Dr. Wubiao Zhou (Joseph) is an Associate Professor of Small Business and Entrepreneurship in the Department of Management, Birmingham Business School at the University of Birmingham, United Kingdom. Previously, he worked in Newcastle University Business School at Newcastle University, Department of Sociology at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, and Division of Sociology at Nanyang Technological University. He obtained a Ph.D. in Economic and Organizational Sociology from Cornell University, and M.A. and B.A., both in Sociology, from Peking University, China.
Adopting quantitative and analytic methods, he has been working in the research areas of Economic and Organizational Sociology, Entrepreneurship, Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs), and Social Networks and Social Capital, with a focus on emerging and transition economies, particularly, China. He has published widely in leading entrepreneurship and development studies journals such as Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, Journal of Business Venturing, Small Business Economics, and World Development. His research has been funded by external agencies such as Research Grants Council of Hong Kong and Natural Science Foundation of China, and has received various best paper awards such as the Emerald Citations of Excellence Award from the Emerald Group Publishing, Global Development Award (finalist) from the Global Development Network (GDN), and Best Doctoral Student Award from the Academy of Management. He is currently serving on the Editorial Review Board of Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice.
Using recent large-scale data, Wubiao Zhou is currently working on several major projects in the following lines of research:
Wubiao Zhou has supervised a number of doctoral and research master's (MPhil) students. Potential doctoral students with research interests in either entrepreneurship or SME development or business strategies are welcome to apply. Those with good training in quantitative methods are particularly welcome. He can be reached at [email protected].
Adopting quantitative and analytic methods, he has been working in the research areas of Economic and Organizational Sociology, Entrepreneurship, Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs), and Social Networks and Social Capital, with a focus on emerging and transition economies, particularly, China. He has published widely in leading entrepreneurship and development studies journals such as Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, Journal of Business Venturing, Small Business Economics, and World Development. His research has been funded by external agencies such as Research Grants Council of Hong Kong and Natural Science Foundation of China, and has received various best paper awards such as the Emerald Citations of Excellence Award from the Emerald Group Publishing, Global Development Award (finalist) from the Global Development Network (GDN), and Best Doctoral Student Award from the Academy of Management. He is currently serving on the Editorial Review Board of Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice.
Using recent large-scale data, Wubiao Zhou is currently working on several major projects in the following lines of research:
- Institutions and entrepreneurship. In this area, while he is continuing research on the role of formal regulatory institutions in entrepreneurship, he has recently been researching the role of informal normative institutions (ideology, cultural norms such as those based on kinship networks) and formal political institutions (democracy and democratic governance).
- Firm political activities and strategies. In this research line, building on his previous research, he has been working on a project to comparing network-based political activities/capital with property-rights-based ones.
- Corporate networks and Chinese state capitalism. With Dr Jianhua Ge at Renmin University of China, he is using panel data of Chinese listed companies to understand the economic and political consequences of structural cohesion among Chinese listed corporations.
Wubiao Zhou has supervised a number of doctoral and research master's (MPhil) students. Potential doctoral students with research interests in either entrepreneurship or SME development or business strategies are welcome to apply. Those with good training in quantitative methods are particularly welcome. He can be reached at [email protected].