Cultural Industries in International Business Research: Progress and Prospect

Cultural industries—systems of organizations that produce and distribute cultural goods with substantive symbolic, aesthetic, or artistic value—represent an important, exciting, and complex context that receives growing scholarly attention. As the first review of management research on cultural industries, this paper aims to provide a systematic synthesis of current research, summarizing distinctive characteristics of cultural industries and highlighting research gaps. We also illustrate how the unique nature, dynamics, and evolution of cultural industries provide opportunities to broaden international business theories in four research themes (i.e., internationalization strategy, cross-border innovation, social inclusion in the global economy, and emerging market research).