“…Despite several decades of research, there remains a lack of consensus within the international business literature regarding the influence of multinational enterprises' (MNEs') internationalisation on their environmental performance (Aragón-Correa et al, 2016;Chen et al, 2016;Gómez-Bolaños et al, 2020). While some prior investigations have considered the fact that MNEs face greater institutional pressures due to higher scrutiny, which can lead them to present advanced green results (e.g., Aguilera-Caracuel et al, 2012;Bansal, 2005;Forslid et al, 2018;Gómez-Bolaños et al, 2020;Symeou et al, 2018), other works have highlighted that the higher complexity generated by operating in a larger number of different international locations can sometimes cause firms to exhibit poorer environmental performance (Aragón-Correa et al, 2016;King & Shaver, 2001;Kostova & Roth, 2003;Levy, 1995). However, previous studies have neglected the notion that both phenomena may derive from one other, meaning that MNEs' better environmental results might actually originate from a deeper ability to overcome such initial complexity and worse green results at earlier stages of their international diversification, and that firms based in certain countries may do so with greater ease.…”