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A proposed explanation for why business creation is often found to increase in recessions is that there are two components to entrepreneurship – “opportunity” and “necessity” – the latter of which is mostly counter-cyclical. Although there is some agreement on the conceptual distinction between these two factors driving entrepreneurship, there is little consensus in the literature on empirical definitions. The goal of this chapter is to propose an operational definition of opportunity versus necessity entrepreneurship based on the entrepreneur's prior work status (i.e., based on previous unemployment) that is straightforward, based on objective information, and empirically feasible using many large, nationally representative datasets. We then explore the validity of the definitions with theory and empirical evidence. Using datasets from the United States and Germany, we find that 80–90% of entrepreneurs are opportunity entrepreneurs. Applying our proposed definitions, we document that opportunity entrepreneurship is generally pro-cyclical and necessity entrepreneurship is strongly counter-cyclical both at the national levels and across local economic conditions. We also find that opportunity vs necessity entrepreneurship is associated with the creation of more growth-oriented businesses. The operational definitions of opportunity and necessity entrepreneurship proposed here may be useful for distinguishing between the two types of entrepreneurship in future research.

This study analyses small-firm responses to an economic crisis, based on an empirical investigation in the post-conflict economy of Kosovo. Although the recent financial crisis affected all economies, we can expect differences in its effects across economies depending on their level of economic development, relative exposure to the crisis, as well as differences in entrepreneurial responses to adapt to the crisis. Kosovo makes a unique case to investigate the impact of the crisis on firm adaptive strategies to overcome or cope with the crisis. Drawing on data from in-depth, multiple case studies show that small firms during the crisis have successfully chosen to diversify and expand into new areas of business in order to compensate for low demand. By contrast, cost reduction was not a successful strategic response. The study demonstrates that although crisis affects many small firms, they show underlying resilience and a high level of adaptability and flexibility.

Shortages of personal protective equipment (PPE) across the United States at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic created entrepreneurial opportunities for sewists and makers. In the United States in March and April 2020, masks were not readily available to the general public from existing retailers and PPE for medical use was being rationed for healthcare workers. Sewists and crafters, professionals and amateurs alike, began making and selling and/or donating masks. For individuals with sewing skills and time, sewing and selling masks became a lifeline financially, personally, and socially. To understand the experiences of people who made and distributed handmade masks during the early months of the pandemic in the United States, an interdisciplinary team developed an online cross-sectional survey instrument using a qualitative-dominated approach with both open and closed questions. This chapter explores themes identified from a sample of 94 participants, predominantly female-identifying, who created an enterprise or added a product line to an existing business. The sample includes individuals who did not identify as a ‘creative entrepreneur’ prior to the pandemic but did identify as an entrepreneur after starting a mask-making venture. Informed by entrepreneurship literature, the authors observed that these nascent entrepreneurs articulated recognisable motivations for social entrepreneurship, showed signs of pre-existing entrepreneurial mindsets, and employed business models and marketing tactics of entrepreneurs, largely without any business training. Implications for the study include increased recognition of latent entrepreneurial readiness, interest of women in social entrepreneurship, and higher levels of business knowledge among women than previously recognised.

Purpose – The purpose of this chapter is to investigate empirically whether entrepreneurship causes growth or whether growth creates a prosper environment for entrepreneurship.

Design/methodology – We perform a co-integration analysis using an error correction model on data from 34 countries spanning 13 years to assess the causality issue between growth (proxied by GDP per capita) and entrepreneurship (proxied by self-employment). Our analysis also includes other variables deemed to influence growth.

Findings – The results from an error correction model show that self-employment Granger causes GDP per capita while the opposite direction is not statistically accepted. Moreover, these results suggest that increases in self-employment increase GDP per capita over the short-term but leads to a GDP per capita decrease at a long-term horizon.

Research limitations and implications – We use a linear model to estimate the relationship between self-employment and Growth. Consequently, a more complex model allowing for nonlinearities and additional variables might be more accurate. The empirical investigation is limited to self-employment, which is one facet of entrepreneurship, hence it will be interesting to introduce other measures of entrepreneurship. A direct implication of our study is that rather to be a sustainable economic driver, self-employment seems to resolve only a short-term problem.

Value – The chapter contributes by analyzing the relationship between self-employment and growth by using a co-integration analysis. Consequently it offers a more rigorous appreciation of the direction of causality as well as the long- vs. short-term relationships.

