Globalisation, De-Globalisation, the Combination, and the Future of Value Chains

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Please see the detailed comments below:

• In the literature review section, consider adding a table that compares previous publications with your work to highlight your contributions. To enhance transparency, the table could include studies, main questions/objectives, methodologies, case studies, etc.
• The manuscript contains some grammatical, formatting, and writing errors, e.g., line 61, line 53, line 59, etc., and careful proofreading is necessary.
• The measurement of variables needs to be described more clearly, what are these five variables, four variables, and six variables, please explain it.
• There is missing information on the initial data collection, e.g., The study’s design is a cross-sectional survey of 277 employees from manufacturing 236 companies in Nigeria, and only using one sentence is too general. What is the survey content?
• “The study examined 7 hypotheses.” What are they? Please list these 7 hypotheses in the manuscript.
• Theoretical contributions and practical contributions need to be discussed more deeply concerning the different theories.

Comments on the Quality of English Language

Many mistakes 

Author Response

Dear Editor

I sincerely appreciate you and the reviewers for their prompt review of our manuscript and for the favourable review. I have also responded promptly to the queries. Please find my point-by-point response below. The responses are highlighted in red.

 

Yours Sincerely

Corresponding Author

 

 

Comment One:            Please cite the table in the text and ensure that the first citation of each table appears in numerical order           

Response One:           We thank the reviewer for the observation. We have now cited the table in the text and the first citation of the table aligns with numerical order

Comment Two:           Please cite the table in the text and ensure that the first citation of each table appears in numerical order.

Response Two           We thank the reviewer for the observation. We have now cited the table in the text and the first citation of the table aligns with numerical order

 

Many Thanks for your efforts

 

Corresponding Author

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Through an empirical analysis of the Nigerian manufacturing industry in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic, this paper has found that the combined model of globalization and de - globalization is most conducive to the sustainable development of the Global Value Chain (GVC), and supply chain management plays a crucial mediating role in this process. However, some problems need to be addressed in the following:

 

1. Details need to be supplemented in the description of sample representativeness. The paper indicates that the data are sourced from 277 employees of 15 multinational manufacturing enterprises in Nigeria. However, there is a lack of clear explanations regarding the industry coverage of the sample (such as the proportion of key sectors like food, automotive, electronics, etc.) and the distribution of enterprise scales (large enterprises or small enterprises). It is recommended to add the following details to enhance the transparency of the sample.
2. In Section 3, the independent variables include globalization, de-globalization, and the combined mode, and each variable has multiple indicators. Nevertheless, the paper does not elaborate on the specific content of these indicators. For example, what are the six indicators of globalization? And what is the source of these indicators? It is suggested to further clarify the content of the indicators.
3. In Section 4, the study finds that globalization (gbl) has no significant direct impact on the future of the value chain (fvc), but has an indirect impact through supply chain management (SCM). However, the potential mechanism of this result (for example, why globalization cannot directly drive the upgrade of the value chain) lacks in-depth explanation, and further discussion may be required here.
4. The combination of text and graphics is insufficient. Some pictures can be added to improve the readability and persuasiveness of the article. For example, a theoretical framework diagram can be established to integrate the logical relationships among globalization, de-globalization, supply chain management, and the future of the value chain. A SEM path diagram can be drawn to visualize the analysis results of the structural equation model, including the standardized coefficients between variables, the significance level, and the model fit indices.

Author Response

Dear Editor

I sincerely appreciate you and the reviewers for their prompt review of our manuscript and for the favourable review. I have also responded promptly to the queries. Please find my point-by-point response below. The responses are highlighted in red.

 

Yours Sincerely

Corresponding Author

 

 

Comment One:            Please cite the table in the text and ensure that the first citation of each table appears in numerical order           

Response One:           We thank the reviewer for the observation. We have now cited the table in the text and the first citation of the table aligns with numerical order

Comment Two:           Please cite the table in the text and ensure that the first citation of each table appears in numerical order.

Response Two           We thank the reviewer for the observation. We have now cited the table in the text and the first citation of the table aligns with numerical order

 

Many Thanks for your efforts

 

Corresponding Author

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

See appendix.

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Comments on the Quality of English Language

The quality of English requires moderate revision to enhance clarity, readability, and academic rigor

Author Response

Dear Editor

I sincerely appreciate you and the reviewers for their prompt review of our manuscript and for the favourable review. I have also responded promptly to the queries. Please find my point-by-point response below. The responses are highlighted in red.

 

Yours Sincerely

Corresponding Author

 

 

Comment One:            Please cite the table in the text and ensure that the first citation of each table appears in numerical order           

Response One:           We thank the reviewer for the observation. We have now cited the table in the text and the first citation of the table aligns with numerical order

Comment Two:           Please cite the table in the text and ensure that the first citation of each table appears in numerical order.

Response Two           We thank the reviewer for the observation. We have now cited the table in the text and the first citation of the table aligns with numerical order

 

Many Thanks for your efforts

 

Corresponding Author

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 4 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

1. In the research background section, the discussion of globalization, deglobalization, and value chains lacks a tight integration of their real-world and theoretical contexts. There is insufficient in-depth analysis of their mutual influence and intrinsic connections. The research objectives are stated in a relatively general manner, without highlighting the study's unique value in addressing practical issues or filling theoretical gaps.
2. The literature review on key concepts is somewhat fragmented and lacks systematic integration. It fails to clearly present the logical relationships between different concepts.
3. The theoretical background section only provides a superficial introduction to relevant theories without deeply analyzing how these theories specifically explain the relationships between research variables. Furthermore, the link between theories and research questions is not sufficiently articulated. The review and evaluation of prior studies are not comprehensive and in-depth enough, making it difficult to distinguish this research from existing studies and highlight its innovations.
4. In the research design, the rationale for selecting employees from Nigerian manufacturing firms as the study sample is not adequately explained. There is no discussion on how this sample affects the generalizability of the research findings.
5. In the sampling technique section, the combination of judgmental sampling and stratified systematic sampling may lead to sample bias, and the basis for determining the sample size is not provided.
6. In the data collection section, the rationale behind the questionnaire design is unclear, and there is a lack of validity testing for the questionnaire content.
7. The study lacks robustness tests, raising concerns about the reliability of the research conclusions.
8. In discussing theoretical contributions, the study does not sufficiently integrate its findings to expand and refine existing theories. In the practical implications section, the recommendations are lacking in specific implementation steps and operational feasibility, making it difficult to guide real-world business decision-making.
9. In the research conclusion section, the summary of research findings is relatively brief, failing to emphasize the core discoveries and key insights. The analysis of research limitations is not comprehensive, as it does not mention potential factors that could affect the results, such as data timeliness and methodological constraints. The discussion of future research directions lacks specificity and fails to propose concrete and feasible suggestions based on the identified limitations.
10. The overall language expression in the paper contains some grammatical errors and unclear statements, affecting readability. Some figures and tables are not clearly labeled or sufficiently detailed, which hinders the understanding of research results.

Comments on the Quality of English Language

The English could be improved to more clearly express the research.

Author Response

Dear Reviewer

Thank you very much for your review of our manuscript. your comments were quite insightful and helpful.

We have responded to the queries. Our responses are highlighted in red

Thank You for your time

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

All the comments are worked out by the authors. And this edition of manuscript is appropriate for publishing.

Reviewer 3 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

 The current paper can be accepted.

Reviewer 4 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The authors reply to all comments well