Search results

1 – 10 of 469
Article
Publication date: 29 January 2024

Liang Shang

Social entrepreneurship has been recently viewed as an emancipatory process that promotes freedom and autonomy for social entrepreneurs and those they serve. However, the…

Abstract

Purpose

Social entrepreneurship has been recently viewed as an emancipatory process that promotes freedom and autonomy for social entrepreneurs and those they serve. However, the mechanisms of how emancipation is enacted remain relatively underexplored. By using an integrative lens, this paper aims to explore the emancipation experiences of women social entrepreneurs and unpack the processes through which they extend their self-emancipation to facilitate the empowerment of others.

Design/methodology/approach

This study adopted a qualitative multiple-case study approach. Semistructured interviews were conducted with eight women social entrepreneurs from various industries in Hong Kong to understand and examine their experiences of “emancipation from” and “emancipation to” in social entrepreneurship.

Findings

This study identified a three-phase emancipatory journey of women social entrepreneurs. Specifically, the findings revealed that their emancipation experiences started with self-awareness of constraints in their surroundings, primarily due to stereotyped social norms and institutional barriers. This phase is followed by embracing social entrepreneurship as a coping strategy for navigating the perceived constraints and exploring new possibilities with increased agency. Ultimately, this transformation extends beyond their individual growth into broader social impacts as women social entrepreneurs use their newfound agency to effect meaningful social changes.

Originality/value

This study enriches the “entrepreneuring as emancipation” perspective by embracing an integrative lens that allows us to delve into the complex layers of emancipation experiences of women social entrepreneurs. Notably, this study differentiates various conceptions of emancipation, presenting a dual role of women social entrepreneurs as both the emancipated and the emancipator. By situating the study in Hong Kong, where women often face gendered expectations that shape their career choices and development, this study offers a nuanced and contextual understanding of the unique challenges and opportunities women social entrepreneurs encounter in their environment.

Details

Gender in Management: An International Journal , vol. ahead-of-print no. ahead-of-print
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1754-2413

Keywords

Open Access
Article
Publication date: 2 May 2023

Bede Akorige Atarah, Vladi Finotto, Eimear Nolan and André van Stel

The aim of this research is to determine the stages that women in resource-constrained environments go through in order to emancipate themselves through entrepreneurial…

2030

Abstract

Purpose

The aim of this research is to determine the stages that women in resource-constrained environments go through in order to emancipate themselves through entrepreneurial activities. Based on their fieldwork, the authors develop a process framework of emancipation-through-entrepreneurship.

Design/methodology/approach

Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 57 female entrepreneurs in two resource-constrained countries in West Africa. Non-participant observations were employed as a secondary data collection technique to provide important sources of information for triangulation.

Findings

This study's findings indicate that the process of female emancipation through entrepreneurship begins with the perception of one's personal motivations, followed by the choice of economic activities, the gathering of various necessary resources, and finally the commencement and running of a venture to bring about the desired emancipation. Various factors, such as family, the external environment, personal qualities and ease of operations, were found to influence the choice of entrepreneurial activities. We also found that human, social, cultural and political capital interact to produce economic capital, a central form of capital for the starting and running of ventures in resource-constrained environments.

Originality/value

Although extant studies have shown that entrepreneurship can be a vehicle for women to liberate themselves from various constraints, it is as yet unclear which process these women follow to achieve such emancipation. The development of a process framework of emancipation-through-entrepreneurship is the key contribution of this paper. Despite extant research demonstrating that entrepreneurship can assist women in financially limited settings to achieve economic independence, the specific steps these women take in the process remain unclear. Thus, this paper presents a process framework that focuses on women in constrained environments and their journey to emancipation through entrepreneurship.

Details

Journal of Small Business and Enterprise Development, vol. 30 no. 4
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1462-6004

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 6 April 2022

Lalit Sharma

The study examines the emancipatory potential of entrepreneurship for women in STEM who have experienced a mid-career break. As studies on this subject are rather scarce, it also…

Abstract

Purpose

The study examines the emancipatory potential of entrepreneurship for women in STEM who have experienced a mid-career break. As studies on this subject are rather scarce, it also makes an important contribution to the literature by providing key insights into the entrepreneurial journeys of women in STEM who have experienced a career break and have started their own enterprises. The findings could be used by governments to intervene in the identified areas of difficulty and to facilitate the entrepreneurial endeavours of women in order to bring this community back into the workforce.

