Mapping the Intellectual Structure of Social Entrepreneurship Research: A Citation/Co-citation Analysis

• Published in: Journal of business ethics Vol. 166; no. 1; pp. 89 - 114
• Main Authors: Hota, Pradeep Kumar, Subramanian, Balaji, Narayanamurthy, Gopalakrishnan
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Dordrecht Springer 01.09.2020; Springer Netherlands; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Analysis; Bibliometrics; Business and Management; Business Ethics; Citation analysis; Citations; Cocitation; Education; Entrepreneurs; Entrepreneurship; Ethics; Management; Mapping; Original Paper; Philosophy; Quality of Life Research; Scholarly communication; Social entrepreneurship; Social network analysis; Co-citation analysis; Bibliometric analysis; Social entrepreneurship; Citation analysis; Business ethics; Intellectual structure
• ISSN: 0167-4544; 1573-0697
• DOI: 10.1007/s10551-019-04129-4

In this paper, we employ bibliometric analysis to empirically analyse the research on social entrepreneurship published between 1996 and 2017. By employing methods of citation analysis, document co-citation analysis, and social network analysis, we analyse 1296 papers containing 74,237 cited references and uncover the structure, or intellectual base, of research on social entrepreneurship. We identify nine distinct clusters of social entrepreneurship research that depict the intellectual structure of the field. The results provide an overall perspective of the social entrepreneurship field, identifying its influential works and analysing scholarly communication between these works. The results further aid in clarifying the overall centrality features of the social entrepreneurship research network. We also examine the integration of ethics into social entrepreneurship literature. We conclude with a discussion on the structure and evolution of the social entrepreneurship field.