Speaker
Description
ABSTRACT
Emerging economies face mounting pressure to achieve sustainable growth while advancing environmental goals —a dual challenge that has intensified amid the global shift toward a green economy. The ability to successfully navigate this transition depends not only on economic resources but also on institutional and strategic capacities. As such, national leadership quality, entrepreneurship, and technological innovation are increasingly recognised as critical drivers. However, their individual and interactive effects on green economic transformation in emerging economies remain underexplored. Motivated by this gap, this study investigates how these three factors influence the green transition across 33 emerging economies from 2006 to 2020. A composite index is developed to capture the multidimensional nature of the green economy, while a two-step dynamic system generalised method of moments (SYS-GMM) estimator is employed to address endogeneity concerns. The results reveal that leadership quality, entrepreneurship, and technological innovation each make significant contributions to green economic development. Notably, the effectiveness of entrepreneurship is significantly enhanced in the presence of strong leadership, underscoring the importance of policy stability, institutional trust, and effective governance. Likewise, the impact of technological innovation on green performance becomes more pronounced under high-quality leadership, suggesting that leadership plays a catalytic role in transforming innovation into tangible environmental benefits. Moreover, a three-way interaction confirms that entrepreneurship and innovation are most effective in promoting green growth, especially in the presence of strong national leadership. These findings highlight the imperative for policymakers to cultivate not only innovative and entrepreneurial ecosystems but also robust leadership structures that can align and accelerate efforts toward a resilient and inclusive green economy.
Keywords: Emerging Economies; Entrepreneurship; GMM; Green economy; National leadership; Technological Innovation
JEL Classification Codes: C36; L26; O11; Q01; Q56
