Guest editorial

Citation

Singh, R. (2017), "Guest editorial", Gender in Management, Vol. 32 No. 4, pp. 242-243. https://doi.org/10.1108/GM-04-2017-0052

Gender and entrepreneurship in cross-cultural perspectives

Welcome to the special issue of Gender in Management on the topic of Gender and Entrepreneurship in Cross-Cultural Perspectives. Although the relation between gender and entrepreneurship is a well-researched area, this special issue is dedicated to studying the gender stereotypes and entrepreneurship in cross-cultural perspectives. The special issue focuses on the advancement of inter-disciplinary research in the areas of gender studies, entrepreneurship and cross-cultural management.

The paper by Zahara identifies the growth barriers of women’s home-based businesses in Iran. The study followed a qualitative approach and interviewed 22 home-based businesses run by women to categorize the growth barriers in a multi-level framework of individual barriers (micro), business-related barriers (medium) and environmental barriers (macro). At the micro-level, lack of skills and experience and financial capability were the barriers identified, whereas the problems of having work interactions with men was most important environmental barrier women who owned home-based businesses faced. This is very specific to a conservative culture that one could find in Iran.

The paper by Bertelson et al., analyses the differences of networking among entrepreneurs based on gender and cultures. The study was conducted in China and five Persian Gulf countries of Yemen, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and United Arab Emirates and show that female entrepreneurs tend to have slightly larger private sphere networks than male entrepreneurs. Societal differences in the relative prominence of networking in the public and private spheres, and the gendering hereof, correspond well to cultural and socio-economic societal differences. In particular, marked differences were found between religiously conservative and politically autocratic Gulf States.

Nelson et al., studied the gender differences affecting family-friendly work perceptions across six countries, that is, comparing Unites States of America with Bulgaria, Denmark, Japan, Russia and South Africa. The results were thought-provoking showing that gender impacts workers’ perceptions of family-friendly work practices in Denmark, Japan and Russia. Interestingly, the work context predictors indicated a cultural universalism, supporting the national convergence hypothesis. The number of hours worked and type of employer were significant across all six countries. In summary, the demographic predictors indicated cultural differences and the work context predictors showed cultural universalism.

The paper by Crespo et al., examines the combinations of national culture dimensions that lead to high (or low) entrepreneurial activity for men and women and uses a fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA) to explore complex causal relations between national culture dimensions, the level of economic development (conditions) and the male and female entrepreneurial activity outcomes. The results show that there are several entrepreneurial cultures instead of a single culture that promotes entrepreneurship. In addition, different levels of economic development (high/low) combine with national culture dimensions to produce different configurations that can lead to high entrepreneurial activity. Also, differences found between the solutions for both genders are higher in the case of the configurations that lead to high entrepreneurial activity.

All the four papers in the special issue are a healthy mix of different aspects of gender and entrepreneurship in different cultural settings. We extend our gratitude to the Editor-in-Chief for her constant support and guidance. We also thank all the reviewers who reviewed the papers and gave critical and insightful observations to the authors for improving their papers. Last but not the least, we thank all the authors who have contributed their papers to this special issue to make it successful.

We hope that you would appreciate and enjoy the special issue as much we were delighted to develop it. Happy reading!