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A very few studies have been conducted to measure a degree of national intellectual capital for selected groups of countries. This paper is conducted to construct a new index of national intellectual capital (INIC) which is simple, quantifiable, relevant and comparable for countries around the globe.

The styudy’s new INIC uses various indicators which are proxies for fundamental aspects of intellectual capital, including (1) human capital, (2) structural capital and (3) relational capital. These indicators are publicly available for many countries. The principal component analysis is utilized to derive the INIC. Various tests have also been conducted to ensure that the new index is appropriate and fit for purpose.

Findings from this paper confirm that the new INIC has a strong correlation of 0.80 with an index developed by Lin et al. (2014) (the LECB index), an advanced INIC to date. The LECB index has been infrequently updated and covered selected countries due to data and information unavailability. In addition, the study’s tests indicate that a high correlation of 0.75 is observed between the study’s index and GDP per capita. The new INIC represents an advancement in relation to its simplicity, quantification, relevance and international comparison across nations.

The estimates of national intellectual capital using the approach in this study will open a new strand of theoretical and empirical studies in relation to national intellectual capital and other economic and social issues of interests. This novel and innovative approach will provide policymakers with a valuable framework to formulate and implement relevant policies to enhance and improve national intellectual capital.

To the best knowledge of the authors, this is the first study of its type, which is conducted to measure national intellectual capital based on publicly available data. Required data cover an extended period of years and a majority of countries. As such, an INIC will enhance transparency and feasibility for international comparison across countries.

National intellectual capital is generally considered a strategic advantage for national competitiveness. However, the measurement of intellectual capital across countries for comparison purposes appears to receive little attention. This study aims to use a new index of national intellectual capital (INIC) to examine the relationship between national intellectual capital and national competitiveness.

This paper uses the INIC, developed by Vo and Tran (2021), to measure, compare and contrast differences in the level of national intellectual capital across 104 countries. INIC comprises the most crucial intellectual capital components: human capital, structural capital and relational capital. Various economic and social indicators are used as the proxies for these components of intellectual capital. Principal component analysis is used to derive INIC.

The results indicate that during the study period the level of national intellectual capital gradually increased. Europe has attained the highest level of national intellectual capital, whereas Africa has achieved the lowest level. This study’s findings confirm a close relationship between the national intellectual capital level and the national income level. Among the ten biggest countries, the USA achieved the highest national intellectual capital level, and China has significantly improved its cumulative level. Finland achieved the highest level of national intellectual capital in the world. National intellectual capital enhances a country’s competitiveness.

Findings in this study shed light on an international comparison of intellectual capital across countries and understanding how national intellectual capital contributes to and improves national competitiveness. Policymakers can consider and use these findings to support the accumulation of national intellectual capital and boost national competitive advantage, especially low-income countries and emerging markets.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study to estimate a degree of national intellectual capital around the world and examine its impact on national competitiveness based on publicly available data.

The purpose of this paper is to explain the difference of national intellectual capital from the perspective of national culture and to illustrate how national leaders or policy-makers increase their country’s national intellectual capital.

The study conducts a descriptive analysis combining the research outcome of Lin and Edvinsson’s (2011) national intellectual capital with Hofstede’s (2001) national culture. The research findings and results of these two studies were compared before running a t-test to determine whether countries with relatively high national intellectual capital have a higher level of certain national culture.

Based on the matching data of 26 countries, the study proposed that countries with certain national culture possess lower intellectual capital. Countries with high intellectual capital tend to exhibit a common culture of low power distance, weak uncertainty avoidance, and individualism.

The study suggests that for a country to enhance its overall intellectual capital, it should strive for a culture of equality, freedom and safety, and an active competitive environment, while avoiding social class distance in order to eliminate insecurity. The study proposes some suggestions to advance the countries’ national intellectual capital. In addition to admit the weakness of their intellectual capital due to cultural reasons, these countries could go a step further to increase their own national intellectual capital by increasing or enhancing certain national cultures if possible.

