Institutional context for entrepreneurship in Arab countries

This research applies the institutional profile survey of Busenitz et al. (2000) to four countries in the Middle East. The purposes are to (1) explore how entrepreneurship contexts are conductive to entrepreneurship and (2) contrast this instrument with other measures of family business and national policies as related to the creation of new business. It is concluded that while the Egyptian entrepreneurship environment is still at the nascent stages of development, both the Kuwaiti and UAE are moving towards established stages of development. Saudi Arabia seems to be somewhat variable; i.e. ranging from the same to lagging behind the other countries depending upon the dimension. It is recommended that in order to build a competitive entrepreneurship advantage, the Egyptian regulatory institutions should strengthen factors of macroeconomic policy and education while regulatory institutions in Kuwait and UAE should strengthen factors of investment in science and technology programmes.