Bibliometric portrait of the theory of community-based enterprise: evolution and future directions

Abstract

The focus of this study is to present an overview of the literature related to the Theory of Community-Based Enterprise (TCBE) using bibliometric analysis. We analysed 477 articles published in 201 journals in the Scopus database till 2021. Initially, prominent features based on key bibliometric indicators of 477 articles are presented under performance analysis, like prominent studies, journals, authors, and keywords. Then in network analysis, bibliographic coupling, and co-occurrence analysis were conducted on the articles. The bibliometric analysis enables mapping of the theory’s evolution, provides a comprehensive overview of TCBE literature, and leads to identifying the dynamics of the field and cluster-based themes and their relationships. The study resulted in three significant findings—the first is that limited studies have assessed the assumptions and features of the theory as valid in different cultural scenarios. Second, the theory is used in various concepts but prominently as a sub-topic under social entrepreneurship; there exists an opportunity to study community initiatives as a focus. The third is a spectrum of words used to represent the idea of community-based enterprises that hampers building uniformity of the concept.

IMPACT STATEMENT

This study aligns with sustainable development goals (SDG 8) and calls attention to the concept of community-based enterprise, which has been accepted as a strategy for sustainable development in remote areas. The authors have pointed out the interdisciplinary nature of the TCBE. The concept examined in this study is deeply rooted within the community’s skills and indigenous knowledge, thus empowering the community members to become crusaders of their development. Policymakers from emerging economies should use this strategy to bring down regional disparity by making policies that give thrust to community-initiatives. Government support will help preserve indigenous knowledge and communities’ self-reliance. This study concludes with intriguing questions that have the potential to ignite future research.

Keywords:

• Theory of community-based enterprise (TCBE)
• bibliometric analysis
• community-based enterprise
• social entrepreneurship
• review of theory

REVIEWING EDITOR:

• Huifen (Helen) Cai, Middlesex University Business School, United Kingdom

SUBJECTS:

• Social Entrepreneurship

1. Introduction

The present study focuses on comprehending the current literature on the Theory of Community-Based Enterprise (TCBE). This study aims to highlight the evolution of the empirical studies focusing on the main concepts and assumptions of the theory and provide a comprehensive understanding of the articles relating to the TCBE. ‘Toward a theory of community-based enterprises’ is considered a seminal paper in the literature on entrepreneurship that proposes a conceptual framework to study Community-Based Enterprises (CBE) and serves as a theoretical background for provoking research in the entrepreneurship domain. This paper was published in 2006 by the Academy of Management Review, an eminent journal, and has garnered 639 citations by 2021. The increasing trend of citations can be interpreted as the success of CBE and the popularity of the TCBE.

Nevertheless, limited studies are available in the literature extending and testing the TCBE and its proposed framework. The diverse orientation of the studies shows that TCBE is cited very loosely in the literature. Therefore, this study aims to assess and map the orientation of studies relating to the TCBE using bibliometric and network analysis. Theory acts as a backbone of the research and is considered one of the critical elements in social science research. As the theory gains popularity, many articles use them to bring academic strength. Therefore, the need for a review article arises to understand the spectrum of a theory and its use. The present study is one such theory-based review article where the authors present a bibliometric and semi-structured analysis of the articles relating to the TCBE.

In the literature on entrepreneurship, authors have emphasised the need to study interactions among communities, families, and solo entrepreneurs to understand their role in inducing/enabling development (Cornwall, 1998; Onyx & Bullen, 2000; Peredo & Chrisman, 2006). Entrepreneurship provides a solution to pestering economic, social, and/or environmental problems. Community-based solutions are one such solution that is gaining popularity in solving pressing problems like environment conservation, providing opportunities for income generation, and alleviating poverty among the poor population. A community-based initiative is an approach where an external agent generally enables the community members to address the solution collectively. The solution becomes sustainable when the beneficiaries are involved in the development process (Handy et al., 2011; Peredo & Chrisman, 2006). In the literature, the authors used the case study method to identify these community-based enterprises and associated their initiatives with various theories from the field of entrepreneurship. One such theory is the TCBE which has instigated research in social and collective entrepreneurship worldwide.

As the body of literature refereeing the TCBE is growing, there is a need for a study that summarises the theory’s life journey and elucidates its use in scholarly articles. This study presents a broad overview by conducting a bibliometric analysis of the literature related to the TCBE and contributing to understanding its use. Bibliometric analysis is used to explore the intellectual structure of the domain under study (Ledwani et al., 2022), and the authors will seek to answer the following questions:

1. What is the overview of the theory of CBE literature?

   • What is the publication trend of articles relating to the literature on TCBE?

   • Which are the most prolific journals contributing to the field?

   • Who are the most contributing authors in the field?

   • Which are the highest cited articles from the literature of the study?

   • Which universities/institutions have the highest publication?

   • Which countries have the highest publication?

   • What are the trending topics in the literature across time?

2. What concepts, sub-topics, and relationships are explored by the literature related to the TCBE?

   • What is the spectrum of concepts covered by the literature based on the TCBE?

   • What major clustered themes emerge from theory-related articles based on bibliographic relations?

   • How has the research on the TCBE temporally evolved?

It is an emerging theory that requires more qualitative and quantitative studies to be undertaken. This study is one such theory-based review article where the authors present a bibliometric and semi-structured analysis of the TCBE to provide an overview of the application of theory.

2. Backdrop of the study

‘Why is a theory-based review needed?’ is the question that must be answered before explaining the TCBE. A theory plays a critical role in the development of any academic area systematically (Stewart & Klein, 2016). Kerlinger (1979, p. 64) defined theory as ‘a set of interrelated constructs, definitions, and propositions that present a systematic view of phenomena by specifying relations among the variables to explain natural phenomena’. It helps in explaining the relationships among variables, provides a theoretical lens, and is used as a testing and building framework (Creswell & Creswell, 2017). As the popularity of the theory gains, many articles use them to bring academic/theoretical strength. Therefore, a need to review articles arises to understand the spectrum of a theory. Theory-based review articles are gaining popularity as they contribute to synthesising and extending a body of literature that uses the same underlying theory (Palmatier et al., 2017).

The TCBE focuses on identifying grassroot initiatives that can be nurtured and converted into an indigenous tool for community development and poverty alleviation. The geographical disparity in the development process has divided the population into two broad categories—one is developed, independent economic groups and the other is where people struggle to meet ends and stay with fewer infrastructural facilities. They are also called the bottom of the pyramid, with fewer development opportunities. They generally tend to stay in groups or communities and possess/are blessed with an abundance of unique and indigenous skills, culture, and values that are faded in the nation’s developed side. Thus, the primary focus of the TCBE is to promote value creation and innovation through business development/entrepreneurial activities at the local level. In today’s context, it is considered one of the most enabled solutions to develop rural areas. It is a popular strategy used by developed nations like the UK and the US to bring development by involving the members in instigating sovereign development.

The phenomenon of CBE was conceptualised and published by Ana Maria Peredo, then assistant professor at the University of Victoria, and James J Chrisman, a professor of management at Mississippi State University and a joint researcher at the Center for Entrepreneurship and Family Enterprise of the University of Alberta. The motivation behind developing the theory was to establish a potential strategy for sustainable local development in remote areas to eradicate poverty with initiatives rooted locally. The World Bank (n.d.) has also stressed the need for local participation in reducing poverty, as due to the unprecedented COVID pandemic, the declining poverty rate took a hit in 2020. The authors identified the enablers like value creation and innovation through local business development that are essential in reducing poverty and preserving the natural environment. These enablers are the true characteristics of entrepreneurship that serve the purpose. However, these characteristics will become the ultimate solution for the problem when it is broad-based, locally focused, and interdisciplinary.

