Arab consumer attitutes towards international marketing as a result of the ongoing Arab Spring : a systematic literature review

Paper from the International Conference on Contemporary Marketing Issues (ICCI), Thessaloniki, 13-15 June 2012 The Middle East has been recently and continues to be affected by a phenomenon referred to popularly as the ‘Arab Spring’. The phenomenon appears to have sparked a wave of candidness amongst Arab consumers in a way that hitherto was not apparent. A question as to whether the uprisings are about the pursuit of democracy, political reform or freedom of speech remains to be settled. The purpose of this discussion paper is to ask what effects the Arab Spring may have on marketing theory and practice. To that end, the paper presents the results of a systematic literature review pertaining to marketing in the Middle East. A quantitative bibliometric method of citation analysis is deployed to identify the range of themes that have been previously researched. From this review, the paper identifies the particular relevance of the Arab Spring phenomenon to international marketing theory and practice. Thus, this study makes the first attempt to conceptualize what the Arab Spring means for future international marketing theory and practice and marks the start of a first investigation, and potential beginning of a longitudinal study into the phenomenon as it continues to unfold, grounded firmly in the marketing discipline