Affiliations: [a] Universidad de las Américas-Puebla, Escuela de
Negocios, Santa Catarina Martir, Cholula, Puebla, Mexico | [b] Graduate School of Management, Clark University,
Worcester, MA, USA | [c] Centre Francophone d'Informatisation des Organisations
(CEFRIO), Montreal, Canada | [d] University at Albany, Suny, Albany, NY, USA | [e] Department of Information Systems and Decision
Sciences, University of South Florida, Tampa, FL, USA
Correspondence:
[*]
Corresponding author: Luis F. Luna-Reyes, Universidad de las
Américas-Puebla, Escuela de Negocios, CS-213, Santa Catarina Martir,
Cholula, Puebla 72820, Mexico. Tel.: +52 222 229 2000 ext. 4536; Fax: +52 222
229 2726; E-mail: [email protected]
Abstract: In this paper we report on the importance of trust in the
development and operation of distribution networks that attach non-price
information to products to mitigate market dynamics introduced by information
asymmetries. Often this non-price information is transmitted from producers to
consumers through trusting networks or under certifiable labels such as
"organic" or "Fair Trade." We are calling such networks Full Information
Product Pricing (FIPP) Networks. This study is part of a larger project aimed
at understanding how a suite of future-possible data interoperability standards
and social computing technologies will set the stage for a set of product
labelings, information architectures and policies that may have the potential
to supplement a compliance-enforcement approach with a more market-based
voluntary approach to significantly expand the share of worker- and
environmentally-friendly products within the NAFTA region. This initial
exploration of four cases in Canada and Latin America indicated that trust, in
the forms of institutional trust, calculative trust, and relational trust,
plays key roles in FIPP operations and expansion. It is critical for building
collaboration, coordinating network activities, and mitigating the risks
associated with information asymmetry.
Keywords: Digital government, transnational collaboration, inter-organizational, multi-jurisdictional, trust
