As increasing numbers of customers pay attention to product and service sustainability when shopping online, more and more firms in the online market engage in promoting perceived sustainability to establish close customer relationships. Prior studies implied the effects of perceived sustainability on transactional customer relationships, however, the role of perceived sustainability in influencing nontransactional customer relationships has received little attention. Drawing on existing conceptual models, this study aimed at exploring the effects of perceived sustainability on rational and emotional customer engagement (CE) in the online shopping environment. The data were collected through a questionnaire survey in China. Using the partial least squares (PLS) approach-based structural equation modeling (SEM) method, the authors found that perceived sustainability positively affects the two CE orientations through influencing short- and long-term transactional attitudes (satisfaction and commitment). A strong interrelationship between rational and emotional CE was also found. This is the first study presenting empirical evidence of the effects of perceived sustainability on nontransactional customer relationships from the rational and emotional perspectives. It also provides critical implications for online sellers in designing engagement programs.

Great changes are taking place, and now is the right time to reflect on the quality philosophy. This research firstly reviewed the quality theories and practices according to the timeline, thus summarising the ‘past’ of the quality movement. Then, a bibliometric analysis based on 20,930 literature on quality management since 2001 was conducted, and the first 19 years of the new millennium were divided into three phases. Through comparative analysis of the three stages by using VOSviewer, this research describes how research on quality management has evolved since the twenty-first century. Finally, through the coding method based on expert interviews and document studies, this research proposed the following six future directions in quality movement: First, no longer about defect reduction, but focuses on value enhancement. Second, no longer product life cycle, but service life cycle. Third, no longer separated, but integrated. Fourth, data will become the core resource for quality management. Fifth, there will be significant changes in existing methods and tools of quality management. Sixth, the quality control power of focal companies over other actors in the supply network will be further enhanced.

This paper conducted a bibliometric analysis based on 4687 papers on supplier management from 1997 to 2017. Through a comparative analysis of the four stages using Bibexcel and Ucinet6 software, this paper explores the evolution of supplier management from the theme and cluster perspectives. The results show that supplier management research has made breakthroughs in both breadth and depth. Representative research themes, such as “sustainable supply chain”, “corporate social responsibility”, “knowledge management”, etc., have gradually penetrated into the field of supplier management. Research related to “supplier selection” and “supplier relations” have always been of the highest strategic importance, and themes in “supplier relations” cluster such as “trust” and “commitment” have gradually attracted more and more researchers’ attention. The “inventory” cluster has also been a research focus, and the structural stability and maturity of the cluster have gradually improved. The “innovation” cluster is a relatively “open” cluster, and its impact on the entire research filed of supplier management has been gradually increasing. More importantly, the “sustainability” cluster is an evolving cluster, research themes related to “sustainability”, such as “green supply chain”, “sustainable supply chain” and “green supplier selection”, will play an increasingly important role in the field of supplier management.

Based on reverse thinking, this research defines the concept of the ‘ISO 9001 effectiveness gap’ for the first time and establishes the ISO 9001 effectiveness gap model. A research study was carried out in 413 ISO 9001 certified companies in Beijing City, Shandong Province, Anhui Province and Guangxi Province, which are representative in China. Data were obtained through a structured questionnaire and have been analysed with exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses using Smart PLS 3. The present study findings show that motivation barriers, top management barriers, employee barriers, resource barriers, and certification organisation barriers all have positive impacts on the ISO 9001 effectiveness gap. In addition, the research also finds that top management barriers play a central role in the model of the ISO 9001 effectiveness gap and that employee barriers are affected by some other factors. It is also important to note that the role of certification organisation barriers cannot be ignored. The present study findings can provide some inspirations for different participants such as companies, certification organisations and government to design efficacious strategies to reduce the ISO 9001 effectiveness gap.

In recent years, the high incidence of product quality problems in online shopping has negatively affected the normal and orderly operation of the online shopping market. In order to probe for ways for the governmental quality supervision department and the online shopping platform to implement effective supervision over online shopping, this paper builds a supervision game model between the governmental quality supervision department and the online shopping platform based on complete information, and thereby analyses the supervision game process and equilibrium state of the governmental quality supervision department and the platform in online shopping. The result shows that the supervision effectiveness of the governmental quality supervision department and the platform is subject to such main factors as the costs of the governmental supervision; the punishments to the governmental quality supervision department due to its failure to supervise; the costs, profits and awards for the online shopping platform when performing its quality control duties; and the punishments and losses that the online shopping platform will incur for failing to perform its quality control duties.

The product quality issues of online shopping have not been effectively solved with the rapid development of electronic commerce in China. Faced with the quality issues of online shopping, the main entities, such as online platforms and online sellers, should cooperate to control and assure compliant quality. The adverse selection of buyers caused by information asymmetry and the moral hazard of sellers aggravated by bilateral markets make the quality management of online shopping have a high degree of uncertainty and complexity. This study constructs an evolutionary game model to discuss the dynamic process of the quality behaviours of members and analyse the key triggers of the evolutionary directions in online shopping. By using numerical simulation analysis, the influences of government supervision intensities on the evolution trend of members’ quality behaviours are analysed with various risk attitude combinations in various cases. The current research finds that (1) the decrease of the quality control cost and the increase of the government’s benchmark fine are conducive to increasing the platform’s controlling probability; (2) the decrease of the proportion of rent and the increase of sellers’ fraud cost and the government’s benchmark fines are conducive to increasing the seller’s compliance probability; (3) when both the platform and seller are unwilling to make efforts for quality assurance, risk‐seeking members make the seller gradually choose to provide compliant products; and (4) when the members are all risk‐seeking, strengthening government supervision will help promote the transition of members’ behavioural choices in a benign direction. This paper enriches the theoretical research studies on both online product quality control and government‐led social governance system of quality. Suggestions for government supervision and e‐commerce entities are also provided for quality assurance and improvement.