The role of enterprise and entrepreneurship education in transformational entrepreneurship: the case of Azerbaijan

This chapter explores the role of enterprise and entrepreneurship education in Azerbaijan as that country aims to establish strong foundations for socio-economic growth beyond dependency on state-owned enterprises and the oil sector. It draws on our experiences of four years of working in partnership with Azerbaijani institutions, entrepreneurs, educators, and students through the British Council funded Creative Spark Project. Taking a multi-layered approach, we use the four layers of the Advance HE Enterprise and Entrepreneurship Framework (Advance HE, 2019) to structure our examination of the role of enterprise and entrepreneurship education within the entrepreneurial ecosystem of Azerbaijan.

Azerbaijan is a fascinating context in which to explore the challenges of transformational entrepreneurship and the role of enterprise and entrepreneurship education within that process. Having declared independence from the Soviet Union in 1991, the country benefitted from a booming oil sector from 1995. However, growth was all but halted after the fall in oil prices in 2014 and Azerbaijan experienced its first major recession since independence in 2016 (World Bank Group, 2022). The Azerbaijan government subsequently introduced a range of economic reforms across a set of strategic sectors, including the small and medium enterprise sector, to support diversification of the economy and improve the business environment (OECD, 2020).