The Emerging Trend of ‘Expat-preneurs’: A Headache for the Pre-existing Ethnic Entrepreneur Theories

Abstract

With regards to entrepreneurship and migration, the overwhelming majority of studies have focused on entrepreneurs within the context of ‘South to North’ migration. This demographic is usually referred to in the literature as “ethnic entrepreneurs” (Waldinger et al., 1990) or “immigrant entrepreneurs” (Volery, 2007). More recently, a new trend is emerging: A small (but potentially significant) number of entrepreneurial migrants are emigrating away from developed economies. Differentiated from the former in terms of becoming entrepreneurs out of volition, and not necessity (Vance et al., 2016), these migrants have been labelled as “Self Initiated Expatriate entrepreneurs” (Andresen, 2014) or “expat-preneurs” (Solimine, 2015). The emerging trend of expat-preneurs poses several questions (and problems) for the existing theories surrounding ethnic entrepreneurs: Where do expat-preneurs fit into the theoretical landscape? Can the theories - created to account for ethnic entrepreneurs - also explain the behavior of expat-preneurs? This paper reviewed eight of the most prominent theories and found that all eight were created in the context of ‘South to North’ migration, with many of them assuming that immigrant entrepreneurs are disadvantaged. As a result, most of the theories are not - in their current state - broad enough to also account for expat-preneurs. Subsequently, most of the existing ethnic entrepreneur theories now need to be broadened to ‘make room’ for the phenomenon of expat-preneurs. This paper contributes to the gap in the literature surrounding expat-preneurs, which has been described as an an under-researched phenomenon (Andresen et al., 2014).