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In this paper we explore potential barriers for commodification of academic research in emerging countries.

We carried out an exploratory study employing a mixed-method sequential exploratory design. Initially, qualitative interviews were performed to identify cognitive, structural, and ideological barriers associated with commodification. Subsequently, we administered a survey at three universities in Kazakhstan to gather quantitative data. The quantitative insights served to complement our qualitative findings and facilitate the interpretation of the observed patterns within the broader population.

We found that a too rapid shift toward commercialization exacerbated concerns among faculty members and created obstacles to commodification. The obstacles identified through inductive clustering of themes from exploratory qualitative interviews were grouped into three intentionally broad categories: cognitive, structural, and ideological barriers. We argue that in emerging economies, the path to commodifying academic research should start with developing local infrastructure to address identified structural, cognitive, and ideological barriers. This, in turn, will lead to more successful commercialization and redefine the role of academics in society.

Our study has several limitations related to its empirical scope. We concentrated solely on one country, Kazakhstan. For future research, it is crucial to broaden the investigation to include more studies from the Central Asia region and other emerging economies. We believe that while there may be some minor institutional differences, the findings are generalizable to all post-socialist countries. However, incorporating a diverse range of institutions, particularly those with foreign ownership or private capital, would enhance the comprehensiveness of the findings. Furthermore, collecting a more extensive and balanced sample of responses from industry partners, academics, and students would have provided more valuable insights. By including a broader representation of stakeholders, we could have gained a more nuanced understanding of the complexities surrounding commodification in higher education. Given the exploratory nature of this study, it is essential to regard the findings as a source of inspiration rather than empirical confirmation.

Our research has practical implications for managing universities in emerging markets, as well as important policy implications, both for international actors and local governmental bodies.

Our findings carry implications for policymakers. The focus that international institutions place on the matter of commodification and commercialization of knowledge is a positive step. Challenges emerge when this matter is approached with a narrow perspective. Drawing on the empirical context of the Republic of Kazakhstan, a country often overlooked in the literature on emerging markets, we find evidence that knowledge has indeed transformed into a commodity. The rapid shift toward commercialization, driven by substantial institutional pressures, may have occurred too precipitously in this particular context. In light of these findings, we advocate for a more balanced and contextually nuanced discourse concerning both the commodification and commercialization of knowledge.

This study represents one of the few endeavors into exploring commodification within the context of emerging economies. In recent decades, universities have faced substantial pressures to commodify academic research. While there has been a significant volume of research discussing and documenting the success of commodification in developed country universities, those in emerging economies have faced similar pressures without achieving comparable success. This paper delves into the reasons why.

The purpose of this paper is to research the impact of digitalization on employees' future competencies and the conditional role of human resource development (HRD) in the relationship between independent and dependent variables.

Empirical research covered 1209 enterprises from all of Slovakia, Poland and the Czech Republic. The research was conducted from 2019 to 2021. Using structural equation modeling (SEM), a theoretical model was tested and verified.

Confirmatory factor analysis has shown a good fit for the tested model. The purpose and character of our data showed a good alignment with the SEM partial least squares method, as the goal is to predict a construct. The model showed that employee-oriented digitalization positively affected the employees' future competencies, with no impact of customer-oriented digitalization treated as a control variable. Also, the moderating role of HRD has not been shown to be significant for the “digitalization – competencies” relationship.

Previous studies on the development of personnel competencies treated these competencies as antecedents of digital transformation and examined the formal role of HRD in building the competencies. The novelty of this study lies in exploring the pattern of interactions among the impact of an environment built by innovative technologies and HRD on the competencies of the future. Also, the research embedded in the environment of Poland, the Czech Republic and Slovakia has contributed to the complex understanding of the transition to digitalization, as this region has often been omitted in the field of human resource management (HRM) research focused on exploring digital transformation.

Competitively multipolar international system demands bilateral and multilateral partnerships. Joint innovation signals close partnerships. Regional proximity of Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) to the European Union (EU) defines its research and development objectives. These objectives are additionally subjected to the USA’s geopolitical strategy in this geographical area. Hence, CEE’s limited resources require limited resources make international innovation cooperation. This paper aims to analyse whether and how CEE countries make international innovation cooperation decisions.

This paper used Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) database of total patent applications filed to the patent cooperation treaty (PCT) with co-applicants from abroad, where co-patents with at least one foreign inventor present a measure of international innovation partnership. A vector autoregression analysis and impulse response function were used to analyse international innovation partnership choices of eight CEE OECD countries for the period 1990–2018.

Innovation with the EU is of collaborative nature, commonly displaying complementary properties with the rest of the examined innovation partners, while co-patenting with the Russia and China act as substitutes or complements. Co-patenting with Russia is the most versatile, displaying both properties of collaboration and competition. Some countries exhibit complementarity in co-patenting activities with multiple partners. The significance levels of these relationships vary, indicating varying degrees of impact. Overall, these findings highlight the complex dynamics of co-patenting activities and the influence of different partners on countries’ collaborative innovation strategies.

