Search strategy and sample

“case” not combined with “study”, which mostly were not case stud- ies. We omitted those publications from the list that were not actually publications dealing with an empirical case study, although they men- tioned such terms in the title or the abstract. For example, we identi- fied 18 publications on case studies in Harvard Business Review, but ten of these appeared to be fictional. We analysed the abstracts of all pub- lications on this final list of case study publications. Table 2.1 documents our results in the different phases of this search. The percentages of case study publications in the last two columns are relative to the total number in the respective previous column. The table shows that 8–10 per cent of the publications in Strategy, HRM, and Operations report case study research. In Marketing and in Finance the relative contribution of case study research is lower 3–6 per cent. Also, in absolute numbers, most case study research is published in Strategy, HRM, and Operations. In Finance and Marketing, relatively few publications on case study research have been published, and a relatively small propor- tion of these publications have been published in ISI journals. Appendix 2 of this book presents a list of the journals that published five or more papers on case study research between 2000 and 2005.

2.1.2 Case studies in Strategy

In Strategy we found 206 publications on case studies in ISI journals. The journals with most case study publications were International Journal of Operations Production Management, International Journal of Technology Management, and Long Range Planning. Although the International Journal of Operations Production Management is not a Strategy research journal, Chapter 2 Table 2.1 Number of publications with case study research in all scholarly journals in Proquest and in ISI journals in the period 2000–2005 Subject Total number of Number of case study Number of case publications in publications in scholarly study publications scholarly journals in journals in Proquest in ISI journals Proquest database database Strategy 10,166 930 9.1 206 22.2 Finance 13,912 436 3.1 47 10.8 Marketing 4,334 255 5.9 39 15.3 HRM 9,492 778 8.1 153 19.6 Operations 7,457 720 9.7 244 33.9 it also publishes many articles on case study research on the interface of Strategy and Operations.

2.1.3 Case studies in Finance

We found 47 publications in ISI journals on case studies in finance and accountancy. Only the journal Accounting, Organizations Society pub- lished more than five articles. The majority of the publications in ISI journals appeared in categories other than the ISI category “Finance and Accounting”. This may indicate that case study research is not well accepted in this field.

2.1.4 Case studies in Marketing

We found 39 ISI publications on case studies in Marketing. The only journal with more than five case study research publications was Indust- rial Marketing Management, with seven papers. About half of the publica- tions were published in journals outside the field of marketing research. None of the top marketing research journals e.g. International Journal of Research in Marketing, Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Marketing, Journal of Marketing Research, and Marketing Science have published on case study research. In Marketing, also, case study research seems to be not well accepted.

2.1.5 Case studies in HRM

We found 153 ISI publications on case studies in HRM. These papers were mainly published in HRM journals such as Human Relations, Human Resource Management, and Journal of Business Ethics, but, again, the International Journal of Operations Production Management was an important outlet for publications on case study research.

2.1.6 Case studies in Operations

We found 244 ISI publications on case studies in Operations. These publications were concentrated in the typical operations management and operations research journals, with the International Journal of 22