The study compares national intellectual capital and national culture and finds the relationship between these two sets of constructs. This study proves that national culture not only influences the strategies or behaviors of business level but also the competitiveness of national levels.

The intellectual capital of a nation (or a region of nations) requires the articulation of a system of variables that helps to uncover and manage the invisible wealth of a country. Most importantly, an emphasis on human capital allows for a better understanding of the hidden values, individuals, enterprises, institutions, and communities that are both current and potential future sources of intellectual wealth. This paper endeavours to address the five research questions. The main outcomes of this paper are the development of a national intellectual capital measurement methodology and index. The NICI is also used within a structural equation model to test several hypotheses related to national intellectual capital development.

This study proposes a model to measure national intellectual capital that can be easily replicated for trend analysis. Key dimensions include human capital, market capital, process capital, renewal capital, and financial capital.

With longitudinal data spanning the period from 1994 to 2005, this study compares the national intellectual capital of 40 countries based on an IC map of 29 indicators.

The overall intellectual capital ranking of the five Nordic countries is: 1 Sweden, 2 Finland, (3 Switzerland), 4 Denmark, (5 USA), 6 Norway, and 7 Iceland in the 40‐country list.

The results confirm the general perception that the Nordic countries have a high degree of national intellectual capital. The research findings clarify the status of national intellectual capital of the Nordic countries, thereby providing valuable information for stakeholders and policy makers to formulate effective strategies for building sustainable national competitiveness. In order to do this, it is necessary to elaborate on the proposed IC framework and to gather relevant and valid IC indicators.

The results of this study can provide a map for the Nordic countries – and other countries – as they prepare for future challenges, such as those associated with globalization and its implications on potential wealth creation. A deeper study of why and how might be a part of forthcoming studies.

This paper has two purposes: to identify and explain the major forces that are causing the increasing need for operational reporting and intellectual capital (IC) reporting for European companies; and to identify the necessary and sufficient conditions for operational and intellectual capital reporting if such reporting is to be meaningful for information users.

The approach for this paper has been to examine relevant papers, reports, guidelines, compendiums, annual reports, opinions, submissions and legislation.

Eight determining forces are identified that make the basis of the case for the provision of operating and IC information: the long‐standing global dominance and growth of the US economy; the emergence of business models other than the value chain (especially the emergence of network businesses); the changing nature of stock exchanges; the influence of different investment fund types (mutual, pension and hedge funds); the roles of buy‐side and sell‐side analysts; global and European investment index development; rating agency activity; and financial reporting and corporate governance regime development.

The eight forces are interdependent and immutable. Comprehensive operational and IC reporting are unavoidable. Accordingly, the authors propose that the necessary and sufficient conditions for adequate enterprise information reporting are: a legal requirement for mandatory operational and IC reporting and attendant regulatory framework(s) where the legal framework is based on the concept of neglect; key operating and IC resource status and activity performance definitions and metrics that reflect the enterprise's underlying business model(s); and (3) a mapping of the capitalized operational and IC investments that are by definition normally expensed to the financial report accounts.

The authors believe that no one has previously formally proposed a mandatory operational and IC reporting requirement; a legal reference frame of reference based on the legal concept of neglect; standard definitions for operational and IC performance metrics; a reference framework for information quality that is, inter alia, based on the consistency, comparability and comprehensiveness of reported metrics; and the requirement to map all capitalized IC resources back to the financial reports of the company.

Aim of the present monograph is the economic analysis of the role of MNEs regarding globalisation and digital economy and in parallel there is a reference and examination of some legal aspects concerning MNEs, cyberspace and e‐commerce as the means of expression of the digital economy. The whole effort of the author is focused on the examination of various aspects of MNEs and their impact upon globalisation and vice versa and how and if we are moving towards a global digital economy.

This study, an exploratory one, aims to empirically investigate the association of national intellectual capital (NIC) with the national digital transformation readiness of the European Union's (EU’s) member states. Apart from building the conceptual model of NIC, this study explores the role of NIC dimensions in the digital divide between European countries.