In addition to significant relationships, insignificant relationships as well as those that could bring about greater synergy are flagged in the paper. Those relationships portray possible direction into which national funds could be channelled to incite cooperation between different sectors and countries, especially as innovation partnerships are not always successful and require a long time period to materialise.

By examining bilateral innovation partnerships, this study provides an insight into the strategic political and economic spheres of influence in the CEE region.

This article presents the results of a quantitative analysis of Ukrainian arts and humanities (A&H) research from 2012 to 2021, as observed in Scopus. The overall publication activity and the relative share of A&H publications in relation to Ukraine's total research output, comparing them with other countries. The study analyzes the diversity and total number of sources, as well as the geographic distribution of authors and citing authors, to provide insights into the internationalization level of Ukrainian A&H research. Additionally, the topical spectrum and language usage are considered to complete the overall picture.

This study uses the Scopus database as the primary data source for analyzing the general bibliometric characteristics of Ukrainian A&H research. All document types, except Erratum, were considered. A language filter was applied to compare the bibliometric characteristics of English versus non-English publications. In addition to directly imported data from Scopus, the study employs the ready-to-use SciVal tools to operate with A&H subcategories and calculate additional bibliometric characteristics, such as Citations per Publication (CPP), Field-Weighted Citation Impact (FWCI) and journal quartiles. Information on the country of journal publishers and details on delisted journals from Scopus were obtained from the official Source Title List available on the Elsevier website and the SCImago Journal and Country Rank Portal.

According to the results obtained, the publication patterns for Ukrainian A&H research exhibit dynamics comparable to those of other countries, with a gradual increase in the total number of papers and sources. However, the citedness is lower than expected, and the share of publications in top-quartile sources is lower for 2020–2021 period compared to the previous years. The impact of internationally collaborative papers, especially those in English, is higher. Nevertheless, over half of all works remain uncited, probably due to the limited readership of the journals selected for publication.

This study provides original insights into the bibliometric characteristics of Ukrainian A&H publications between 2012 and 2021, as assessed using the Scopus database. The authors’ findings reveal that Ukraine's A&H publications have higher visibility than some Asian countries with similar population sizes. However, in comparison to other countries of similar size, Ukraine's research output is smaller. The authors also discovered that cultural and historical similarities with neighboring countries play a more significant role in publication activity than population size. This study highlights the low integration of Ukrainian A&H research into the global academic community, evident through a decline in papers published in influential journals and poor citedness. These findings underscore the importance for authors to prioritize disseminating research in influential journals, rather than solely focusing on indexing in particular databases.

Based on social cognitive theory, this study aims to analyze the impact of fear of failure on entrepreneurs’ growth aspirations, the moderating role of collectivist institutional culture and the differences between emerging and developed countries.

Using the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor and the Global Leadership and Organizational Behavior Effectiveness databases for 27 developed and 15 emerging countries, and Global Leadership and Organizational Behavior Effectiveness, the authors apply multilevel model with individual-level and country-level variables.

The fear of failure has a negative impact on growth aspirations and that impact differs between developed and emerging countries. One of the main conclusions is that collectivist culture mitigates the negative impact of fear of failure on growth aspirations, and that this result is significant only in emerging countries.

The authors introduce a boundary condition for this study’s predictions, showing that in emerging countries, contrary to developed countries, the moderator effect of cultural context contributes to growth aspirations, despite the entrepreneur’s fear of failure.

The institutional context in which family firms operate influences their behaviour and performance, yet literature reviews seldom analyse family firms on a regional basis. To fill this gap, this review aims to present research on family entrepreneurship in the transition economies of the Visegrád countries (V4). In this particular group of European economies, the current formal institutions have largely evolved along Western European lines. However, the transformation of informal institutions appears to be still in its infancy.

In order to identify the most representative authors, the methodologies used, the main research topics and to establish a future research agenda, the authors selected, through a systematic process, 112 papers from the Web of Science up to the year 2022. The authors performed a bibliographic analysis using clustering algorithms, complemented by a traditional literature review.

The performance of family firms in transition economies has been the subject of very little research. The results allowed the authors to identify four main areas of research: governance, innovation, sustainability, competitive advantage and considering the influence of the region's characteristics on family business behaviour.

Studies from transition economies can contribute to a broader understanding of family firms in terms of the impact of the institutional environment (especially the influence of sociological changes and specific historical experiences of family members) on their long-term planning, socioemotional wealth (SEW) protection and ethics. In light of recent events, research from the region may also contribute to the understanding of how and to what extent “familiness” influences crisis management or socially responsible behaviour in family firms.

This study aims to define, classify and interconnect the wide range of known entrepreneurial abilities with terms such as skills, capabilities and competencies, which have been used inconsistently within the entrepreneurial field.

