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Refugee Entrepreneurship : Towards a Nuanced Understanding of the Phenomenon

Abebe, Solomon Akele LU (2023)
Abstract
Forced cross-border migration and entrepreneurship have persisted as perennial themes throughout the annals of human history. However, the recent ‘refugee crisis’ has sparked a resurgence of interest in their interplay under the rubric of ‘refugee entrepreneurship’. While its territory is not entirely uncharted, a surge in scholarly urgency and heightened scientific production have significantly expanded the corpus of refugee entrepreneurship
literature. Yet, despite the contributions to date, this research area faces several challenges—spanning domain-specific and methodological issues to theoretical concerns—calling for further scholarly endeavour.

This thesis ventures into this emerging yet rapidly progressing research... (More)
Forced cross-border migration and entrepreneurship have persisted as perennial themes throughout the annals of human history. However, the recent ‘refugee crisis’ has sparked a resurgence of interest in their interplay under the rubric of ‘refugee entrepreneurship’. While its territory is not entirely uncharted, a surge in scholarly urgency and heightened scientific production have significantly expanded the corpus of refugee entrepreneurship
literature. Yet, despite the contributions to date, this research area faces several challenges—spanning domain-specific and methodological issues to theoretical concerns—calling for further scholarly endeavour.

This thesis ventures into this emerging yet rapidly progressing research area, providing a nuanced investigation of the phenomenon and unravelling its complexities through a weave of systematic, methodological, theoretical, and empirical analyses across four interlinked studies. Systematically, it navigates the landscape of refugee entrepreneurship research, mapping its intellectual territory across various academic disciplines and consolidating existing knowledge. Methodologically, the thesis introduces an innovative sampling approach that pertains to the specificity of entrepreneurial refugees in terms of their ‘hidden’ nature and initial placement within the host country post-relocation. Theoretically, it offers a balanced perspective on the agency-structure dialectic, capturing the dynamics of refugee entrepreneurship through the interplay between refugees’ voluntary pursuit of entrepreneurship and adverse circumstances and structural constraints linked with forced migration.

This dissertation is a testament to the growing recognition of refugee entrepreneurship as a specific area of scholarship, underscoring its contributions to research, policy, and practice. Through its comprehensive analysis, this volume lays the groundwork for further investigations, striving for a deeper understanding of this intricate phenomenon. (Less)
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author
supervisor
opponent
  • Professor Dana, Léo-Paul, Rowe School of Business, Dalhousie University
organization
publishing date
type
Thesis
publication status
published
subject
keywords
Refugee entrepreneurship, Entrepreneurial Beliefs, Forced migration, Hard-to-reach populations, Refugee crisis, Refugees, Refugee integration, Refugee policy, Sweden, Austria
pages
286 pages
publisher
Lunds universitet, Media-Tryck
defense location
EC3:207
defense date
2023-09-14 14:15:00
ISBN
978-91-8039-762-9
978-91-8039-761-2
language
English
LU publication?
yes
id
654abb8b-ed8b-4fef-b1fa-c34a941d6d50
date added to LUP
2023-08-16 09:53:54
date last changed
2023-08-18 11:33:17
@phdthesis{654abb8b-ed8b-4fef-b1fa-c34a941d6d50,
  abstract     = {{Forced cross-border migration and entrepreneurship have persisted as perennial themes throughout the annals of human history. However, the recent ‘refugee crisis’ has sparked a resurgence of interest in their interplay under the rubric of ‘refugee entrepreneurship’. While its territory is not entirely uncharted, a surge in scholarly urgency and heightened scientific production have significantly expanded the corpus of refugee entrepreneurship<br/>literature. Yet, despite the contributions to date, this research area faces several challenges—spanning domain-specific and methodological issues to theoretical concerns—calling for further scholarly endeavour.<br/><br/>This thesis ventures into this emerging yet rapidly progressing research area, providing a nuanced investigation of the phenomenon and unravelling its complexities through a weave of systematic, methodological, theoretical, and empirical analyses across four interlinked studies. Systematically, it navigates the landscape of refugee entrepreneurship research, mapping its intellectual territory across various academic disciplines and consolidating existing knowledge. Methodologically, the thesis introduces an innovative sampling approach that pertains to the specificity of entrepreneurial refugees in terms of their ‘hidden’ nature and initial placement within the host country post-relocation. Theoretically, it offers a balanced perspective on the agency-structure dialectic, capturing the dynamics of refugee entrepreneurship through the interplay between refugees’ voluntary pursuit of entrepreneurship and adverse circumstances and structural constraints linked with forced migration.<br/><br/>This dissertation is a testament to the growing recognition of refugee entrepreneurship as a specific area of scholarship, underscoring its contributions to research, policy, and practice. Through its comprehensive analysis, this volume lays the groundwork for further investigations, striving for a deeper understanding of this intricate phenomenon.}},
  author       = {{Abebe, Solomon Akele}},
  isbn         = {{978-91-8039-762-9}},
  keywords     = {{Refugee entrepreneurship; Entrepreneurial Beliefs; Forced migration; Hard-to-reach populations; Refugee crisis; Refugees; Refugee integration; Refugee policy; Sweden; Austria}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  month        = {{08}},
  publisher    = {{Lunds universitet, Media-Tryck}},
  school       = {{Lund University}},
  title        = {{Refugee Entrepreneurship : Towards a Nuanced Understanding of the Phenomenon}},
  url          = {{https://lup.lub.lu.se/search/files/154965494/Refugee_entrepreneurship.pdf}},
  year         = {{2023}},
}