2.1. About CBE

In the absence of the concept of CBE, rural development is dependent on the initiatives of the government and non-government agencies. The problem with these externally induced initiatives is that, at times, the solution is crafted without analysing the root causes of the problem and lacks efforts to understand the locals’ needs. These initiatives fail as the aid exhausts and does not result in desired outcomes. One of the common problems in all failed initiatives was that these initiatives were conceived and managed by external development agencies rather than community members. Due to this, people lacked a sense of ownership, and locals lost interest in continuing the project once the agency’s budget was exhausted. To enable sustainable rural development, those initiatives should be promoted where community members are involved, yielding sustainable individual and group benefits over the short and long term. Once the members associate themselves with the development process, a sense of ownership arises among them (Handy et al., 2011; Peredo & Chrisman, 2006). They continue to work with the realisation that they can bring development to their lives and community. The sense of ownership and strong social capital will make them thrive for their sustainable development. Therefore, CBE is argued to be a promising strategy for fostering sustainable local development where community members work together to overcome the common problems they face (Peredo & Chrisman, 2006). The solution involves the community and their knowledge to allow them to devise an enterprise that will help them reap the benefits sustainably. To make a solution effective in addressing a problem, it is necessary to understand the root cause of the problem by involving the community members in making and implementing the solution.

CBE, or community entrepreneurship, is a phenomenon that existed way before scholars started reporting it in the entrepreneurship literature. The phenomenon has been deeply rooted in history since the beginning of civilisation. We all have studied barter systems where different communities using their indigenous knowledge and local resources, created something useful and then exchanged it with other community members for a living. However, with time, development, and entrepreneurship, the concepts of CBE changed, and TCBE defines the present form of CBEs. This phenomenon of CBE, or collective economic action taken up by a community, was explained systematically by Peredo and Chrisman in the article titled ‘Toward a theory of community-based enterprise’. It was the first attempt to conceptualise and propose a theoretical model for studying CBE.

2.2. About the TCBE

In the literature, we find the presence of CBE explaining the community development process through TCBE. The concept was used by authors worldwide either to identify a CBE and report it as a case study or to introduce a CBE structure to instigate development in an area. In theory, CBEs are defined as ‘when a community acts corporately as both entrepreneur and an enterprise to pursue the common good’ by Peredo and Chrisman (2006, p. 310). It results from a process in which the community works entrepreneurially to create and operate a new enterprise embedded in its existing social structure. CBE is argued to be a promising strategy for fostering sustainable local development.

Table 1 summarises the factors leading to the emergence and sustenance of CBE and challenges that may disturb the community concluded by Peredo and Chrisman.

Table 1. Characteristics and challenges of CBE as identified by Peredo and Chrisman in 2006.

Characteristics of CBE
i	Triggered by social and/or economic stress
ii	A product of incremental learning
iii	Dependent on social capital
iv	Community size
v	Based on available community skills
vi	A multiplicity of goals
vii	Dependent on community participation
Challenges in sustaining CBE
i	Maintaining a balance between individual and collective needs among economic, social, environmental, and cultural goals.
ii	Coping with the changes to the external environment as a consequence of economic and cultural globalisation.

Source: Taken from the article titled ‘Toward a theory of Community-Based Enterprise’ and compiled by the authors.

Peredo and Chrisman (2006) stated that the emergence of CBE will happen when the community suffers from economic stress, leading to a disintegrated family and social stress. This stress brings the community together to redress the situation. The members depend on their indigenous knowledge and local resources, carving the way out for development while continuously learning from their environment. In theory, one of the most crucial features of CBE identified is social capital signifying members’ interpersonal relationships. It is an asset and plays a vital role in developing a system based on trust among members where the resources are used with shared understanding. The higher the social capital in the community, the better CBE will perform. Communities with too many or too few members will not achieve stability. The emergence of CBE is a response to improve the deteriorating economic conditions but also aims to restore social stability in the community. Members’ active participation leads to the sustainable development of the community. Along with the emerging factors of CBE, Peredo and Chrisman have also alerted with two conditions (stated as challenges in Table 1) that may (bring instability in the community/distort the community development process).

Many authors identified and reported the characteristics and challenges stated in Table 1 in different geographical locations. These studies have immensely contributed to validating and developing the theory. Now the concept of CBE is extending towards achieving sustainability in forestry, tourism, sports, and biomedical. These studies broadly talk about bringing communities together, alleviating poverty, collaborative development, and using community strength to lead to the area’s and nation’s sustainable development.

In recent literature, the concept of CBE is seen prominently being used in two areas that are forestry and tourism. In forestry, the communities taking initiatives are addressed as Community-Based Forest Enterprise (CBFE), which is defined as community forestry in which community groups/members actively produce goods and services in response to the demands of the market, generating income, social returns and other assets benefitting those communities (Ambrose-Oji et al., 2015; Macqueen, 2008). Collective management of forests came to the fore in the 1980s. It was linked to global efforts to protect natural tropical forests from degradation, reduce poverty and inequality in rural areas, and integrate more relevant and just development assistance to communities (Charnley & Poe, 2007; Humphries et al., 2012). In the direction of sustainable tourism, communities are enabled to give an experience to tourists. They are addressed as Community-Based Tourism Enterprises or community-based tourism (CBT), an activity that ‘through increased intensities of participation, can provide widespread economic and other benefits and decision-making power to communities’ (The Mountain Institute, 2000). It is thought to have three advantages at the local level: CBT minimises leakages at the local level; second, CBT maximises linkages; and third, CBT fosters empowerment and a sense of ownership (Lapeyre, 2010). The aim of CBT ventures is to ensure that members of local communities have a high degree of control over activities taking place in their localities and a significant proportion of the economic benefits (Scheyvens, 2002; Stone & Stone, 2011).

In the literature, the standard form of organisation adopted by the CBEs to get a legal identity, rights, and support from the government are cooperative societies, self-help groups, farmer’s producers’ organisations, community interest companies, and community contribution companies, to name a few.

