Entrepreneurship Safari: A Phenomenon-Driven Search for Meaning

Abstract

We propose a model that links seven different conceptions of entrepreneurship and maps them in relation to eight associated disciplines and theories, specifying their corresponding units and levels of analysis and stage in the entrepreneurial process. Entrepreneurship scholars are attempting to either carve out a distinctive domain for the field or build a distinctive theory of entrepreneurship. However, an obstacle for understanding entrepreneurship is the lack of integration of the assumptions implicit in different conceptualizations of entrepreneurship. We contribute a scholarship of integration approach for understanding the phenomena underlying these conceptualizations and linking entrepreneurship domain, theory, method, and policymaking.