This book focuses on the role of subsistence entrepreneurs in creating social and sustainable business opportunities on the global marketplace. Subsistence entrepreneurs use scarce resources to create new business opportunities, often in developing or emerging economies. In addition, subsistence entrepreneurship is increasingly being used as a way to facilitate market entry for small and medium-sized business enterprises that focus on collaborative innovation. The interdisciplinary contributions gathered here will expand readers’ understanding of the nature and characteristics of subsistence entrepreneurs, as well as the challenges they face. The central connection between subsistence, sustainability and social entrepreneurship is also explored.
In Matarenda/Talents in Zimbabwean Pentecostalism, the contributors reflect on how Pentecostalism contributes to the empowerment of marginalised societies, empowers women through the matarenda practices, and contributes to the development of wider society.
Often considered one of the major forces behind economic growth and development, the entrepreneurial firm can accelerate the speed of innovation and dissemination of new technologies, thus increasing a country's competitive edge in the global market. As a result, cultivating a strong culture of entrepreneurial thinking has become a primary goal throughout the world. Surprisingly, there has been little systematic research or comparative analysis to show how the growth of entrepreneurship differs among countries in various stages of development. International Differences in Entrepreneurship fills this void by explaining how a country's institutional differences, cultural considerations, and personal characteristics can affect the role that entrepreneurs play in its economy. Developing an understanding of the origins of entrepreneurs as well as the choices they make and the complexity of their activities across countries and industries are of central importance to this volume. In addition, contributors consider how environmental factors of individual economies, such as market regulation, government subsidies for banks, and support for entrepreneurial culture affect the industry and the impact that entrepreneurs have on growth in developing nations.
Entrepreneurship is the result of various contextual factors in the community, which are shaped by social challenges and business needs. Recent research efforts have focused on the dynamics of communities and how they facilitate entrepreneurship among a diverse group of people and organizations. This book highlights research on the importance of communities and their role in providing an entrepreneurial ecosystem that promotes innovation and business activities. Adopting a multidisciplinary perspective, it explores what it takes to create an entrepreneurial community that fosters creativity. Sharing valuable insights, it will enhance readers’ understanding of how entrepreneurship is formed by and exists in communities.
The Routledge Handbook of Entrepreneurship in Developing Economies is a landmark volume that offers a uniquely comprehensive overview of entrepreneurship in developing countries. Addressing the multi-faceted nature of entrepreneurship, chapters explore a vast range of subject areas including education, economic policy, gender and the prevalence and nature of informal sector entrepreneurship. In order to understand the process of new venture creation in developing economies, what it means to be engaged in entrepreneurship in a developing world context must be addressed. This handbook does so by exploring the difficulties, risks and rewards associated with being an entrepreneur, and evaluates the impacts of the environment, relationships, performance and policy dynamics on small and entrepreneurial firms in developing economies. The handbook brings together a unique collection of over forty international researchers who are all actively engaged in studying entrepreneurship in a developing world context. The chapters offer concise but detailed perspectives and explanations on key aspects of the subject across a diverse array of developing economies, spanning Africa, Asia, Latin America and Eastern Europe. In doing so, the chapters highlight the heterogeneity of entrepreneurship in developed economies, and contribute to the on-going policy discourses for managing and promoting entrepreneurial growth in the developing world. The book will be of great interest to scholars, students and policymakers in the areas of development economics, business and management, public policy and development studies.
Provides understanding of global phenomenon marketplaces where individuals living in poverty buy/sell products and services. This volume presents a collection of articles that describe the particular group of consumers and entrepreneurs, and inform us on better ways to understand, reach, and empower them.
Presenting an updated overview of transformational entrepreneurship, this book explores how critical concepts can be contextualised for different regions and countries, underlining the fact that no one system fits all. In order for entrepreneurship to play a role in socio-economic development, a balance needs to be struck between focusing on individual entrepreneurial activities and regions, and society-wide changes. Building on the Editors’ previous books, Systemic Entrepreneurship and Entrepreneurship Centres, this volume delves deeper into the importance of innovative eco-systems, providing examples of how transformational entrepreneurship can be implemented in different geographical locations. An invaluable read for policy-makers as well as scholars, the authors provide a series of detailed case studies from regions including the UK, Malaysia and Africa.