The key literature relating to the TCBE is briefly summarised as follows:

The first citation for the theory paper was a self-citation by Peredo (2005), which is included in the dataset for analysis. A case study describes the emergence of an indigenous community venture locally in the Andes, Latin America, in response to the failed political operations for development. Then the theory was used to give perspectives on social entrepreneurship (Peredo & McLean, 2006), organisation and theory development (Walsh et al., 2006) along with entrepreneurship (Phillips & Tracey, 2007), social enterprise discovery (Murphy & Coombes, 2009). The theory was also used in studying the role of family social capital and knowledge capital in the process of new venture creation (Chang et al., 2009) and the origination of institutional voids in an entrepreneurial venture of a developing country (Mair & Marti, 2009). Since 2010 the use of theory has expanded in both width and depth. The TCBE was studied in its components independently like social bricolage (Di Domenico et al., 2010), resource-based perspective (Meyskens et al., 2010), community and indigenous enterprises (Hindle, 2010; Hindle & Moroz, 2010), their types, process (Smith & Stevens, 2010) and the sustainability of these organisations (Moizer & Tracey, 2010). Ratten (2010) developed a new sub-domain theory in the field of ‘sports-based entrepreneurship’, which Ratten further developed in 2011 (Ratten, 2011). The ‘critical theory of value creation’ (Le Ber & Branzei, 2010) also cited the TCBE. It is also used to study the community’s initiatives in biosphere conservation and forestry enterprises (Trosper et al., 2008; Persaud et al., 2021), forest-based enterprises (Lamsal et al., 2017), or environmentally driven enterprises (Gurău & Dana, 2018). The TCBE has influenced the studies in tourism entrepreneurship (Solvoll et al., 2015) and community and indigenous-based tourism (Giampiccoli & Saayman, 2018; Mayaka et al., 2018; Mtapuri & Giampiccoli, 2016). Some studies have used concepts like culture, religion, and ethnicity of the community (Chai-Arayalert et al., 2021; Dana & Dana, 2010; Fernandez-Jardon et al., 2020; Jardon & Martinez-Cobas, 2020), and cooperatives (Mastronardi et al., 2020; Muñoz et al., 2020).

The CBE structure has provided opportunities for women of impoverished communities to become self-reliant and contribute to their family’s economic upliftment (Okolie et al., 2021). This concept of CBE works on inclusivity and allows members to improve their living standards and strive for better living. CBEs contribute to the increment of income and bestow the strength and confidence to bring change to their community by themselves (Pinheiro et al., 2020).

3. Materials and methods

The present study follows the steps recommended by Block and Fisch (2020) and Block et al. (2019).

3.1. Literature search strategy

Bibliometric analysis is a specific form of systematic literature review (Block & Fisch, 2020); therefore, the authors undertook a systematic literature search to find the academic documents relating to the TCBE. The literature search has two steps—(a) identification of database and articles relating to the TCBE and (b) screening of articles using inclusion/exclusion criteria.

3.1.1. Identification of articles

Various databases are available to collect bibliometric data from articles like Scopus, Web of Science, Google Scholar, PubMed, and Dimension (Cobo et al., 2011). Elsevier-based Scopus is the largest database of multidisciplinary peer-reviewed documents (Mongeon & Paul-Hus, 2016) and is popular among social science researchers. Authors have considered the Scopus database for literature search because it is—

1. Large document source: Scopus has indexed numerous documents in social science and business, management and finance; therefore, sufficient data for bibliometric analysis can be procured.

2. Easy accessibility: the authors’ affiliated university has subscribed for institutional membership to provide full access to the database, reducing the possibility of missing important and relevant articles.

3. Format of the dataset file: the type of file required by visualisation software can be easily obtained from Scopus, like in CSV and BibTeX format.

These advantages of Scopus and its ease of analysing its data make it the appropriate choice. Further, Scopus has a combination of high-impact journals that lead the field and potential journals that contribute to the field’s development.

After contemplating the appropriateness of the database, a ‘topical query’ with the Boolean operator ‘AND’ was used to search the theory. The search string (‘theory’ AND ‘community-based enterprise’) search within the ‘Article Title’ category resulted in the seminal paper with the title ‘toward a theory of community-based enterprise’. All citations of the seminal paper are considered for the analysis to cover the holistic evolution of the TCBE. As a result, 644 studies were identified between 2005 and 2021.

3.1.2. Screening of articles

The obtained dataset was screened and filtered by applying inclusion/exclusion criteria in this step. It is a crucial step as it helps in identifying the irrelevant articles and missing data that may adversely affect the validity and relevance of the analysis. The dataset defines the scope of the study, and a refined dataset will yield relevant, replicable, and reliable results. The criteria are described in Table 2.

Table 2. Inclusion-exclusion criteria.

Inclusion criteria
Year	2006–2021
Document type	Articles and review
Source type	Journals
Language	English
Exclusion criteria
Manual cleaning	Articles with unstructured and inaccurate bibliometric information in the data file downloaded from Scopus are removed.

Source: Proposed by authors.

The TCBE continues to attract citations, but for defining the boundaries for this study, articles published till 2021 (final and articles in press) are considered. However, the updated file was downloaded on 4 May 2022, considering the fact that the Scopus database gets its annual update of CiteScore and other relevant parameters in May 2022 for 2021 (Elsevier, 2022). As the TCBE is a multidisciplinary theory, articles from all subject areas are included to understand theory usage across disciplines better. Only articles and review articles were considered to maintain the quality of analysis (Gyimah et al., 2023), as these document categories contribute to developing new knowledge. All other document types were excluded as they are mere repetitions of existing knowledge and are redundant (Ozturk, 2021). The reason behind including journals only as a document source is that they follow a peer-review publication process. The last step was cleaning the dataset containing bibliometric information downloaded after applying these criteria. The dataset file was manually checked to remove missing values and misinformation in articles, as it affects the data processing by the data visualisation and analysis tools. After all these steps, the final dataset is ready to be analysed using VOS Viewer (Van Eck & Waltman, 2010) and R Studio’s Bibliomatrix package (Aria & Cuccurullo, 2017).

3.2. Rationale behind using bibliometric tools

Bibliometric analysis is used to explore the domain’s intellectual structure under study. It is one of the most sought-after methods of analysing massive data and interpreting it objectively and subjectively together (Cobo et al., 2011; Donthu et al., 2021). Bibliometrics was first introduced by Pritchard (1969). It is a widely accepted methodology in many social science disciplines like Economics, Management, and Entrepreneurship (Zupic & Čater, 2015), which uses bibliographic data to analyse the structure and evolution of a research area (Valtakoski, 2019). The study uses bibliometric analysis for three reasons—Firstly, it helps decipher and rigorously map the TCBE. Secondly, it helps in processing extensive unstructured data; thirdly, it uses objective analysis of data with subjective interpretation to better understand the field studied.

There are two aspects of bibliometric analysis, also shown in Figure 1; one is performance analysis which examines the contributions of research constituents/measures of the field under study by analysing the number of articles published each year) and influence (number of citations per year). Other measures include citations per article (total citations divided by total articles) and the h-index (number of articles cited at least n times) (Alonso et al., 2009; Phan Tan, 2022). The second is science mapping, which examines the relationship between research constituents/measures (Baker et al., 2020; Ramos-Rodrígue & Ruíz-Navarro, 2004). It includes tools like citation analysis (Appio et al., 2014), co-citation analysis (Rossetto et al., 2018), bibliographic coupling (Kessler, 1963; Zupic & Čater, 2015).

Figure 1. Steps explaining the process of material and methods and analysis.

Source: Prepared by authors.

Authors have used this methodology to present the diverse application of various theories. To name a few bibliometric analysed theories are resource dependency theory (Ozturk, 2021), theory of constraints (Ikeziri et al., 2019), life-history theory (Nettle & Frankenhuis, 2019), fuzzy theory research in China (Yu et al., 2018) and grey system theory (Yin, 2013). Therefore, this methodology was considered appropriate for the present study.

4. Results and discussion

It has been established that bibliometric analysis effectively depicts and aligns the massive scientific raw data by comprehending the field into meaningful conclusions. The analysis helps sum up the progression of the field and elucidate it in terms that equip researchers to find the prospects in that field. The researcher wants to be true to the objectives of this scientometric analysis and has divided this part into performance analysis and network analysis of the literature relating to this theory.

