Abstract
Abstract
This study investigates the systemic gaps constraining university-based entrepreneurial ecosystems (UBEEs) in an emerging economy context, examining how these gaps interact and persist despite institutional commitments to entrepreneurship. Employing a qualitative case study approach grounded in an interpretivist philosophy, we collected and analysed semi-structured interviews with 21 stakeholders (students, academic staff, management, alumni, and industry actors) at a private Nigerian university, triangulating interview data with participant observation and analysing it using the Gioia methodology. The analysis identified four interconnected gap dimensions: structural and governance deficiencies, knowledge transfer and pedagogical limitations, network and collaboration fragmentation, and institutional logic misalignment. These gaps form six bidirectional relationships that create self-reinforcing feedback loops and generate path-dependent trajectories resistant to change. We develop an integrative framework combining complex adaptive systems theory and institutional theory to explain UBEE dysfunction, revealing previously unexplored mechanisms through which macro-level institutional forces cascade into meso-level ecosystem dysfunction. The findings indicate that effective UBEE development requires coordinated, multidimensional interventions that address interdependencies among gaps rather than piecemeal initiatives; universities must embed entrepreneurial logics in systems, governance structures, and organisational cultures, moving beyond symbolic gestures towards authentic institutional transformation. Context-adapted strategies prove more effective than importing best practices from elite institutions. The study extends UBEE and entrepreneurial-ecosystem scholarship by evidencing the systemic, rather than additive, nature of ecosystem gaps in an under-researched emerging-economy setting.