Based on the literature review and the available EU statistical data and indexes, the theoretical framework and conceptual model for NIC were developed. The model explores the relation of NIC and its dimensions (human, social, structural, relational and renewable/development capital) on the readiness of European countries for digital transformation and the digital divide. Significant differences between EU countries in NIC and digital readiness were tested. Multiple linear regression was used to explore the association of each NIC dimension with digital transformation and digital divide within the EU.

Despite a positive association between all dimensions of NIC and digital transformation readiness, the proposed model of NIC was not confirmed in full. Regression analysis proved social capital and working skills, a dimension of human capital, to be the predictors of digital transformation at a national level, able to detect certain elements of digital divide between EU member states. Structural capital, knowledge and education, as dimensions of human capital, were predictors of the digital divide in terms of the integration of digital media in companies.

This research has a limited propensity for generalisation due to the lack of common measurement models in the field of NIC exploration.

This research offers policy makers an indication of the relationships between NIC and digital transformation, pointing out which dimensions of NIC should be strengthened to allow the EU to meet the challenges of digital economy and to overcome the digital divide between EU member states.

The use of digital technologies is key in creating active and informed citizens in the public sphere and productive companies and economic growth in the business sphere.

This study provides an original theoretical framework and conceptual model through which to analyse the relationship between NIC and digital transformation, which has thus far not been explored at the level of the EU. This research makes an original contribution to the empirical exploration of NIC and produces new insights in the fields of digital transformation and intellectual capital.

The studies that explore the impacts of national intellectual capital on informal economy are scant. Moreover, the effect of an external factor such as institutional quality that moderates this relationship has largely been neglected in previous studies. Institutions are considered important pillars to accumulate national intellectual capital and reduce shadow economy. As such, this paper aims to investigate how institutional quality moderates the effects of national intellectual capital on informal economy in 17 Asian countries from 2000 to 2018.

This paper uses the generalized method of moments techniques, which allow cross-sectional dependence and slope homogeneity in panel data, to examine the moderating role of institutional quality on the relationship between national intellectual capital and informal economy. Various tests are conducted to ensure the robustness of the findings.

Empirical findings from this paper indicate that an increase in national intellectual capital and institutional quality declines the informal economy. Interestingly, better institutional quality aggravates the negative effects of national intellectual capital on reducing the size of informal economy. The author also finds that enhancing international trade and economic growth results in a decrease in the informal economy in Asian countries.

Empirical findings offer policymakers an indication of the relationships between national intellectual capital, institutional quality and informal economy, pointing out that national intellectual capital and institutional quality should be strengthened to allow Asian countries to limit the informal economy.

This study provides a conceptual model through which the moderating role of institutional quality on the national intellectual capital–informal economy nexus can be recognized. This approach has thus far not been investigated in the existing literature. To the best of the author’s knowledge, this study makes an original contribution to the empirical of national intellectual capital and informal economy nexus and produces new insights into the fields of the moderating effects of institutional quality on this nexus.

This study examines whether the national innovative city pilot policy (NICP) influences urban entrepreneurship (UE). To examine the underlying causal mechanism, this study modeled the city-level intellectual capital index and financing capacity (FC) in the relationship between NICP and UE.

An empirical model of NICP, intellectual capital, FC and entrepreneurship is conceptualized based on theoretical analysis. Using a quasi-natural experiment of China’s NICP, with a sample of 280 prefecture-level cities in China from 2003 to 2018, propensity score matching with difference-in-differences (PSM-DID) is used to empirically test the NICP’s impact on UE, mediating effects of intellectual capital and moderation effects of FC.

The results show that the NICP can significantly motivate UE. Intellectual capital plays mediating effects on the relationship between NICP and UE. Moreover, the NICP and intellectual capital’s effects on UE are moderated by FC.

This study provides an important reference for promoting UE through intellectual capital and FC in the construction of the NICP.

This is a pioneering study that develops a theoretical model to incorporate NICP, intellectual capital, FC and UE. This paper applies experimental governance theory in innovative urban scenarios, and verifies its applicability and particularity in the Chinese context.