According to the Scopus database, the TCBE has gained 644 citations in a short period of fifteen years. The distribution of citations in terms of document type comprises articles (73.1%), book chapters and books (18.3%), review articles (4.7%), conference papers (2.9%), and editorials (1.4%). It should be noted that TCBE is continuing to attract citations in 2022. This continuous increase in publications and citations for the theory depicts that the theory is relevant to the current scenario. Most of the documents citing the TCBE are published in premier journals.

The results of the bibliometric analysis of the theory are presented in this section. The results are presented under two categories, the first is a preliminary description of the articles using theory, and the second section is science mapping and network analysis.

4.1. Publication trend

These articles’ increasing publication and citations depict the theory’s popularity. Figure 2 is a bar graph where X-axis represents Years, and Y-axis represents Articles that have cited the TCBE in these years. An additional Z-axis represents the citations attracted by these articles each year. The maximum number of citations of 2519 were received by the articles published in 2012, as many thought-provoking articles covering cases from emerging economies were published in that year. The upward trend of publication and increasing citations support the growing nature of the field.

Figure 2. Publication trend of articles. Note: The figure also shows the number of citations received by the articles published each year from 2005 to 2021. N = 477.

Source: Prepared by authors.

4.2. Top contributing affiliation

Table 3 lists the institutes with the highest contribution in terms of publication. It represents the author’s affiliating institutions that have facilitated the authors with a conducive environment and encouraged them to publish articles in the field. The information in Table 3 will provide a broad idea about the institutions supporting research in the area. The most influential institutions promoting research relating to the TCBE are the Indiana University of Bloomington, the University of Victoria, and the Durban University of Technology, respectively, in terms of quantity of publications.

Table 3. Top contributing affiliations.

Rank	Affiliation	NP	Country
1	Indiana University Bloomington	13	USA
2	University of Victoria	11	Canada
3	Durban University of Technology	8	South Africa
4	Delft University of Technology	8	Netherlands
5	Nordlands Forskning	8	Norway
6	Erasmus Universiteit Rotterdam	7	Netherlands
7	Kelley School of Business	7	USA
8	Mississippi State University	6	USA
9	Universidad de Monterrey	6	Mexico
10	University of Otago	6	New Zealand

NP: number of publication.

Source: Prepared by authors using the Bibliometrix (R Studio).

4.3. Most contributing journals

Table 4 represents the top 10 most cited journals with their performance indicators publishing articles relating to the theory. As the table states, the top three journals based on the number of publications are the Journal of Enterprising Communities, Entrepreneurship: Theory and Practice (ET&P), and Journal of Business Venturing (JBV). However, ET&P has the highest h index and g index. Still, JBV has the highest m index, indicating that this journal made a better mark in the field in a shorter period, providing an edge over other journals. The m index is calculated considering 2022 in the number of production years.

Table 4. Most contributing journals.

Rank	Journal name	NP	h Index	g Index	m* Index	TC	PY Start
1	Journal of Enterprising Communities	25	12	16	1	309	2011
2	Entrepreneurship: Theory and Practice	20	16	20	1	2764	2007
3	Journal of Business Venturing	19	15	19	1.07	2211	2009
4	Entrepreneurship and Regional Development	18	14	17	0.93	801	2008
5	Journal of Business Ethics	17	11	16	0.78	1118	2009
6	Journal of Social Entrepreneurship	17	11	16	0.84	374	2010
7	Sustainability (Switzerland)	15	6	11	0.66	141	2014
8	International Journal of Entrepreneurship and Small Business	14	6	11	0.42	139	2009
9	Journal of Business Research	7	5	6	0.38	97	2010
10	Organization	7	4	6	0.3	156	2010

TC: total citation.

Note: The m index is calculated considering 2022 in the number of production years.

Source: Prepared by authors using the Bibliometrix (R Studio).

4.4. Most prolific authors

Table 5 provides the topmost authors publishing in the area based on the number of productions. All these authors are top contributors in their respective areas, and the ranking in Table 5 is based only on the number of studies considered for analysis. Shepherd et al. are the three most-cited authors, with 1231, 993, and 568 citations. Although Peredo and Chrisman have propounded the TCBE, Shepherd, who works in sustainable entrepreneurship, has emerged as the most influential author based on all parameters. Giampiccoli and Mtapuri worked together and have published on community-based tourism. While Peredo publishes in CBE covering cultural aspects focusing on poverty reduction. Kleinhans explores the area of Community Entrepreneurship, and Chrisman holds expertise in the family business and family firm area. Other productive authors include Dana (Entrepreneurship based on cases from America), Mazzarol (Cooperatives and Small and Medium Enterprises), Meyer (the commons, social finance, and the collective financial welfare), and Ratten (sports-based entrepreneurship).

Table 5. Most prolific authors.

Rank	Authors	Production	h Index	g Index	m Index	TC	PY start
1	Shepherd DA	10	10	10	0.83	1231	2011
2	Giampiccoli A	8	6	8	0.6	194	2013
3	Peredo AM	8	6	8	0.33	993	2005
4	Kleinhans R	7	5	6	0.62	99	2015
5	Dana LP	6	5	5	0.31	139	2007
6	Chrisman JJ	5	5	5	0.35	568	2009
7	Mazzarol T	5	4	5	0.4	81	2013
8	Meyer C	5	4	5	0.66	58	2017
9	Mtapuri O	5	4	5	0.4	119	2013
10	Ratten V	5	5	5	0.38	295	2010

TC: total citation; PY: publication year.

Source: Prepared by authors using the Bibliometrix (R Studio).

4.5. Most prominent articles

Table 6 below states the most cited documents with the TCBE, as the underlying theory from 2005 to 2021. As can be deduced from the table, Peredo and McLean (2006), ‘Social Entrepreneurship: A critical review of the concept’ with 783 citations, article by Mair and Marti (2009), ‘Entrepreneurship in and around institutional voids: A case study from Bangladesh’ and ‘A Positive Theory of Social Entrepreneurship’ by Santos (2012) with 673 and 580 citations, respectively.

Table 6. Most prominent articles.

Rank	Title of document	Authors	Year	TC
1	Social entrepreneurship: A critical review of the concept	Peredo AM, & McLean M.	2006	814
2	Entrepreneurship in and around institutional voids: A case study from Bangladesh	Mair J, & Marti, I.	2009	723
3	A positive theory of social entrepreneurship	Santos FM	2012	634
4	Social bricolage: Theorizing social value creation in social enterprises	Di Domenico M, Haugh H., Tracey P.	2010	554
5	The new field of sustainable entrepreneurship: Studying entrepreneurial action linking “what is to be sustained” with “what is to be developed”	Shepherd DA, Patzelt H.	2011	457
6	Research on entrepreneurship in the informal economy: Framing a research agenda	Webb JW, Burton GD, Tihanyi L & Ireland RD,	2013	292
7	The adolescence of family firm research: Taking stock & planning for the future	Gedajlovic E, Carney M, Chrisman JJ, & Kellermanns FW	2012	277
8	Multilevel challenges and opportunities in social capital research	Payne GT,	2011	275
9	Recognising opportunities for sustainable development	Patzelt, H., Shepherd, D.A.	2011	274
10	Entrepreneurship, social capital, and institutions: Social and commercial entrepreneurship across nations	Estrin S, Mickiewicz T, Stephan U.	2013	272

TC: total citation.

