Title: Rural context favouring family business and urban context promoting non-family business in Egypt, Morocco and Turkey

Authors: Seham Ghalwash; Esra E. Karadeniz; Fatima Boutaleb

Addresses: Department of Graduate Studies and Research, School of Business, The American University in Cairo, Cairo, Egypt ' Department of Economics, University of Yeditepe, Istanbul, Turkey ' Faculty of Law, Economic and Social Sciences, University of Hassan II Casablanca, Casablanca, Morocco

Abstract: Family business has recently gained research attention, particularly in specific contexts. We extend the existing literature by exploring the urban and rural context of family business, focusing on a sample of 3935 family and non-family businesses in Egypt, Morocco and Turkey. Family businesses are known to be more self-reliant than non-family businesses. Therefore, we expect them to thrive in a rural environment, where institutions are less elaborate, resources fewer, and networks sparser than in urban eco-systems, which are expected to be better for non-family businesses. We find that businesses governed by families are more frequently seen in rural areas than cities and those governed by non-family more often in urban than rural areas - and this pattern is remarkably similar in the three countries studied here, suggesting that it may well be generalisable globally.

Keywords: Egypt; family business; Morocco; rural; Turkey; urban.

DOI: 10.1504/EJIM.2021.117113

European Journal of International Management, 2021 Vol.16 No.2, pp.207 - 221

Received: 02 May 2019
Accepted: 22 Mar 2020

Published online: 18 Aug 2021 *

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