An Approach to Entrepreneurial Success and Its Determinants: The Case of Spain

Abstract

Entrepreneurial activity is one of the main driving forces of the economy, so economic development depends to a large extent on the quantity and, especially, the quality of entrepreneurs. This means that if a country wants to improve economic development one of its priorities should be the promotion of entrepreneurship. To do this, the first step is to define the factors that determine it and to understand how they operate. But this is not so easy. Otherwise, we would have the key to economic development. Some explanations — Schumpeter (1911), Knight (1921), Kirzner (1973), Casson (1982), Baumol (1990), Shane (2003), among others — have been particularly enlightening for the understanding of the entrepreneurial function and its importance. Following or inspired by them, many economists, sociologists and economic historians have been carrying out empirical studies in the last decades to check theories and/or to obtain more specific and detailed evidence about the causes and effects of entrepreneurship.¹ This paper intends to make a contribution in this sense.