Source: Prepared by authors using the Bibliometrix (R Studio).

4.6. Top contributing countries

Table 7 provides the top ten countries contributing to social entrepreneurship and community enterprises between 2005 and 2021. Each country’s contribution was calculated as the total number of articles published by an affiliated institution of a nation, and citations received by those articles signify countries with the most impactful articles. Each author’s contribution was considered an affiliation to their country. In this list, India holds the 19th position with 64 citations.

Table 7. Top contributing countries.

Rank	Country	Total articles
1	USA	147
2	UK	83
3	Canada	58
4	Australia	39
5	Spain	29
6	Italy	26
7	France	26
8	Germany	22
9	Netherlands	21
10	South Africa	20

Source: Prepared by authors using the Bibliometrix (R Studio).

4.7. Trending words

An analysis that uses notional words from the documents and maps the concepts. The lines denote the use of the concept in years, and nodes depict the frequency of its use in articles. The bigger the node, the more frequently that concept is used. Figure 3 maps these frequently used concepts in articles over time. It explains the concepts that gained popularity through time. It can be observed from recent articles that concepts like social inclusion, social change, rural population, and poverty have attracted the attention of authors.

Figure 3. Trending words.

Source: Created using Bibliometrix (R Studio).

4.8. Bibliographic coupling

Bibliographic coupling based on documents to a data set results in cluster formation where each cluster contains the documents, sharing similar references resulting in a common theme. For the current data set, documents are bibliographically coupled into five clusters. These clusters were analysed manually, and a theme was assigned to each of them, reflecting the contents of the articles from each cluster and, therefore, may have subjectivity (Baker et al., 2020). A total of 473 articles met the threshold out of 477 means that those four articles are not connected with any of the documents. Two documents are bibliographically coupled when the have one or many common referred articles. The greater the number of articles common in the bibliography of two documents, the higher the coupling strength is. In VOS viewer, the bibliographic coupling based on the document is an analysis where articles are clubbed together when they cite the same articles. Hence clusters are generated for those documents that have common cited articles. Furthermore, when any document does not have a common citation, VOS viewer eliminates those documents from clusters (that happened for four documents for this study).

The first cluster analyses relationships, the studies grouped in this cluster either build or test relationships among various concepts. The second cluster summarises those studies contributing to developing conceptual models and providing theoretical support to new models. The third cluster is themed as traits of social and community ventures as articles under this cluster advance by identifying and supporting the common characteristics of social ventures. The fourth cluster talks about the sustainability of entrepreneurship and the development of entrepreneurial culture. The last cluster has articles that talk about innovative actions by the community for the success of their enterprises. The summary of cluster-wise information is available in Table 8, where publication and citation metrics of each cluster with the top three cited and two recent articles with their information are provided.

Table 8. Cluster table.

Cluster number	Cluster focus	TP	TC	Range of publication years	Cited articles	Citation per published article	Citation per cited article	Most cited articles
								Author	Title	Year	TC
Cluster 1	Relationships analysis	250	4704	2006–2021	229	18.816	20.541	Gedajlovic E., Carney M., Chrisman J.J., Kellermanns F.W.	The adolescence of family firm research: Taking stock and planning for the future	2012	277
								Wang T., Bansal P.	Social responsibility in new ventures: Profiting from a long-term orientation	2012	232
								Barkema H.G., Chen X.-P., George G., Luo Y., Tsui A.S.	West meets East: New concepts and theories	2015	208
								Shepherd D.A., Gruber M.	The lean startup framework: Closing the academic–practitioner divide	2021	45
								Troisi O., Visvizi A., Grimaldi M.	The different shades of innovation emergence in smart service systems: The case of Italian cluster for aerospace technology	2021	31
Cluster 2	Theorising and developing conceptual framework/modelling	110	4504	2008–2021	106	40.954	42.490	Santos F.M.	A positive theory of social entrepreneurship	2012	628
								Estrin S., Mickiewicz T., Stephan U.	Entrepreneurship, social capital, and institutions: Social and commercial entrepreneurship across nations	2013	272
								Datta P.B.	Empowering women through social entrepreneurship: Case study of a women’s cooperative in India	2012	238
								Weerawardena J., Salunke S., Haigh N., Sullivan Mort G.	Business model innovation in social purpose organisations: Conceptualising dual social-economic value creation	2021	25
								Cardella G.M.	Social entrepreneurship research: Intellectual structures and future perspectives	2021	3
Cluster 3	Traits of social and community ventures	79	5651	2005–2021	78	71.531	72.448	Mair J., Marti I.	Entrepreneurship in and around institutional voids: A case study from Bangladesh	2009	721
								Di Domenico, Haugh & Tracey	Social bricolage: Theorising social value creation in social enterprises	2010	552
								Webb, Bruton, Tihanyi & Ireland	Research on entrepreneurship in the informal economy: Framing a research agenda	2013	291
								Korsgaard, Müller, & Welter	It’s right nearby: How entrepreneurs use spatial bricolage to overcome resource constraints	2021	7
								Liu, Xiao, Jiang, & Hu	Social entrepreneurs’ personal network, resource bricolage and relation strength	2021	5
Cluster 4	Development and sustainability of entrepreneurship culture	20	1987	2006–2021	19	99.350	104.578	Peredo & McLean	Social entrepreneurship: A critical review of the concept	2006	811
								Shepherd & Patzelt	The new field of sustainable entrepreneurship: Studying entrepreneurial action linking “what is to be sustained” with “what is to be developed”	2011	456
								Patzelt & Shepherd	Recognising opportunities for sustainable development	2011	271
								Pansera & Fressoil	Innovation without growth: Frameworks for understanding technological change in a post-growth era	2021	4
								Saleem, Yasir Arafat, Balhareth, Hussain & Dwivedi	Cognitive aspects of disadvantaged entrepreneurs: Evidence from India	2021	1
Cluster 5	Innovative community initiatives for thriving enterprise	14	230	2012–2021	14	16.428	16.428	Linna P.	Bricolage as a means of innovating in a resource-scarce environment: A study of innovator-entrepreneurs at the bop	2013	65
								Natsuda K., Igusa K., Wiboonpongse A., Thoburn J.	One village one product – Rural development strategy in Asia: The case of OTOP in Thailand	2012	30
								Innes J.	New Zealand ecosanctuaries: Types, attributes and outcomes	2019	29
								Hertel C., Binder J., Fauchart E.	Getting more from many—A framework of community resourcefulness in new venture creation	2021	4
								Haugh H.M.	The governance of entrepreneurial community ventures: How do conflicting community interests influence opportunity exploitation?	2021	1

TP: total production (total published article); TC: total citation.

Note: The table provides information about each cluster.

Source: Prepared by authors.

4.8.1. Cluster 1: Relationships analysis

The largest cluster comprises 250 articles with 4704 citations. These articles focus on exploring the relationships between various constructs, theories, enterprises, family businesses, and the orientation of management enterprises. This cluster has covered articles extrapolating the theory of community-based enterprises in different facets of entrepreneurship, like family firms, sports-based, social and community enterprises, and stakeholders’ orientation. The most cited article in this cluster has 277 citations by Gedajlovic et al. (2012). The authors explore the adolescent literature in the family business and how it still has the potential to ‘give back’ to the stream of organisational sciences. The next most cited article carries 232 citations by Wang and Bansal (2012). In this article, the authors test relationships between new ventures and findings from established corporations regarding socially responsible activities and how these activities generate positive economic returns for survival. Barkema et al. (2015) follow the streak of most citations with 208 in which authors studied the influence of management paradigms from North America and offers insights from the east, highlighting the contextual differences and supports the integration of the Eastern and Western concepts for the development of the field.

