Recent Trends in Leading Entrepreneurship Research: The Challenge for European Researchers

Abstract

Recent researchers have noted differences in the culture of entrepreneurship research between the USA and Europe, with European researchers being more policy orientated, more methodologically open, more inclined to favour multidsciplinary approaches and less preoccupied with “grand theories”. The leading entrepreneurship journals are US based, and increasingly becoming dominated by theory-driven approaches to research. As the US journals are edited and reviewed by international academics, including many European ones, this apparent culture difference cannot be accounted by national culture alone. This paper discusses the notion that the drive for setting rigorous standards for achieving elite status for the journals mainly through championing rigorous theory development is driven by the needs for setting benchmarks for research selectivity in Universities in both sides of the Atlantic. This results in a disturbing mismatch between academic and applied research, as most of the funding comes from governments who need answers to important policies rather than academic questions. This is particularly a serious challenge for a majority of European researchers who depend largely on policy sources for funding.