This book is designed for two primary audiences - those interested in working in subsistence marketplaces, as well as those interested in applying the lessons learned (in such extreme contexts) to their own contexts, such as in advanced economies or in higher-income segments of developing economies. We aim to reach a diverse audience including practitioners in business, government, and social sectors; and researchers, educators, and students. We develop the notion of bottom-up enterprises learned through practice in extreme, i.e., resource-constrained, settings. Sometimes, the most insightful lessons for all settings come from such discovery. The book begins with a journey of immersion and reflection in the first part, followed by explicit discussions of lessons learned in the second section. In the third and last part, we broaden the dialogue to include bottom-up applications to a variety of settings and operations. Even for those not working in subsistence marketplaces, there is significant value in understanding the implications of these bottom-up approaches to their own efforts. We illustrate a number of situations where our approaches have had impact in other domains.Finally, our sequencing here is bottom-up as well, beginning with a deep understanding of subsistence marketplaces, followed by the design of solutions and enterprise plans for them. After this, the discussion turns to lessons in running a bottom-up enterprise before moving on to the application of these lessons in a variety of contexts.There is an irony is writing a book about being bottom-up. The very act of writing about it is, in a sense, top-down. And so goes the dance between the bottom-up and the top-down that is detailed in this journey.
. . . the Handbook of Qualitative Research Methods in Entrepreneurship is an important contribution to the field, and should be referenced in any paper using qualitative methodologies to investigate the entrepreneurial phenomenon. Craig S. Galbraith, Journal of Enterprising Communities There is no hiding behind the ramparts of dry scholarship here. The credibility of the theory being spoken of is not the stuff of constructed proofs, but alignments of critical insight and utility. This is where qualitative work can make a difference to the field, and where this book makes its mark. Robin Holt, International Journal of Entrepreneurial Behaviour and Research The Handbook of Qualitative Research Methods in Entrepreneurship is an unusually solid and multifaceted book on what qualitative methods have done, are doing and will do in entrepreneurship research. Every serious entrepreneurship scholar should read it. It points at the future! Björn Bjerke, University of Kalmar, Sweden I would warmly recommend this unique collection of qualitative methods of entrepreneurship research to both mature and beginning researchers as a menu to choose from for their planned empirical studies. For those who try to get away from only quantitative studies in both business practice and academic research, this book is their chance to find a rich inspiration in reflecting on entrepreneurship as a lived experience using grounded theory and ethnographic, discourse and narrative approaches. It might convince editors of top journals of entrepreneurship research to welcome qualitative research submissions as an indispensable complement to quantitative only submissions. This domain is not physics. In bringing together such a variety of experts from so many nationalities in this Handbook, our Danish colleagues are making entrepreneurship research a realistic global venture. Jan Ulijn, Eindhoven University of Technology, The Netherlands Helle Neergaard and John Parm Ulhøi have compiled a remarkable collection of work that both represents the range of methods and demonstrates the depth of insight that can be achieved through qualitative approaches. This book is not simply a handbook of qualitative research methods, though it well achieves this aim, it is also an important contribution towards the field of entrepreneurship research. From the Foreword by Sara Carter This expansive and practical Handbook introduces the methods currently used to increase the understanding of the usefulness and versatility of a systematic approach to qualitative research in entrepreneurship. It fills a crucial gap in the literature on entrepreneurship theory, and, just as importantly, illustrates how these principles and techniques can be appropriately and fruitfully employed. The Handbook is underpinned by the belief that qualitative research has the potential to charter hitherto unexplored waters in the field of entrepreneurship and thus contribute significantly to its further advancement. The contributors seek to assist entrepreneurship researchers in making more informed choices and designing more rigorous and sophisticated studies. They achieve this by providing concrete examples of research experiences and tangible how to advice. By clarifying what these research methods entail, how they are currently being used and how they can be evaluated, this Handbook constitutes a comprehensive and highly accessible methodological toolbox. Dealing with both well-accepted qualitative approaches and lesser-known, rarer and more novel approaches to the study of entrepreneurship, this Handbook will be invaluable to those studying, researching and teaching entrepreneurship.
To achieve progress in society and business practices, more entrepreneurship is needed to encourage action and enhance social capital in society, and transformational entrepreneurship may be the key. Transformational entrepreneurship offers a way of integrating sustainability practices whilst focusing on sustainable future trends. This book discusses how transformational entrepreneurship uses novel business practices to reduce inequality in the marketplace and how it transforms society through creative solutions that enable change. The book provides useful insight into better understanding this emerging concept.