The two most recent articles in this cluster are from 2021 and have received 45 and 31 citations. The first article has taken a core topic of the lean start-up framework to reduce the academic-practitioner gap in entrepreneurship literature and suggests exploring how this framework differs in social start-up building, addressing societal challenges and community problems (Shepherd & Gruber, 2021). The second article, authored by Troisi et al. (2021), explores the relationship between innovation and value creation. There are different approaches to studying innovation. The community-based enterprise theory explores the social-oriented approach to social innovation and value co-creation in the entrepreneurial ecosystem.

4.8.2. Cluster 2: Theorising and developing conceptual framework/modelling

This is the second-largest cluster with 110 articles with 4504 massive citations. This cluster is a sum of studies contributing to the area’s development and conceptual framework evolution and provides a thriving business model. The most highly cited article, with 628 citations, is by Santos (2012), who establishes a conceptual framework of social entrepreneurship as a sustainable solution to overlooked problems. The next most cited article is by Estrin et al. (2013), with 272 citations. The article implements social capital theory to test the relationship between social and commercial entrepreneurship and proposes a model that depicts the country’s entrepreneurial model. The third most cited article has 238 citations, authored by Datta and Gailey (2012), a case study from the Indian context, one of the first women cooperatives ‘Lijjat’ assessing the cooperative elements of the business model and empowerment perceptions of the members.

The two recent papers published under this cluster are from 2021. One is by Weerawardena et al. (2021) that works to fill the gap by developing a conceptual framework reflecting the use of Business Model Innovation (BMI) for the progression of non-profit social purpose organisations, BMI like these will help in capturing the impact of the dual-natured organisation. The second paper is by Cardella et al. (2021), a review article summarising the research on social entrepreneurship, bringing out the literature’s conceptual structures and providing further study guidance.

4.8.3. Cluster 3: Traits of social and community ventures

The third cluster contains 79 articles with a total citation of 5651, spanning from 2005 to 2021. The studies in this cluster show the characterisation of essential traits mentioned in the TCBE. The articles in this cluster have centred their studies on social capital, embeddedness, bricolage, poverty alleviation, and inclusive growth, salient features of a thriving CBE. The top-cited article in this cluster is by Mair and Marti (2009), carry 721 citations that illustrate the entrepreneurial activities that need to be introduced for crafting a new institutional arrangement to fill the gap and to promote and open the opportunities to participate) participation of those living at the base of the pyramid/rural areas. Another highly cited article by Di Domenico et al. (2010) with 552 citations is an article that discusses in depth the concept of social bricolage, an essential trait of CBEs. The third article has 291 citations by Webb et al. (2013). In this article, the author blends three theoretical perspectives to identify the conditions for entrepreneurs surviving to work in an informal economy.

The recent most influential articles in this cluster are by Korsgaard and Liu, both from 2021. The article by Korsgaard et al. (2021) discusses spatial bricolage and how local entrepreneurs use it to overcome constraints. The second paper by Liu et al. (2020) deals with the personal network of social entrepreneurs that leads to the formation of social capital. The article also states the use of social capital to overcome the limitations of resources that are the features of CBE and are used by social entrepreneurs to strengthen the association for enterprise development.

4.8.4. Cluster 4: Development and sustainability of entrepreneurship culture

The fourth cluster has 20 articles with a total citation of 1987 elaborating on the factors influencing the stimuli leading to the development of enterprise and entrepreneurial behaviour among community members and discussing the sustainability of these enterprises. The most highly cited article is by Peredo and Chrisman (2006), a review article that critically evaluates the concept of social entrepreneurship. It is one of the first review articles to provide an overview of an emerging concept like social entrepreneurship. It is followed by the article with 456 citations by Shepherd and Patzelt (2011), in which authors address entrepreneurship through sustainable development literature and suggests research questions to be further explored through two different perspectives that are ‘what is to be developed’ and ‘what is to be sustained’. Furthermore, in the third article, Patzelt and Shepherd (2011), with 271 citations, propose a model in which the authors suggest that entrepreneurs will be able to identify a sustainable opportunity only when they have a better understanding of the ecological and natural environment. The author suggests that entrepreneurial knowledge plays a moderating role in recognising opportunities for sustainable development.

The recent two publications in this cluster are from 2021 by Pansera and Saleem. In their paper, Pansera and Fressoli (2021) propose a newer approach to achieving growth by backing the use of bottom-up initiatives and social constructs in forming an equitable society. This new approach will also reduce the sole weightage on innovation to bring development. Another recent paper by Saleem et al. (2021) identifies the antecedents leading to the formation and sustenance of CBE in resource-constrained areas. The study has also highlighted its findings of features that enable people to take up the role of entrepreneur.

4.8.5. Cluster 5: Innovative community initiatives for thriving enterprise

The fifth cluster is the last cluster, with 14 articles and 230 citations. It explores the governance of CBE, resourcefulness, resilient community, innovative initiatives like OVOP (one village, one product), and ecosanctuaries for community and enterprise. The top three cited articles are by Innes et al. (2019), Linna (2013), and Natsuda et al. (2012). The first article by Linna (2013) highlights the role bricolage plays in innovating affordable solutions by local entrepreneurs for rural people. The second paper by Natsuda et al. (2012) highlights the positive role played by a/or/the success of program/policy/scheme by government OVOP/OTOP in generating opportunities for communities to market their local output and prosper. In the third paper, Innes et al. (2019) talk about the ecosanctuaries of New Zealand. It highlights the consequences of building forest-based community enterprises while exploring the features and types of ecosanctuaries. It helps in creating a more close-knitted community.

One recently published article in this cluster by Hertel et al. (2021) projects the community’s resourcefulness in mobilising the required resources and how engagement with the local community perpetuates the flow of unsolicited resources for efficient working of the venture. The second article, by Haugh (2021), reveals how the governance system in CBEs helps take advantage of the available opportunity and saves the community interest from getting exploited.

4.8.6. Future research scope

Based on clusters that emerged from bibliographic coupling analysis, the authors provide ten future research agendas, which researchers can use as the base for future multi-discipline research.

1. Investigate the interrelationship of an entrepreneurial mindset and psychological ownership in the establishment of an enterprise that works on hybrid goals.

2. Analyse the emergence of innovation from value co-creation focusing on emerging markets. This analysis can further be improved by using a mixed-method or multi-case study approach to gain a better understanding.

3. Test the conceptual framework of the business model for hybrid enterprise proposed by Weerawardena et al. (2021) with different cases and develop measures for key constructs of the framework.

4. More studies from emerging nations should come up on social entrepreneurship and community-based enterprises.

5. There is a need for development in understanding bricolage and how available resources in geographical regions are utilized to develop an enterprise.

6. The role of social capital, significance, and degree of presence should be further explored from the sustenance perspective of an enterprise.

7. Researchers can work on identifying alternative organisations and conditions leading to their emergence and sustenance.