Design/methodology/approach

The study maps the entrepreneurial journeys of 23 women with a STEM background who turned into entrepreneurs after experiencing a career break. Qualitative data was collected through personal interviews with women entrepreneurs and was then analysed to interpret the results.

Findings

While the study confirms the emancipatory potential of entrepreneurship among well-educated middle-class women with a STEM background who face constraints related to career advancement and work–life balance, it also provides insights on various aspects related to their entrepreneurial development. This includes aspects such as their motivation to start a business, major barriers they face in developing their businesses and the strategies they use to handle those barriers. Suggestions for policy development are also proposed.

Originality/value

In addition to studying the entrepreneurial aspect of a rather underexamined segment of women in STEM who have experienced a career break, the study also examines the scope of the emancipatory potential of entrepreneurship for this segment of women. To the best of our understanding, no such study on STEM women has been carried out in developing nations in spite of the fact that this segment of women forms an important techno-economic resource which remains largely underutilised in developing economies.

Article
Publication date: 4 August 2021

Subhadip Roy, Subhalaxmi Mohapatra and Dina Banerjee

This study aims to explore the process of women entrepreneurship in India from a social perspective using the concept of entrepreneurship as emancipation.

Abstract

Purpose

This study aims to explore the process of women entrepreneurship in India from a social perspective using the concept of entrepreneurship as emancipation.

Design/methodology/approach

An interpretive approach is applied to address the study objectives, and based on an inductive method, the non-economic antecedents that led women to start entrepreneurship ventures are explored using 33 in-depth interviews. The study explores beyond the motivations and investigates the social process through which a women entrepreneur passes through after taking the decision to start a business venture.

Findings

Major findings indicate entrepreneurship as a change process where changes in both the entrepreneur and her social surroundings are observed with time. More detailed analysis reveal opposing (the entrepreneur) social forces in the initiation phase but more supportive social set up in the later phases of the entrepreneurship. The results support the process of entrepreneurship as emancipation (with stages such as seeking autonomy, authoring and declaring).

Research limitations/implications

The present study supports the concept of entrepreneurship as an emancipation process, and how it unfolds as a gendered process in a society where women (in general) are still not treated as equals.

Practical implications

The study has practical implications for entrepreneurs and their stakeholder networks.

Social implications

The findings have novel social implications on how a broader social structure has an influence on the entrepreneurship journey of a woman.

Originality/value

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study to explore the phenomenon of entrepreneurship as an emancipation for women entrepreneurs of elite families in a developing nation who have started their business from non-economic needs.

Details

Journal of Entrepreneurship in Emerging Economies, vol. 14 no. 6
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2053-4604

Keywords

Book part
Publication date: 22 September 2022

Violina P. Rindova, Santosh B. Srinivas and Luis L. Martins

The assumption of wealth creation as the dominant motive underlying entrepreneurial efforts has been challenged in recent work on entrepreneurship. Taking the perspective that…

Abstract

The assumption of wealth creation as the dominant motive underlying entrepreneurial efforts has been challenged in recent work on entrepreneurship. Taking the perspective that entrepreneurship involves emancipatory efforts by social actors to escape ideological and material constraints in their environments (Rindova, Barry, & Ketchen, 2009), researchers have sought to explain a range of entrepreneurial activities in contexts that have traditionally been excluded from entrepreneurship research. We seek to extend this research by proposing that entrepreneurial acts toward emancipation can be guided by different notions of the common good underlying varying conceptions of worth, beyond those emphasized in the view of entrepreneurial activity as driven by economic wealth creation. These alternative conceptions of worth are associated with specific subjectivities of entrepreneurial self and relevant others, and distinct legitimate bases for actions and coordination, enabling emancipation by operating from alternative value system perspectives. Drawing on Boltanski and Thévenot’s (2006) work on multiple orders of worth (OOWs), we describe how emancipatory entrepreneurship is framed within – and limited by – the dominant view, which is rooted in a market OOW. As alternatives to this view, we theorize how the civic and inspired OOWs point to alternate emancipatory ends and means through which entrepreneurs break free from material and ideological constraints. We describe factors that enable and constrain emancipatory entrepreneurship efforts within each of these OOWs, and discuss the implications of our theoretical ideas for how entrepreneurs can choose among different OOWs as perspectives and for the competencies required for engaging with pluralistic value perspectives.

