Table 3.

Different theories used to study channel conflict

Key theories or models	Derived from	Details and role of conflict	Example studies
Trust-Commitment (TC)	Social Exchange Theory (Cook and Emerson 1978)	Trust and Commitment are the main drivers of interorganizational performance. Conflict is mostly seen as an outcome variable that could be affected by the level of trust and commitment in the channel. These two constructs prevent channel members from only focus on pursuing their own interests. Therefore, they can mitigate the negative effect of conflict.	Morgan and Hunt 1994; Palmatier et al. 2007; Terawatanavong et al. 2007; Leonidou et al. 2006.
Interdependence (INT)	Social Exchange Theory (Cook and Emerson 1978), Sociology (Emerson 1962)	Dependence is the key to interorganiational performance. Dependence makes the channel members work together while interdependence asymmetry may lead to a decrease in the level of performance due to the use of coercive power.	Kumar et al. 1995; Palmatier et al. 2007; Samaha et al. 2011; Van Bruggen et al. 2005
Intrachannel Conflict (ICC)	Organizational Conflict (Pondy 1967)	Intrachannel conflict can be viewed as a process or state (Rosenberg and Stern 1970). In the process view, conflict is seen as a mediator that is affected by causes of conflict and, in turn, affects the channel outcomes. (Rosenberg and Stern 1971).	Rosenberg and Stern 1971; Dwyer et al. 1987; Lengers et al. 2015.