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This chapter aims to identify the current challenges facing women entrepreneurs. Female entrepreneurship must be analyzed from a binary perspective: the position of women in society and the role of entrepreneurship in society. The study focused on women entrepreneurs in the European Union (EU). Considering the social-economic diversity in the EU, we evaluated the five economic systems. To highlight how these differences are manifested in the different systems, we considered for analysis one country belonging to each model, namely, Denmark for the Scandinavian system, Germany for the Continental system, Ireland for the Anglo-Saxon system, Spain for the Mediterranean System, and Romania, for the Catching-up system. The analysis considered women entrepreneurs in the labor market, female employment/management in the labor market, female entrepreneurs in the labor market, and female mentality regarding work and entrepreneurship.

This chapter addresses the intricacies and hurdles in female entrepreneurship within Romania, scrutinizing the often-indistinct lines among authentic entrepreneurship, self-employment, and fraudulent self-employment. It notably spotlights the unique challenges faced by women, stressing the necessity of educational initiatives, legislative backing, and precise policy development. Emphasizing the importance of thorough data gathering and research, the study seeks to deepen the understanding of the specific obstacles and opportunities present for female entrepreneurs. It provides a thorough overview of the status quo of women’s entrepreneurship, outlines the systemic challenges, and discusses potential empowerment and development strategies in this domain.

This study explores the configurations of management control systems (MCSs) while taking into account entrepreneurial cognition styles (ECSs) in small and medium enterprises (SMEs). The objective is to understand the impact of ECS on deployment and identify the various modes of MCS configurations employed by SMEs. The authors draw on and synthesise two theoretical perspectives relating to cognition and management control packages to understand the associations between ECS and MCS employed by SMEs in managing their business. This study was conducted using a quantitative approach that utilises a questionnaire survey to collect cross-sectional data from 150 SMEs. The authors uncovered three cognitive styles: knowing (e.g. preciseness), planning (e.g. organising), and creativity (e.g. innovativeness). Furthermore, five configurations of MCS utilised by SMEs were identified: customer focus, performance monitoring, administrative focus, strategic focus, and development focus. By combining both analyses, the authors discovered three constellations of significant association between ECS and MCS characterised by Cluster 1’s cohesive integration approach, Cluster 2’s revealing strategic approach, and Cluster 3’s multifaceted exploration. The study is significant because it uncovers the complex relationship between ECS and MCS configurations, highlighting their interdependence within the institutional context. Using a cognitive view, the authors explore how the cognitive styles of entrepreneurs facilitated imprinting institutional context into MCS configurations. These insights enable us to envisage that ECS is not mutually exclusive but forms a continuum that provides more plausible explanations that relax the direct universal relationship between MCS configurations and contextual factors.

This chapter analyses indigenous tourism as both a form of indigenous resistance and revindication and a public policy implemented jointly by public institutions, universities and non-governmental organisations (NGOs). The concept of indigenous tourism has a relatively short history in Chile. However, it has acquired particular importance in light of the country’s constitutional process, triggered by the social uprising of 18 October 2019. This process incorporates the recognition of indigenous peoples and their rights as transversal areas.

To explain the process, this chapter examines indigenous tourism from the standpoint of indigenous initiatives, considering the context in which it has developed while also looking at how this concept is incorporated into the public institutional framework. It also examines the different influences and political context of the concept’s installation and how it has acquired increasing importance and complexity in public affairs. Given that it requires a multidimensional and multilevel approach, it can be analysed as a wicked problem.

Finally, this chapter discusses how indigenous tourism takes a political form of revindication of rights and territorial control and as an alternative to the neoliberal and extractivist model of other types of tourism.

Patriotism is often described as the “love of country” that individuals display in the acclamation of their national community. Despite the prominence of this sentiment in various societies around the world, organizational research on patriotism is largely absent. This omission is surprising because entrepreneurs, human resource (HR) divisions, and firms frequently embrace both patriotism and patriotic organizational practices. These procedures include (among other interventions) national symbol embracing, HR practices targeted toward military members and first responders, the adulation of patriots and celebration of patriotic events, and patriotic-oriented corporate social responsibility (CSR). Here, the authors argue that research on HR management and organization studies will likely be further enhanced with a deeper understanding of the national obligation that can spur employee productivity and loyalty. In an attempt to jumpstart the collective understanding of this phenomenon, the authors explore the antecedents of patriotic organizational practices, namely, the effects of founder orientation, employee dispersion, and firm strategy. It is suggested that HR practices such as these lead to a patriotic organizational image, which in turn impacts investor, customer, and employee responses. Notably, the effect of a patriotic organizational image on firm-related outcomes is largely contingent on how it fits with the patriotic views of other stakeholders, such as investors, customers, and employees. After outlining this model, the authors then present a thought experiment of how this model may appear in action. The authors then discuss ways the field can move forward in studying patriotism in HR management and organizational contexts by outlining several future directions that span multiple levels (i.e., micro and macro). Taken together, in this chapter, the authors introduce a conversation of something quite prevalent and largely unheeded – the patriotic organization.