Details

Entrepreneurialism and Society: New Theoretical Perspectives
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-80382-658-5

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 24 March 2014

Karen Verduijn, Pascal Dey, Deirdre Tedmanson and Caroline Essers

The purpose of this paper is to use the attribute “critical” as a sensitizing concept to emphasize entrepreneurship's role in overcoming extant relations of exploitation…

2118

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to use the attribute “critical” as a sensitizing concept to emphasize entrepreneurship's role in overcoming extant relations of exploitation, domination and oppression. It builds on the premise that entrepreneurship not only brings about new firms, products and services but also new openings for more liberating forms of individual and collective existence.

Design/methodology/approach

Honing in on Calas et al.'s (2009) seminal piece on critical entrepreneurship studies, and building on Laclau's (1996) conceptualization of emancipation as intimately related to oppression, the paper explores different interpretations of emancipation and discuss these from a critical understanding of entrepreneurship. The paper then employs these interpretations to introduce and “classify” the five articles in this special issue.

Findings

The editorial charts four interpretations of emancipation along two axes (utopian-dystopian and heterotopian-paratopian), and relates these to various strands of critical entrepreneurship research. United by a general commitment to positive change, each interpretation champions a different take on what might comprise the emancipatory or oppressive potential of entrepreneurship.

Originality/value

As the emancipatory aspect of entrepreneurship has attracted increasing attention among entrepreneurship researchers, the paper formulates a tentative framework for furthering views on the emancipatory aspects of entrepreneurship as a positive phenomenon in critical research – which to date has tended to be preoccupied with the “dark side” of entrepreneurship.

Details

International Journal of Entrepreneurial Behavior & Research, vol. 20 no. 2
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1355-2554

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 24 August 2018

Louise St-Arnaud and Émilie Giguère

This paper aims to examine the experience of women entrepreneurs and the challenges and issues they face in reconciling the work activities of the family sphere with those of the…

Abstract

Purpose

This paper aims to examine the experience of women entrepreneurs and the challenges and issues they face in reconciling the work activities of the family sphere with those of the entrepreneurial sphere.

Design/methodology/approach

This study is based on a materialist feminist perspective and a theory of living work that take into account the visible and invisible dimensions of the real work performed by women entrepreneurs. The methodology is based on a qualitative research design involving individual and group interviews conducted with 70 women entrepreneurs.

Findings

The results show the various individual and collective strategies deployed by women entrepreneurs to reconcile the work activities of the family and entrepreneurial spheres.

Originality/value

One of the major findings emerging from the results of this study relates to the re-appropriation of the world of work and organization of work by women entrepreneurs and its emancipatory potential for the division of labour. Through the authority and autonomy they possessed as business owners, and with their employees’ cooperation, they integrated and internalized tasks related to the work activities of the family sphere into the organization of work itself. Thus, not only new forms of work organization and cooperation at work but also new ways of conceiving of entrepreneurship as serving women’s life choices and emancipation could be seen to be emerging.

Details

International Journal of Gender and Entrepreneurship, vol. 10 no. 3
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1756-6266

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 5 March 2021

Anuja Shukla, Priyanka Kushwah, Eti Jain and Shiv Kumar Sharma

The role of information and communications technology (ICT) has been tested in various contexts of online shopping and the results show that ICT has successfully transformed the…

1449

Abstract

Purpose

The role of information and communications technology (ICT) has been tested in various contexts of online shopping and the results show that ICT has successfully transformed the way of doing business. This study aims to propose that if women have adequate internet skills, namely, operative, informational and creative skills, their entrepreneurial intentions will be high.

