Supplier-Led or Retailer-Led Supply Chains: Emergency Supplies Pre-positioning under Option Contracts and Corporate Social Responsibility

Abstract

Effective emergency supplies pre-positioning is critical for mitigating disaster losses, but government-managed reserves face persistent shortages and waste. Public-private collaboration offers a practical solution, yet its sustainability is constrained by firms’ trade-offs between commercial operations and emergency obligations, and the role of corporate social responsibility (CSR) in driving participation remains underexplored. This study evaluates two public-private emergency collaboration modes with supplier-led and retailer-led supply chains respectively, and identifies their applicable conditions. Unlike existing bilateral government-firm research, it innovatively integrates vertical supply chain competition and heterogeneous CSR signaling into a unified framework. We construct a three-stage Stackelberg game model under option contracts, derive equilibria via rigorous backward induction, and complement theory with numerical analysis. Four key findings emerge. First, rising consumer CSR sensitivity consistently boosts overall supply chain profits but raises emergency reserves in supplier-led modes and reduces them in retailer-led modes. This stems from distinct CSR signal transmission paths across the two structures. Second, option contracts do not always ensure effective collaboration, with two distinct incentive failure types across the modes: supplier underproduction and government zero procurement respectively. Third, the two modes yield identical government procurement cost and total reserve capacity, so cost minimization alone cannot reliably guide mode selection. Fourth, the supplier-led mode outperforms under low disaster risk, production cost and CSR sensitivity, while the reverse holds otherwise. These findings offer scenario-based guidance for policymakers to select partners, design incentive-compatible contracts, and leverage CSR as a lever to build sustainable public-private emergency reserve systems.