8. More exploration must be done for ‘disadvantaged community entrepreneurship’.

9. The concept of community resourcefulness and its potential for new venture creation should be dug deeper to understand its benefits to the enterprise and community.

10. The concept of community stakeholder governance should be explored to understand what kind of benefits it offers and whether it offers a solution to the problem of community size—a feature of successful CBE (Peredo & Chrisman, 2006).

4.9. Thematic evolution analysis

Keyword co-occurrence analysis assumes that author keywords adequately represent an article’s themes. Their co-occurrence shows patterns and trends in any discipline (Comerio & Strozzi, 2019). It helps identify major recurring themes in any literature (Kumar et al., 2020). Figure 4 is a three-field plot mapping the evolution of the author’s keyword in articles. It describes the evolution of keywords used by authors, stating the areas in which articles are published. It provides temporal evolution of authors’ keywords for the duration divided into three time frames. The article propounding the theory of CBE was published in 2006 and was considered the base for identifying the time frame. The first-time frame was from 2005 to 2010; this was a very nascent stage for the theory, but the research community adopted it well. The second time frame is from 2011 to 2017 when the theory started gaining popularity among researchers in entrepreneurship and social enterprises. The theory was adopted for testing in developing economies during this time frame.

Figure 4. Three-field plot showing the temporal evolution of keywords. The complete duration is divided into three-time slices.

Source: Prepared by authors using Bibliometrix (R Studio).

The third and last time frame is from 2018 to 2021; this frame depicts the current stream of research with this theory. The logic of dividing the author’s keywords into these time frames is the subjective observation of the authors. After analysing publication trends, titles, abstracts, and keywords of documents, it was observed that the growth of the theory started in 2011; therefore, from 2011 to 2017 was identified as a single time frame. While doing research, a general rule of the last 3–4 years is followed to accommodate contemporary studies in the field; therefore, to accommodate and view the flow of contemporary studies under the theory, the time frame of 2018–2021 is considered. Thematic maps of these time frames are analysed to identify the Basic, Motor, Niche, and Emerging themes. For each time frame, a thematic map was generated using a keyword plus to analyse the Basic, Motor, Niche, and Emerging themes.

4.9.1. Thematic map for time slice 1

The basic theme for the evolution of the theory of community-based enterprises lies in entrepreneurship and social entrepreneurship for identifying a tool for the economic development of communities. Therefore, as Figure 5 reports, among the articles of this time frame, the emphasis was on explaining and identifying ways to nurture entrepreneurs. The motor theme of corporate social responsibility, the bottom of the pyramid, social capital, and resource allocation signify that these keywords are attracting the attention of researchers and are used by them in numerous studies during this time frame.

Figure 5. Temporal evolution—time slice 1.

Source: Created using Bibliometrix (R Studio).

4.9.2. Thematic map for time slice 2

Figure 6 explains the growth of the TCBE. Basic themes expanded as articles published in this time frame took social capital, cooperatives, sustainability, community, community development, and social entrepreneurship and entrepreneurship from the previous time frame. The authors have also slightly touched upon social venture and institutional theory. Moreover, attention was given to studying indigenous entrepreneurship and its impact on the uplifting rural economy using community-based enterprises as a tool to induce development in the developing world and promote sustainable development.

Figure 6. Temporal evolution—time slice 2.

Source: Created using Bibliometrix (R Studio).

4.9.3. Thematic map for time slice 3

Figure 7 depicts the mapping of the latest themes addressed by scholars. The use of theory has evolved from just being a niche topic in social entrepreneurship to accommodating initiatives to ignite the development of the rural economy in practical terms. Nevertheless, the literature is still inching toward growth. The increasing publication denotes the development of the TCBE. The movement of keywords shows the usage of keywords, and in this time slice, new keywords like community-based tourism and business corporations have emerged from the studies. It has also opened multiple opportunities for further studying the use of this theory in different facets of research.

Figure 7. Temporal evolution—time slice 3.

Source: Created using Bibliometrix (R Studio).

4.10. Keyword co-occurrence

Figure 8 represents the co-occurrence of author keywords from the articles considered for review. It highlights social enterprise, entrepreneurship, community-based enterprise, sustainable development, social capital, community, development, innovation, indigenous entrepreneurship, and poverty alleviation as hotspots. Most authors used these diverse words to represent their work and the multidisciplinary nature of the TCBE.

Figure 8. Co-occurrence analysis of author keywords.

Source: Created using VOS Viewer.

Keywords like community development, embeddedness, resilience, indigenous, bricolage, social network, and rural communities are deeply rooted in the TCBE; however, has lower frequency but better total link strength. The emerging hotspots are embeddedness, bricolage, developing nations, ethnography, geographical location, and culture. Exploring the association of these keywords from CBE and indigenous entrepreneurship will open exciting opportunities and help identify the implication of these concepts for sustainable rural development. Future researchers should study the TCBE in these emerging hotspots to contribute to the theory’s development, focusing on empirical mixed-method studies. Table 9 lists the most co-occurring authors’ keywords.

Table 9. Keyword co-occurrence.

Keywords	Freq	TLS
Social entrepreneurship	86	188
Entrepreneurship	61	137
Community-based enterprise	42	106
Sustainability	41	116
Social enterprise	38	114
Social capital	24	61
Community	23	57
Poverty alleviation	19	45
Economic development	18	45
Innovation	18	46
Cooperatives	16	30
Social innovation	16	39
Community-based entrepreneurship	15	54
Embeddedness	15	42
Indigenous entrepreneurship	15	27
MSME	15	38
Social networks	15	45
Community development	13	25
Resilience	13	33
Developing countries	11	30
Bottom of the pyramid	10	24
Community-based tourism	10	16
Corporate social responsibility	10	20
Indigenous communities	10	31
Corporate entrepreneurship	9	19
Gender	9	25
Literature review	9	21
Common good	8	14
Family business	8	13
Hybrid organizations	8	23
Sense of place	8	18
Social economy	8	20
Social venture	8	12
Sustainable entrepreneurship	8	20
Tourism industry	8	21
Business model innovation	7	16
Community participation	7	17
Latin America	7	23
Social value	7	18
Value creation	7	15
Bricolage	6	15
Culture	6	22
Ethics	6	9
Social performance	6	19
South Africa	6	16
Africa	5	10
China	5	10
Firm performance	5	9

TLS: total link strength.

Note: This table lists the most occurring keywords with their frequency and total link strength. Prepared using VOS Viewer.

Source: Prepared by authors using data from VOS Viewer.

5. Conclusion

Very few studies try to map the literature associated with a theory, and this study is one of them. It is unique also as no other review was conducted to comprehend the use of the TCBE. It provides a comprehensive overview of the TCBE literature using bibliometric tools. We mapped the field using performance and network analysis tools to get a current sketch of the use of theory and its related literature. The analysis shows a positive reception of the TCBE among researchers, with an upward trend in articles citing the theory. It has led to some crucial findings regarding using theory in research gap identification and substantiating future research avenues based on the outcomes of the research analysis. The findings captured, and recommendations for future studies below are associated with developing theory and community-based enterprises.

