Emerging markets research: Trends, issues and future directions

We survey recent research on emerging markets (EM) within the fields of economics, finance, international business and management. To do this, we reconfiguring the Journal of Economic Literature (JEL) classification system to provide a comprehensive list of the topics that have been studied, and we combine it with the main journal ranking methodologies to identify the journals in which significant contributions to EM research have been disseminated. We highlight the areas of greatest interest and those that have received relatively less attention to date. The suggested topics for future research include: Data and methods; market efficiency, risk-adjusted returns and risk premia; exchange rate volatility and firm-level exposures; classification systems, clusters and networks; firm-level internationalisation; international business strategy; attracting and benefiting from FDI; corporate and institutional governance; and behavioural perspectives, culture and the demise of the representative agent.

That is from a paper by Colm Kearney (Emerging Markets Review, June 2012). A draft is here.