Sustainable development is inseparable from rational and responsible use of resources and promotion of green entrepreneurship. The contemporary green development agenda encompasses climate, economic, technical, social, cultural, and political dimensions. International efforts to greening the global development are conducted by the major economies, including China as the world’s largest consumer of energy and the biggest emitter of greenhouse gases. China is aware of its environmental problems, as well as of its part of the overall responsibility for the accomplishment of the sustainable development goals. By means of the decarbonization efforts, the latter are integrated both into the national development agenda (the concept of ecological civilization) and China’s international initiatives (the greening narrative within the Belt and Road Initiative). Over the past decade, China has made a breakthrough on the way to promoting green entrepreneurship and greening of its development (better quality of air and water, renewable energy, electric vehicles, and organic farming). On the other hand, emissions remain high, agricultural land loses productivity, and freshwater resources degrade due to climate change. In conventional industries (oil, coal mining, and electric and thermal energy), decarbonization faces an array of impediments. In this chapter, the authors summarize fundamental provisions of China’s approach to building an ecological civilization and measures to reduce emissions and achieve the carbon neutrality status within the nearest decades. The analysis of obstacles to the decarbonization of the economy and possible prospects for the development of green entrepreneurship summarizes China’s practices for possible use in other countries.

Each company, large or small, starts with a dream and an idea for a new product or service. Companies can succeed or fail for a wide variety of reasons, including inexperienced managers, failure to build or sell the desired product, launching products into highly competitive environments, and a lack of capital. This chapter reviews the traditional methods of capital formation, including funding by angel investors and venture capital firms. These funding methods are only available to relatively large firms, leaving millions of small firms without reliable debt and equity funding sources to scale their business. The growth of the internet, blockchain technology, and fintech firms has introduced innovative funding methods, such as crowdfunding and Initial Coin Offerings (ICOs). While these structures have been successful in raising capital for smaller firms, changes in the regulatory environment, such as the JOBS Act, are needed for these new forms of capital formation to reach their full potential.

This chapter in its first part analyzes the Leader approach in terms of concept, constituent elements, application, and its contribution to rural development and rural entrepreneurship. In the continuation of the text, authors analyze the application of this approach in Serbia, looking at the activities of the ministry in charge and the views of local action groups (LAGs)’ managers on this matter. The aim of this chapter is to present the results and problems Serbia has seen so far in the implementation of the Leader approach for development of rural areas on a local level. The results indicate that the lack of systemic and continuous state support resulting, among other things, in the lack of a financial portfolio for the LAGs, is the main cause of low local entrepreneurial initiatives and projects implemented within the Leader approach. Future steps in the implementation of this approach in Serbia will depend on financial support for the LAGs from all levels of government, as well as from the possibility of using funds within the EU pre-accession assistance for rural development. Also, it will be necessary to launch larger innovative and entrepreneurial initiatives both by LAGs’ managers and all stakeholders involved in local rural development.

This chapter examines how more women in the workforce can contribute towards making businesses more resilient. The overall objective of the study is to assess how women's employment influences various factors related to resilience and that in turn drives business activities. The methodology used is qualitative in nature using thematic analysis as a tool. Some quantitative data have been assessed in order to understand how companies survived the pandemic and to examine the trends in female labour force participation. This chapter also builds on observational research methodology in places to arrive at certain key inferences. The analysis examines top performing firms and sectors that survived the pandemic, key characteristics of business resilience and characteristics of women's labour and their role in building business resilience. A conceptual framework has been developed to discuss how female labour force participation can contribute to different sectors in order to build resilient businesses.

Governments frequently utilise tourism as a means of enhancing the economic participation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples in Australia. Yet, the ‘systemic wickedness’ (Carson & Koster, 2012) of problems, purportedly addressed by government policies for Indigenous Australians more broadly, can arguably be seen as inhibiting the creation of a thriving and sustainable Indigenous tourism sector. For too long, authors have questioned the appropriateness and effectiveness of tourism policy developed for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples (Hudson, 2016; Whitford & Ruhanen, 2010), and importantly, over and above governments’ apparent poor understanding of what ‘works’ and under what conditions, is the absence of First Nations peoples voices in driving the development of the First Nations sector. Utilising a wicked policy lens, this chapter explores Indigenous tourism policy in Australia and discusses the extent to which one particular initiative, the inaugural Queensland First Nations Tourism Plan (QFNTP) 2020–2025 addresses a range of complex and wicked policy challenges.