This chapter evaluates the motivations that inform engagement in enterprise creation and operation by individuals experiencing poverty. An in-depth, empirical qualitative exploration of motives for enterprise amongst a sample of 42 people in the UK who are experiencing poverty conditions is presented. The results demonstrate that traditional push–pull thinking about enterprise motivation lacks nuance, specifically that the financial motive previously assumed to be prioritised in a context of resource deficit, in this research it was not. Second, push–pull motivations and intersections with intrinsic–extrinsic motivations are mapped, creating and developing a more refined understanding of enterprise motivations. Third, contexts and circumstances are recurrent factors reflexively informing motivations of those experiencing poverty and engaging in enterprise creation and operation.

The expert survey, carried out in the manner described in Part I of this volume (in Chapter 2), enables us to get a look, through the opinions of a set of top leaders and opinion makers, at the perception of the cultural gap between society and armed forces felt by current elites, as well as to gain insights into the trends over time.

Transnational migrant entrepreneurship is an increasingly important and multi-faceted process. Because of the ‘double transition’ of Albanian migrants, in terms of migration (spatial transition) and in terms of transition from socialism to capitalism and more specifically the absence of entrepreneurship experience in their homeland during the communist regime, we might think of Albanians as being in a weak position for mastering entrepreneurship. But, paradoxically, the evidence tends to prove the opposite. Albanians have succeeded in identifying various entrepreneurial opportunities, and are nowadays increasingly engaging in a wider range of entrepreneurial activities. The overall aim of this chapter thus is to analyse the causes and consequences of transnational entrepreneurship among Albanian migrants doing business with Albania and Albanian returnees pursuing business activities with their former destination countries. For this purpose, the author draws on face-to-face interviews with 50 Albanian migrant entrepreneurs engaged in cross-border economic activities in Albania, Italy and Greece, supplemented by further interviews with key informants, as well as government policy documents. The analysis in this chapter offers important insights into the two main types of entrepreneur, which are ‘necessity’ and ‘opportunity’ entrepreneurs; the emergence of academic entrepreneurship among Albanian transnational entrepreneurs; and the contribution of transnational migrant entrepreneurs in terms of added value at the individual and community levels, as well as potentially impacting on the country’s economic and social development.

This chapter focuses on how students think before we can teach them how to act. This idea is anchored in the observation that most institutions of higher education tend to teach their students to become employees, whether in the public or private sector, rather than to become employers. Thus, the mindset with which we equip our students is not sensitised to entrepreneurial action. Therefore, the aim of this chapter is to propose and illustrate a more comprehensive approach to teaching entrepreneurship, which aims to transform the way that students think about entrepreneurship. In order to achieve this objective, we identify and develop techniques for promoting entrepreneurial awareness and preparedness in our student population, and provide tools for educators to promote the individual’s innate drive to perfect him/herself, thus recognising his/her own need for personal growth. At the theoretical level, we build on the authors’ teaching experiences from different cultural contexts, which show ways in which alternative learning initiatives may enhance enterprising thinking among students. Based on our experiences with the influence of context, we propose that it is necessary to consider seven different, yet interconnected teaching principles, which may influence the impact of entrepreneurship education and which relate to the why; where; when; what and how of entrepreneurship. In continuation, on a practical level, we suggest a coherent system of innovative educational techniques, so-called Verwunderungsübungen, or wonderment exercises, that can be used individually or in combination. By creating a comprehensive teaching paradigm for entrepreneurship we pay tribute to entrepreneurship being an inherently dynamic phenomenon, which goes beyond exclusively focusing on new venture creation.

The debate that entrepreneurship is an engine of economic development has been a long-standing one. The higher the level of entrepreneurial activities, the higher the economic development. However, this literature is contradictory or elusive in Sub-Saharan Africa. Entrepreneurial activities are high in Africa, but economic development is not. Using Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM, 2017) data, the chapter discusses some of the contradictory factors. Further data were collected from 60 businesses, 20 each from Cameroon, Nigeria and Uganda for more clarification in 2019. The results show that the economic development is solely measured in economic terms. Entrepreneurship in Africa operates in an embedded context quite different from that of developed nations. Africans are often only making do with the environment in which they find themselves; thus, entrepreneurship in Africa should not be seen as unproductive considering the context and motives of the entrepreneurs.