A DESCRIPTIVE QUANTITATIVE ANALYSIS OF COMMERCIAL SPACE AND THE SPACE ECONOMY

Purpose- The reason of conducting this study is to provide an overview of the quantitative aspects of research on the rising space economy and commercial space exploration in recent years. With the 77th International Space Congress to be held for the first time in Türkiye, in Antalya, in October 2026, the study is targeting to monitor the current numerical status of academic works in this field. Methodology - This study uses a descriptive quantitative research approach and descriptive analysis for its aim. The numerical results were obtained as of June 7, 2026, from the most commonly used academic databases such as Web of Science and Scopus, and from academic search engines such as Dergipark and Google Scholar, using relevant keywords. Findings - The fact that the number of Turkish studies obtained from Google Scholar using the relevant keywords is close to the number of papers submitted from Türkiye to the 77th International Space Congress held in Antalya (with the accepted number being about one-third) is a significant finding indicating that studies on space economy and commercial space, particularly in Türkiye, are at an insufficient level. Indeed, the figures received from Dergipark strongly support this. In foreign publications, the similar levels of Scopus, WoS, and Google Scholar figures suggest that the studies received from all these indexes and search engines may be overlapping studies, and again, despite the importance of the subject, the number of studies on a global scale is low. Conclusion - As expected, searches on the most widely used academic search engines and index databases using keywords related to space economy and commercial space did not yield many results, particularly for Turkish studies. The fact that the number of Turkish studies was close to the total number of papers submitted from Türkiye to and accepted at the 77th International Space Congress is seen as both a deficiency and an opportunity for the development of this subject in Türkiye (International Astronautical Federation, n.d.). Although engineering, astrophysics, astronomy, and aviation come to mind first when space is mentioned, the subject is now of greater importance in terms of business, finance, accounting, and economics. With the interest and entry of the private sector into this field, an era has begun in the social sciences where many books need to be rewritten and theories and rules need to be reviewed. The simplest example is that concepts such as specific gravity and interest rate will call into question all financial and economic theories with relativity. In JEL codes, it is necessary to create codes and sub-codes for space economics and astroeconomics. In Türkiye, The Council of Higher Education (YÖK) should facilitate the opening of new departments in this field, just as it has done in artificial intelligence. Therefore, Astroeconomics and Space Economy (Space Economics), primarily in finance and economics, will become a new major discipline in the social sciences. Keywords: Space economy, commercial space, space accounting, new space, space industry, astroeconomics