Stakeholder salience in global projects

Stakeholder management is particularly important in global projects, which are carried out in institutionally demanding environments. Existing research suggests that management gives attention to stakeholders whose claims are perceived to be more salient in terms of power, legitimacy and urgency. In this paper, we study a pulp mill construction project in Uruguay to identify the different strategies project stakeholders use to increase their salience. The salience shaping strategies identified include the direct withholding strategy, indirect withholding strategy, resource building strategy, coalition building strategy, conflict escalation strategy, creditability building strategy, communication strategy and direct action strategy.