; however, the SARC → SP path became significant in a common method sensitivity analysis. These cross-sectional results represent associations rather than causal effects. The findings suggest that safety performance in the port sector is associated less with formal regulatory compliance alone than with the internalization of safety practices in a shared safety culture, which is relevant to United Nations Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 8 (Decent Work and Economic Growth) and SDG 3 (Good Health and Well-Being).