Pedagogy of Effectuation: a pending task in entrepreneurship education

This article reviews the literature on teaching entrepreneurship in higher education, with an emphasis on its shortcomings. We explore the relevance of the Theory of Effectuation as an alternative to complement the training of future entrepreneurs. The review had an Ecological Triangulation approach, which proposes that behavior, people, and the environmental context are mutually interdependent while shaping the understanding of the subject of study. We performed a search for case studies on the Web of Science. Most of this literature has a normative bias; it contains proposals of what should be. On the contrary, there is little evidence on the impact of teaching entrepreneurship on students. The few impact studies have focused on developed countries, although most studies have emerged in emerging economies over the last 5 years. Finally, the need for a pedagogy based on the Theory of Effectuation is justified as an alternative to the prevalent challenges reported.