Introduction

Abstract

Today enterprise and entrepreneurship often feature in government policies, usually because they appear to be seen as some sort of universal cure which can be administered to improve economic performance. In this context the words enterprise and entrepreneurship have come to be used apparently with similar meanings and often interchangeably. This prescription of enterprise and entrepreneurship as an economic cure seems to be based on the beliefs that enterprise and/or entrepreneurship are good for us, and that because we know how to grow more of them, governments and others should take steps to promote them. These beliefs are reflected, for instance, in the introduction to a report on the ‘World Entrepreneurship Summit’ held in 2008 which, in calling for more action to promote entrepreneurship across the world, said that

we have plenty of research that tells us that entrepreneurship is important and what we need to do to get more entrepreneurs. We have policies aplenty to create entrepreneurial cultures, to deepen our scientific and technological knowledge and to widen access to education, finance and the internet.¹

This quotation indicates both that entrepreneurship is important and that we know how to get more of it.