1. Granados et al. (2011) criticised using multiple words and models to represent the work on CBE, leading to the under-utilisation of this theory. Even though the number of studies relating to the theory has increased, the multiple vocabularies used to represent have hindered the area’s growth and taken the focus from rural community development to complexities of understanding the terms used. The following gamuts represent the same concept of inclusive rural development—community-led organisations, indigenous entrepreneurship, community-led social ventures, social purpose organisations, place-based organisations, and more. In these terms, the scholars working in the area need to identify the various terms/phases/terminologies used in the literature to address the same issue, define them, and try to bring uniformity in terminology to represent the CBEs. It need not be a single term/phase, but an umbrella term can be identified and promoted. Under the umbrella term, specific terms may be used that may be specific to the problems addressed, like community-based tourism enterprises and community-based forest enterprises. This will bring more structure to the body of literature and encourage and attract researchers for more contributions toward developing the TCBE and CBEs.

2. Though it is a multidisciplinary theory, it is used in a broad spectrum of areas in literature. Authors have referred to the TCBE with social entrepreneurship theories, new venture creation, family business, start-up frameworks, value creation, governance and polity, and cooperatives. These various studies show the promising nature of TCBE and enhanced utility in multidisciplinary research. However, the literature review demonstrates ample opportunities to validate the theory, assumptions, and characteristics by conducting more studies to identify CBEs worldwide. It will help advance the theory, identify cultural differences and similarities, and make the TCBE universally relevant. The insightful case studies and narratives will help grow and strengthen the roots of the TCBE. The multidisciplinary studies will expand its relevance and develop the theory as a multi-utility theory to bring inclusive and sustainable development to an area/community.

3. The orientation of the literature associated with the theory of CBE is limited to developing it as a niche area. Keyword co-occurrence analysis shows that CBEs are still considered a small unit/sub-section of entrepreneurship and social entrepreneurship. Keywords like social enterprises, entrepreneurship, sustainable development, corporate social responsibility, and innovation are used prominently in the literature that defines the broad application of the theory of CBE. However, to advance the theory of CBE, more studies are required to address these deep-rooted concepts and relations like bricolage, embeddedness, socio-culture, indigenous knowledge, resourcefulness, and social capital. We also suggest that the researchers explore the role and contribution of the theory of bricolage and social capital theory from a community and social entrepreneurship angle in the future.

4. To comprehend the contribution of CBEs in reducing regional disparity, it is crucial to study their structure and work. Handy et al. (2011) have undertaken a study explaining the success of the CBE concept in bringing economic development to a community. They concluded that the structure of CBE is impactful in solving rural development problems. Contemporary researchers are productively using TCBE, and researchers should take this approach to analyse CBEs from different socio-cultural backgrounds. These studies will help in highlighting the similarities and differences to make the conceptual framework provided by the TCBE more robust. It will help in identifying the factors from CBEs that lead them to success or struggle to thrive. Learnings from these studies will contribute to enhancing the performance of CBE across the globe and provide the policyholders and members of CBE to prosper.

5. In the analysis, the authors explore the community initiatives to conserve the biosphere around them and exploit tourism opportunities available in their area. Various connotations are used for community initiatives towards biosphere conservation like Community Forestry Enterprise, Ecopreneurship, Environmentally Driven community entrepreneurship, and Forest-based SMEs. There is a lack of systematic studies which authors can explore in the future. The analysis results show that more organised literature concerning community-led tourism enterprises is available. There are articles proposing models (Mtapuri & Giampiccoli, 2016) and stating/boasting the success story of female-led tourism enterprises. These tourism enterprises play a role in creating local employment and conserving culture and environment (Zapalska & Brozik, 2017). There is also an angle of sports coming out to be helpful in the formation of entrepreneurial organisations. Studies suggest that sports fulfill socio-economic and recreational functions and create a close community (González-Serrano et al., 2021). There is a scarcity of studies in the literature addressing these aspects of community-led initiatives while studying Community-tourism enterprises, community-forestry enterprises, and sports-based enterprises.

6. The TCBEs conceptual framework signifies that if a community acts as an enterprise collectively, this will lead to the development of the community. Along with economic benefits and belief in their indigenous knowledge, studies should identify the over and above benefits of implementing the CBE model in their community. The importance of culture and indigenous skills must be highlighted, and all efforts should be engaged to preserve them. Some studies have identified the benefits of increased cooperative spirits, social cohesion, leadership, and managerial capacities development, co-existence, and faith in themselves for their growth. Further studies should identify these benefits, motivating other communities to adopt the CBE model. One challenge that all CBEs face other than operational inadequacy is keeping members actively involved and engaged in the workings of CBEs. Many CBEs have failed for this reason, and in future studies, authors must try to identify and suggest solutions to maintain members embedded and engaged in the CBEs’ activities. One such case study has stated the organisation of music festivals to bring people close (Vestrum, 2014). The role played by external support like NGOs or government is another essential factor that should not be overlooked while studying CBEs, and their influence and degree of involvement should be considered.

7. The profuse benefits of CBE state that other nations should use it, especially developing and underdeveloped nations. It will help quasi-automate the development process, bring down regional disparity, and induce a sustainable and holistic development of all the country’s communities. The policymakers must emulate the success of the CBE structure in their country. There cannot be a rigid format of CBEs that can be copy-pasted. Still, the essence of CBEs remains the same, and therefore more studies should be undertaken to understand the communities and similarities and differences in communities across the world.

8. Based on the performance analysis, it has been observed that the top contributing countries in community-based enterprises are the developed nations like USA, UK, and Canada. Though some studies have considered cases from developing countries like Bangladesh and India, their representation is meagre. Communities are indigenous and unique to a specific area and have guiding principles, norms, and customs for working. The authors suggest that more studies should be taken to identify the various working techniques that will improve and provide a comprehensive status of CBEs worldwide. These studies will help identify new ways of operating and managing CBEs. Other struggling CBEs may also emulate the best practices and redressal system of successful CBEs. It will benefit policymakers by proposing better policies for developing remote areas.

After featuring the future scope of study from the analysis, the following are the potential methodological limitations that can be considered for future studies. This descriptive review has tried to cover and represent the literature broadly. It provides a content analysis of selected trending articles, so in-depth content analysis is recommended in the future. This study has included the data till 2021 to have stable bibliographic data, and the recent articles can be considered for future studies. The TCBE shows potential for other types of literature review like systematic, scoping reviews, or meta-synthesis as bibliometric analysis limits quantitative measures. There is also an opportunity for researchers to take each cluster as a database for future studies. Lastly, we have only considered the Scopus database for bibliographic data, and future researchers can use various databases to compile the relevant studies.

Acknowledgements

We would like to express our gratitude to the Department of Commerce, MAHE, Manipal, India, for providing facilities that have helped us complete the study.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

No direct funding is received by any of the authors for conducting this study.

Notes on contributors

Aamrapali Sharma

Aamrapali Sharma is a doctoral student pursuing her degree from the Department of Commerce, Manipal Academy of Higher Education, Manipal, Karnataka (India), under the guidance of Dr Sandeep Shenoy. She is interested in Community-Based Enterprise, Sustainable Development, Social Entrepreneurship, and Indigenous knowledge.

Sandeep S. Shenoy

Sandeep S. Shenoy works as a Professor at the Department of Commerce and holds the position of Director of Compliance at Manipal Academy of Higher Education, Manipal, Karnataka (India). He holds a PhD in behavioural finance, and his interests focus on Entrepreneurship, Sustainability, Behavioral, and Applied Finance. He has authored many articles in reputed journals in these and related areas.