Going collective: worker takeovers, entrepreneurship and collective actions

Abstract

Over the past two decades, researchers have collected solid evidence on the ability of job-threatened workers around the world to preserve their jobs via takeover operations. Worker takeovers are effective strategies to preserve jobs in times of crisis, spread economic democracy and promote local development. Yet, collectives of workers running their own businesses under self-management challenge the premises of orthodox economics and entrepreneurship. By analysing critical contributions via an integrative literature review, the paper discusses core assumptions of methodological individualism and opportunity entrepreneurship. The paper also uses the case of worker takeovers to further falsify these assumptions and confirm the shortcomings of research approaches anchored to the individual-opportunity nexus. By building on the case of worker takeovers, the paper endorses approaches which adopt (collective) entrepreneurial actions as crucial metrics to analyse entrepreneurial undertakings.