Entrepreneurship development in universities across Gulf Cooperation Council countries: a systematic review of the research and way forward
Journal of Enterprising Communities: People and Places in the Global Economy
ISSN: 1750-6204
Article publication date: 17 July 2023
Issue publication date: 4 September 2023
Abstract
Purpose
Entrepreneurship has been recognized as a vital tool to combat youth unemployment and rising exclusion, as it is an incredible force that impacts economic development and societal growth by stimulating innovation, job creation and social empowerment. On the other hand, higher education institutions (HEIs) can foster entrepreneurship and thus develop entrepreneurial self-efficacy, self-employment, innovation, enhanced ability to risk-taking and thus result in benefiting people, society, organizations and economy. This prompted the authors to carry out an in-depth investigation of published research on entrepreneurship development and HEIs across Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries.
Design/methodology/approach
This study strives to analyze the work carried out until now on entrepreneurship development in HEIs across GCC countries and describe the constructs characterizing it. Bibliometric and content analysis were carried out, integrating citations in Scopus database for last 10 years. Two software packages – Bibliometric R and VOS viewer – were used to investigate the research questions and construct various visualizations of bibliometric networks. Thematic mapping of this multidimensional research area is demonstrated, and evolving trends are identified.
Findings
Findings revealed that research on entrepreneurship development in HEIs is more prevalent in UAE and Saudi Arabia followed by Oman and Qatar. However, more efforts are required to further consolidate cross-national collaborations among all the GCC countries to obtain a comprehensive overview of the regional context.
Originality/value
Such a comprehensive bibliometric review coupled with content analysis on entrepreneurship development in HEIs across GCC countries has not yet been published, to the best of the authors’ knowledge.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
The corresponding author would like to thank Chair – Department of Marketing and Entrepreneurship, and Dean – College of Business and Economics at United Arab Emirates University, Al Ain, Abu Dhabi, UAE for their continuous support rendered to his research pursuits.
Erratum: It has come to the attention of the publisher that the article, Syed, R.T., Singh, D., Agrawal, R. and Spicer, D.P. (2023), “Entrepreneurship development in universities across Gulf Cooperation Council countries: a systematic review of the research and way forward”, Journal of Enterprising Communities: People and Places in the Global Economy, Vol. ahead-of-print No. ahead-of-print. https://doi.org/10.1108/JEC-03-2022-0045, presented the affiliation for Dr Reena Agrawal incorrectly. This error was introduced in the editorial process and has now been corrected in the online version. The publisher sincerely apologises for this error and for any inconvenience caused.
Citation
Syed, R.T., Singh, D., Agrawal, R. and Spicer, D.P. (2023), "Entrepreneurship development in universities across Gulf Cooperation Council countries: a systematic review of the research and way forward", Journal of Enterprising Communities: People and Places in the Global Economy, Vol. 17 No. 5, pp. 1045-1062. https://doi.org/10.1108/JEC-03-2022-0045
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
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