Pragmatic entrepreneurs and institutionalized scholars? On the path-dependent nature of entrepreneurship scholarship

Abstract

In Chapter 3, entitled Pragmatic entrepreneurs and institutionalized scholars? On the path-dependent nature of entrepreneurship scholarship, Henrik Berglund and Karl Wennberg start with the question: The essence of entrepreneurship is being different. If this is the case, why does so much of entrepreneurship research seem to be so very similar? They argue that the increased maturation and institutionalization of entrepreneurship as a scholarly field have led to greater influence from established research fields such as strategic management and organization theory, and as a consequence, an increased 'taking-for-grantedness' of research questions, unit of analysis and research designs. Thus, much entrepreneurship research becomes fairly narrow in focus and echoes mainstream disciplines. Taking inspiration from real-world entrepreneurs and the philosophical tradition of pragmatism, the authors provide some suggestions for entrepreneurship research: * Entrepreneurship scholars need to pay more attention to the fundamental nature of entrepreneurship and practicing entrepreneurs. * Entrepreneurs are pragmatic individuals and in the same way as real-world entrepreneurs, entrepreneurship scholars need to adopt a 'down to earth', actionable and pluralistic view of entrepreneurship. * This pragmatic view of entrepreneurship calls for epistemological inspiration from pragmatic philosophy, theoretical inspiration from disciplines other than strategic management and organization theory, as well as methodological inspiration from a wide range of traditions.