In Phase 3, the third selected paper is Altinay and Miles (2006). These authors respond to the surge of attention to stakeholder issues in the previous decade by using stakeholder theory to provide a frame of reference to examine the decision-making process involved in international franchising agreements. In a sense, there is an affinity between relationship theory (as illustrated through the previous paper in this epoch, Doherty and Alexander, 2004) and stakeholder theory. However, the latter is distinct enough to warrant separate treatment. Altinay and Miles are particularly influenced by the seminal paper by Eroglu (1992), especially the role of key decision makers. Their response is to feature decision making in their title and to focus on key stakeholders, with an emphasis on the initial selection of the internal franchise partner.