Design/methodology/approach

This is descriptive research. The data was collected from 246 university students and analyzed using PLS-SEM.

Findings

The results of the study show that students belonging to entrepreneurial backgrounds have a positive attitude toward entrepreneurship. The impact of internet skills was mixed on the relationship of entrepreneurial attitude and entrepreneurial intention.

Research limitations/implications

The sample was not generalized as the sample consisted of urban and internet-using women. Future research can test the model for rural women entrepreneurs or usage of m-commerce for the same.

Practical implications

The results of the study show that women having the skills to operate the internet have higher intentions to become an entrepreneur. Thus, the e-commerce web-space can use the results to influence women of the new generation to use available tools in their journey of entrepreneurship.

Social implications

Women are an indispensable part of society. Empowering them will not only improve their confidence but will also strengthen the pillars of society.

Originality/value

Extensive research work has been done in the context of women entrepreneurship. The study is a novel attempt to test the effects of internet skills on entrepreneurial intention among new generation women. The results will be very much useful for future research and will extend the body of academic literature.

Details

Journal of Enterprising Communities: People and Places in the Global Economy, vol. 15 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1750-6204

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 15 February 2022

Rana Zayadin, Antonella Zucchella and Amitabh Anand

The aim of the study is to examine the reciprocal relation between context and emancipatory acts. Context is important in shaping the entrepreneurial action, particularly in a…

Abstract

Purpose

The aim of the study is to examine the reciprocal relation between context and emancipatory acts. Context is important in shaping the entrepreneurial action, particularly in a developing region, as it expounds its emancipatory role. At the same time emancipatory acts can affect context as well.

Design/methodology/approach

The study employs an inductive research design, applying an open-ended exploratory research and conversation analysis, to elicit the stories of 25 entrepreneurs who are challenging their status quo.

Findings

Acts of emancipation were observed through a dynamic process centred around entrepreneurs' abilities to respond to policy debates. These debates introduced an individual level action towards social and institutional change. The findings present a model of entrepreneurial acts as an enabler in a socially constrained and challenging context.

Originality/value

Through contextual embeddedness, this study captured the entrepreneur's abilities to re-perform and negotiation with their context towards actions of emancipation. The study aims to capture individuals' narratives to enhance our understanding of the contextual and embedded factors that shape the entrepreneurial process towards emancipation. The study presents a model that theorises these narratives and actions.

Details

International Journal of Entrepreneurial Behavior & Research, vol. 28 no. 2
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1355-2554

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 13 March 2017

Ted Baker and Friederike Welter

The purpose of this paper is to make the argument that previously marginalized but now flourishing subfields of entrepreneurship research continue to provide insights that can…

1748

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to make the argument that previously marginalized but now flourishing subfields of entrepreneurship research continue to provide insights that can form the basis for future entrepreneurship research that is more broadly practical and critical. What is currently core or “mainstream” in entrepreneurship research would then be seen as an important but rare special case.

Design/methodology/approach

The essay briefly explores a number of illustrative themes that have emerged and become important in women’s entrepreneurship research (acknowledging that some similar themes have emerged in other subfields). These themes are used to suggest how broader application of such insights to theory-building about entrepreneurship in general – rather than “just” to “women’s entrepreneurship” – might greatly enrich the field.

Findings

The authors’ arguments suggest that research focused on ghettoized subfields such as women’s entrepreneurship challenge the assumptions of what entrepreneurship is and what it contributes. For example the richer perspective on motivations, goals, and outcomes and on the possibilities of emancipation that currently animate research on women’s entrepreneurship can improve the understanding of all entrepreneurship.

Originality/value

Too much of current entrepreneurship research is both of limited practical value for “practitioners” and of little “critical value” for scholars interested in how things might work better. The authors argue that by broadening the set of goals, motivations, contexts and accomplishments that are taken as legitimate targets of study, entrepreneurship research can become both more practical and more critical and thus more broadly useful and legitimate.

Details

International Journal of Entrepreneurial Behavior & Research, vol. 23 no. 2
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1355-2554

Keywords

1 – 10 of 469