ABSTRACT
This chapter aims to consolidate the status of academic research on business and development and to identify the state of the art within the emerging academic discipline. It discusses the business and development studies represent an emerging academic discipline in its own right. Specifically, business and development studies constitute an academic research discipline, a profession, and an applied social science subject. Because business and development studies are normative in approach, writings in this academic discipline tend to feature policy recommendations about what businesses, states, nongovernmental organizations, trade unions, and other stakeholders should do to promote the development and regulation of the private sector. An important theme relates to the business strategies of micro, small, and medium-sized enterprises, which typically account for 80 to 90 percent of all employment, often in informal economy settings.
