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Institutional trust is vital for social and economic activity and crucial in reducing uncertainty for entrepreneurs and society. To shed light on the role of institutional trust on productive entrepreneurial activity, this paper analyses the impact of six urban entrepreneurial ecosystems (EEs) using the contexts of the transition economies of Eastern Europe, Caucasus and Central Asia. This study aims to pursue the research question: what role does institutional trust play in the relationship between formal institutions and productive entrepreneurship in the EEs of transition economies? This paper aims to posit that the development and enforcement of formal institutions and institutional trust enhance productive entrepreneurship.

In this study, the authors apply a mixed-method approach. The authors’ dataset includes 657 respondents (ecosystem stakeholders) from six city-level entrepreneurial ecosystems in the transition economies of Georgia, Ukraine and Kazakhstan, as well as 51 semi-structured interviews from EE representative stakeholders to examine the validity of the findings.

Institutional trust in many cities has been negatively affected by institutionalised corruption and continuous non-transparent reforms, furthering prior research in developing and transition economies. The authors’ findings suggest that institutional trust can be investigated not as a country phenomenon but as a regional phenomenon extending prior research towards understanding the institutional trust – productive entrepreneurship research domain at the city EE level.

The authors apply the institutional trust perspective to the EEs in cities in order to examine how institutional trust affects productive entrepreneurship in challenging institutional environments. The authors contribute to the literature on institutions and entrepreneurship by using a mixed-method analysis to examine the relationship between formal institutions and institutional trust in the context of EEs in transition economies.

A main challenge in studying China is that different views clash. A more serious challenge is that studies that are critical of or dissent from the Chinese government policies are labeled “anti-China” by the Chinese authorities, affecting the free academic exchange of ideas on China. This article discusses this issue and proposes a long-term solution.

This is a perspective study and uses the qualitative approach to develop the authors’ arguments.

The authors argue that the contention in China-related studies is derived primarily from the different perspectives that scholars use. This study identifies two main perspectives: the China-centric view and the rest of the world’s view. The combination of the clash of perspectives and the interference of the Chinese state hinders the development of our knowledge regarding China. Using Rawls’ theory of justice and the veil of ignorance, the authors propose to build common ground for the China study community based on academic freedom, equality and the rule of law. This study further shows that building the common ground is feasible.

The authors’ proposed common ground will help create a free environment for meaningful exchange between different perspectives and reduce the risks in China studies.

The authors’ angle to examine the contentiousness and riskiness of China studies is new. It is the first time that different perspectives on China studies are delineated and compared, the costs of the contentiousness and riskiness are assessed, and the long-term consequences of different paths are examined.