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The Palgrave Handbook of Multidisciplinary Perspectives on Entrepreneurship pp 249–269Cite as

Palgrave Macmillan

National System Perspective on Entrepreneurship

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Abstract

Christensen argues that, although the National Systems of Entrepreneurship literature has established metrics that potentially can bring research forward toward a holistic understanding of the entrepreneurship process, there is still a need to develop the operationalization of the theoretical base for a better assessment of the relevant metrics for entrepreneurship measurement. He maintains that the functionalist approach to innovation system analyses is better suited to bridge the theoretical foundation and the relevant empirics. Christensen also suggests that more attention should be paid to the implications for empirical analyses due to the fact that entrepreneurship is a process and that solely focusing on the output metrics of entrepreneurship renders analyses that cannot capture the full picture. Implications for renewed theoretical understanding, entrepreneurship measurement, teaching, and policy are put forward.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    To a large extent, the innovation system concept quickly gained appeal within policy circles because it was developed in an interaction between academia and policymakers, in particular the OECD (Weber and Truffer 2017).

  2. 2.

    Sharif (2006) provides an account of the evolution of the innovation system concept and how it found resonance in policymaking. See Rakas and Hain (2016) for a bibliometric analysis of recent developments in innovation system research traditions and Weber and Truffer (2017) for suggestions to further developments of the approach.

  3. 3.

    A very similar approach was developed by Baker et al. (2005). As the title of their paper indicates (‘A Framework for Comparing Entrepreneurship Processes across Nations’), the basic purpose was to present a framework that could be used for comparing entrepreneurship processes across nations, and, in content, their paper is very similar to the work of Acs et al. For example, they point to the consequences of ignoring the context of entrepreneurship processes and of focusing too much on the individual level, and they point to the need to incorporate institutional factors into the framework.

  4. 4.

    A number of studies within, for example, the cluster literature do, though, introduce the entrepreneur as a key driver of the creation and dynamics of clusters (e.g., Feldman et al. 2005; Feldman and Francis 2006; Christensen and Stoerring 2011).

  5. 5.

    It is a related point in this approach that, because the state provides funding for both successes and failures, there is no reason why the state should not have a share of the upside and behave to a larger extent similar to as in a venture capital model. In the current paradigm, the public sector bear risks and pay for failures but do not harvest proceeds from successes.

  6. 6.

    A Kirznerian entrepreneur has the ability and creativity to spot opportunities for, and facilitate, exchange, hence profiting from acting as a mediator for trade.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Business and Management, Aalborg University, Aalborg, Denmark

    Jesper Lindgaard Christensen

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  1. Jesper Lindgaard Christensen
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Correspondence to Jesper Lindgaard Christensen .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Business and Management, Aalborg University, Aalborg, Denmark

    Romeo V. Turcan

  2. Department of Business and Management, Aalborg University, Aalborg, Denmark

    Norman M. Fraser

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Christensen, J.L. (2018). National System Perspective on Entrepreneurship. In: Turcan, R., Fraser, N. (eds) The Palgrave Handbook of Multidisciplinary Perspectives on Entrepreneurship. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-91611-8_12

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