Abstract
In 2015 and 2016, forced migration led to a large influx of refugees to Germany. In general, Germany has a low percentage of entrepreneurs and at the same time, many studies have reported a higher propensity of migrants engaging in entrepreneurship. Nevertheless, refugee entrepreneurship is hardly a topic in Germany, neither in common media nor in research. Drawing on the concept of institutional voids, we explore the characteristics of refugee entrepreneurs and ask which institutional voids do refugee entrepreneurs face in Germany.
Our method is based on qualitative semi-structured interviews, but on a two-step basis. In the first round, we interviewed 20 refugees on their general perceptions of labor market integration. In the second round, we conducted seven detailed case studies with refugee entrepreneurs in Germany.
We can show that many refugee entrepreneurs are necessity entrepreneurs due to perceived disadvantages in the labor market. Furthermore, we demonstrate that institutional voids do not just exist in emerging economies, as most literature suggests, but can also exist in the developed world in times of crisis and capacity overload. Lastly, we demonstrate the role of specific social capital in bridging some of the voids.
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Lehmann, T., Albaba, H., Kreiter-Sammet, S. (2022). Refugee Entrepreneurship in Germany: An Institutional Voids Perspective. In: Dana, LP., Khachlouf, N., Maâlaoui, A., Ratten, V. (eds) Disadvantaged Minorities in Business. Contributions to Management Science. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-97079-6_6
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