This investigation is based on a systematic literature review and strengthened by a meta-analysis equipped with a bibliometric study to assist the generation of outcomes with a quantitative investigation.

This study proposes an evolving entrepreneurial ability model which interconnects genetic and acquired skill types, capabilities and competencies and is equipped with an Entrepreneurial Skills Map essential to operate in the 21st century.

The proposed model is specific to the entrepreneurial field.

This study supports universities and government agencies for the development of educational programs to prepare current and future entrepreneurs to match the changes in the new environment that has emerged with the COVID-19 pandemic.

This research contributes to the entrepreneurship research domain by shedding light on the inconsistent use of non-standardised terminologies and providing an entrepreneurial model and updated skills map to guide scholars to frame research in the post-COVID era with more clarity.

This study has two objectives: to explore the factors that influence student self-efficacy regarding engagement and learning outcomes in a business simulation game course and to compare the difference between hierarchical and general teaching methods.

From September 2021 to May 2022, a questionnaire was administered to 126 students in a business simulation game course at the Zhongshan Institute, University of Electronic Science and Technology of China. Data were analyzed using nonparametric paired samples tests and linear regression.

The results showed that student self-efficacy, engagement and learning outcomes were significantly higher with the hierarchical teaching method than with the general teaching method. There were also differences in the factors that influenced self-efficacy regarding learning outcomes between the two teaching methods. With the general teaching method, student self-efficacy did not directly affect learning outcomes, but did so indirectly by mediating the effect of engagement. However, with the hierarchical teaching method, self-efficacy directly and significantly affected learning outcomes, in addition to indirectly affecting learning outcomes through student engagement.

Compared with the control group experimental research method, the quasi-experimental research method can eliminate the influence of sample heterogeneity itself, but the state of the same sample may change at different times, which is not necessarily caused by the hierarchical teaching design.

Based on the results of this study, teachers can apply hierarchical teaching according to student ability levels when integrating business simulation games. The results of this study can inspire teachers to protect student self-confidence and make teaching objectives and specific requirements clear in the beginning of the course, and also provide an important practical suggestion for students on how to improve their course performance.

The research results can be extended to other courses. Teachers can improve students' self-efficacy through hierarchical teaching design, thus improving students' learning performance and also provide reference value for students to improve their learning performance.

This study built a model based on self-system model of motivational development (SSMMD) theory, comparing factors that affect student self-efficacy regarding learning outcomes under different teaching methods. The model enriches the literature on SSMMD theory as applied to business simulation game courses and adds to our understanding of hierarchical teaching methods in this field. The results provide a valuable reference for teachers that can improve teaching methods and learning outcomes.

Long regarded as a far-fetched notion, companies from post-socialist economies (PSEs) increasingly compete with companies from advanced economies in their domestic markets and abroad. This study identifies PSE companies' motives and determinants of outward foreign direct investment (OFDI) in advanced economies.

This study analyses Slovenian business activities in Germany by juxtaposing eight Slovenian investors and three exporters using a multiple case study approach. The authors use content analysis to examine rich data from semi-structured interviews, databases and internal and external documents to provide comprehensive and in-depth insights into PSE investments in advanced economies.

The authors identify market-seeking motives and competitive advantages which differ from those of other emerging economy companies and offer theoretical suggestions. In contrast to findings from other emerging economies, the authors identify firm- and country-specific advantages, such as high technology, high service quality, a highly educated labour force, and European Union membership, which Slovene companies have employed to enter the advanced German market.

This study represents the first application of springboard theory to explain PSE company investment in advanced economies. The authors offer contextualised explanations of PSE investments in advanced host economies, which have been lacking thus far. The authors also contribute to the scarcity of studies on the effects of supranational institutions on OFDI from emerging economies.

Entrepreneurial activity is a phenomenon that increases the economic growth of countries and improves their social welfare. The economic development levels of countries have significant effects on these entrepreneurial activities. This research examines which institutional and macroeconomic variables explain early-stage entrepreneurship activities in developed and developing economies.

The authors conducted panel data analysis on the data from the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM) and International Monetary Fund (IMF) surveys covering the years 2009–2018.

First, the authors' results reveal that cognitive, normative and regulatory institutions and macroeconomic factors affect early-stage entrepreneurial activity in developed and developing countries differently. Second, the authors' findings indicate that cognitive, normative and regulatory institutions affect early-stage entrepreneurship more positively in developed than developing countries. Finally, the authors' results report that macroeconomic factors are more effective in early-stage entrepreneurial activity in developing countries than in developed countries.

This study provides a better understanding of the components that help explain the differences in entrepreneurship between developed and developing countries regarding institutions and macroeconomic factors. In this way, it contributes to developing entrepreneurship literature with the theoretical achievements of combining institutional theory and macroeconomic indicators with entrepreneurship literature.