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The Field of Entrepreneurship Research: Some Significant Developments

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Contemporary Entrepreneurship

Abstract

This chapter discusses significant developments in the field of entrepreneurship research. These include, but are not limited to: (a) considerable growth in volume, quality, and theory-drivenness; (b) a drift of the main emphasis from small scale and independent ownership towards newness and novelty realized through a multitude of organizational solutions; (c) interest in multiple aspects of the entrepreneurial individual beyond personality; (d) moving beyond the individuals towards teams, networks and social capital; (e) viewing entrepreneurship as a multi-level phenomenon, with increased emphasis on outcomes beyond the individual- and firm-level financial result; (f) realizing the heterogeneous, context-dependent and process nature of entrepreneurial practice, along with the challenges to generalizability and research design that follow from this. These developments, including the increased focus on theory and theoretical contributions, have served the field well. This said, the author argues that we are now at a juncture where recognizing a broader set of types of scholarly contributions would be even more beneficial.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Australian Centre for Entrepreneurship Research, Queensland University of Technology, GPO Box 2434, Brisbane, 4001, QLD, Australia

    Per Davidsson

  2. Jönköping International Business School, Jönköping, Sweden

    Per Davidsson

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Alpen-Adria University Klagenfurt, Klagenfurt, Austria

    Dieter Bögenhold

  2. University of Caen Lower Normandie, Caen, France

    Jean Bonnet

  3. University of Namur, Namur, Belgium

    Marcus Dejardin

  4. Technical University of Cartagena (UPCT), Cartagena, Spain

    Domingo Garcia Pérez de Lema

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Davidsson, P. (2016). The Field of Entrepreneurship Research: Some Significant Developments. In: Bögenhold, D., Bonnet, J., Dejardin, M., Garcia Pérez de Lema, D. (eds) Contemporary Entrepreneurship. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-28134-6_2

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