Student Immigrants and the Usefulness of Diversity: The New Face of Entrepreneurship

Abstract

The global economic crisis occurred starting from 2008 has deeply marked all the advanced economies: the reduction of purchasing power from the American consumers resulting from the loss of the property values (−25 % only in 2008), the fall of the Stock Exchange values (−40/50 % in the main world Stock Exchanges) which has lead the savers to increase their propensity to save, the fall of value of the Pension Funds in the Anglo-Saxon countries, the tightening of bank credit which has conveyed its reflexes on consumers and enterprises especially in Europe. Such economic and financial worldwide crisis made arousing a second phase of the globalization which is now displaying the change of numerous economic and managerial paradigms, competitive sceneries and relationships among the enterprises. Thus, new competitive rules emerged which, particularly in the emerging economies, are producing complex and variegated effects.

Appendix: Concepts and Implications for Definitions of Ethnic Entrepreneurship

1.1 Ethnicity

Title	Author	Definition
1. Green E., Endogenous Ethnicity, Department of International Development, 2011	• (Ordeshook and Shvetsova 1994)	“ethnic diversity is an exogenously determined social state”
2. Volery T., Ethnic entrepreneurship: a theoretical framework, Handbook of research on ethnic minority entrepreneurship, 2011	• (Masurel et al. 2004)	“An ethnic group is made up of people who have some or all of the following characteristics: • a common proper name, • one or more elements of common culture which need not be specified, but nay include religion, customs, or language, • unique community of interests, feelings and actions, • a shared sense of common origins or ancestry, and a common geographic origin.”
	• (Fregetto 2004)	“Ethnic and immigrant groups are equipped with culturally determined features such as dedication to hard work, membership of a strong ethnic community, economical living, acceptance of risk, compliance with social value patterns, solidarity and loyalty, and orientation towards self employment. These features provide an ethnic resource which can facilitate and encourage entrepreneurial behavior and support the ethnic self-employed.”
3. Danes S., Lee J., The effects of ethnicity, families and culture on Entrepreneurial experience: an extension of sustainable family business theory, International small business journal, 2011	• (Dimov 2007)	“In contrast to culture, ethnicity is an individual characteristic, a form of human capital. Human capital is considered the most fundamental form of capital. Human capital consists of skills and abilities vested in people.”

1.2 Ethnic Entrepreneurship/Entrepreneur

Title	Author	Definition
1. Volery T., Ethnic entrepreneurship: a theoretical framework, Handbook of research on ethnic minority entrepreneurship, 2011	• (Greene and Owen 2004)	“Ethnic business typically starts when an entrepreneur begins serving other members of the ethnic community and satisfies their specific ethnic needs.”
	• (Butler and Green 1997)	“Foreign entrepreneurs can be defined such as ‘immigrant entrepreneurs,’ ‘ethnic entrepreneurs’ and ‘minority entrepreneurs.’ Immigrant entrepreneurs refer people who start their own business just after their arrivals using of their individual connection with former immigrants and non-immigrants with a common origin.”
	• (U.S. Department of Commerce 1997)	“..foreign business owners such as ‘minority entrepreneurs’ who are not of the majority population..”
	• (Waldinger et al. 1990)	“Ethnic entrepreneurs create a set of connections and regular patterns of interaction among people sharing common national background or migration experiences.”
	• (Leung 2002)	“Ethnic enterprises rapidly pop up with the expansion and growth of an ethnic community and include businesses such as travel agencies, garment shops, specialized grocery shops, tearooms and fast-food stands.”
2. Adiguna R., Habib Sha S., Exploring Transnational Entrepreneurship: On the Interface between International Entrepreneurship and Ethnic Entrepreneurship, 2012	• (Honig and Drori 2010)	“Ethnic entrepreneurship includes entrepreneurial activities that involve individuals whose group membership is tied to a common cultural heritage or origin and are known to out-group members as having such traits.”
	• (Terjesen and Elam 2009)	“Individual actions of an immigrant, often with distinctive language and customs, engaged in formal, informal, or illegal self-employment and/or businesses in adopted country; also entrepreneur’s role and position within an ethnic community network.”
	• (Levent, Masurel and Nijkamp 2003)	“Ethnic entrepreneurs with their untapped job-creating potential offer (i) different approaches and management styles within urban economic life which reflect their cultural diversity; (ii) many opportunities for urban revitalisation/development of local economies, thereby increasing economic and cultural diversity, reducing unemployment and social exclusion, mitigating the problematic employment situation of young people in the ethnic segment and raising living standards in ethnic groups that often belong to the more disadvantaged segments in society.”

1.3 Diversity

Title	Author	Definition
1. Simons S., Rowland K., Diversity and its Impact on Organizational Performance: The Influence of Diversity Constructions on Expectations and Outcomes, Journal of Technology Management & Innovation, 2011	• (Gonzales and Denisi 2009)	“..differences between individuals on any personal attributes that determine how people perceive one another.”
	• (Christian et al. 2006)	“..most diversity research focuses on demographic attributes, including age, gender, race-ethnicity, functional background, educational background, and tenure..”
	• (Van Knippenberg and Schippers 2007)	“..diversity in workgroups can have both positive and negative effects..” “There have been a number of types of diversity classification proposed in the literature, not all of which are defined consistently. A majority of these diversity characteristic classifications are based on perception and are dichotomous in nature. Some of the classifications that can be identified in the literature include readily detectable/less observable, surface-level/deep-level, highly job-related/less jobrelated, task-related/relations-oriented, and role-related/inherent dimensions. However, the majority of these classifications can be broken down into two perspectives, the information and decision making perspective and the social organization perspective.” “..diversity of values, rather than diversity of demographic characteristics, was more likely to be at the heart of negative effects on team performance.”
	• (Estergaard et al. 2011)	“Study used social diversity characteristics only, including age, gender, ethnicity, and education Education and gender were positively associated with innovation, age had a negative association, and ethnicity had no effect.”
2. Janssens M., Steyaert C., Theories of Diversity within Organisation Studies: Debates and Future Trajectories, Nota di lavoro- Fondazione Eni, 2003	• (Carter et al. 1982)	“..people with different ethnic backgrounds, nationalities, age, religion and social class..”
	• (Pollar and Gonzalez 1994)	“Examples of cultural differences include religion, age, ethnicity and language ability. Functional differences refer to the differences in the way we learn, think, process information and deal with authority. Historical differences refer to family make-up, political opinions and inter-group relationships.”
	• (McGrath et al. 1995)	“An often cited categorisation of diversity is the following five clusters: 1. Demographic characteristics such as age, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, physical status, religion and education 2. Task-related knowledge, skills and capacities 3. Values, views and attitudes 4. Personality, and cognitive and attitudinal styles 5. Status in the organization such as one’s hierarchical position, professional domain, departmental affiliation and seniority.”