Introduction to Comparative Entrepreneurship Initiatives

Abstract

The last two decades have witnessed a revival in worldwide academic appreciation of entrepreneurship as an important driver of economic growth, productivity, innovation, and employment. There are several reasons for this revival. The media has celebrated business success as the result of an entrepreneurial culture of innovation in management groups. Studies have highlighted the growing successes of international entrepreneurial alliances (Cassis and Minoglou, 2005). Others have attributed the revival of small business in Europe and the United States to the recent interest in entrepreneurship (Swedberg, 2000). The celebration of entrepreneurship has also occurred in the context of concerns over increasing rates of unemployment. The discussions suggested entrepreneurship as an antidote to the economic stagnation that has gripped parts of Europe and Japan. Others have noted the shift in political economic ideology from the neo-liberalism under Thatcher in England and Reagan in the United States as contributing to the optimistic sense of entrepreneurship and open markets in the global economy (Swedberg, 2000).