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Both entrepreneurship and technology are significantly gendered, and when combined in technology entrepreneurship, they make up a fundamentally masculine field. This article investigates men tech entrepreneurs' negotiations of gender and gender (in)equality. The purpose is to gain knowledge on masculinity in tech entrepreneurship and to explore what role this might play in any change towards more gender-equal entrepreneurship.

Semi-structured interviews were conducted with ten Swedish and Norwegian male tech entrepreneurs in tech incubators. The interviews dealt with gender (in)equality and masculinity in tech entrepreneurship. The data were coded in NVivo and inductively analysed using thematic analysis. We apply a social constructivist understanding of gender.

We categorise the male entrepreneurs' views of gender equality along “privileged”, “paradoxical” and “potential” articulations of gender (in)equality. Building on these articulations, we discuss the potential entrepreneurial men and masculinities could have for changing gender inequality in the Scandinavian tech entrepreneurship context. The findings are applicable to several entrepreneurial contexts.

The study contributes to further the theoretical understanding of tech entrepreneurship as a gendered phenomenon, its dynamics and its potential for change, particularly in promoting gender equality in tech entrepreneurship. Empirically, it investigates the perceptions about gender (in)equality and gender as negotiated concepts amongst male tech entrepreneurs.

In order to address the gender divide in technology entrepreneurship, we explore how different national contexts impact policies and policy implementation. We investigate how transnational concerns (macro level) about women’s low participation in (technology) entrepreneurship are translated and implemented amongst actors at the meso level (technology incubators) and understood at the micro level (women tech entrepreneurs).

We adopt gender institutionalism as a theoretical lens to understand what happens in the implementation of gender equality goals in technology entrepreneurship policy. We apply Gains and Lowndes’ (2014) conceptual framework to investigate the gendered character and effects of institutional formation. Four countries represent different levels of gender equality: high (Norway and Sweden), medium (Ireland) and low (Israel). An initial policy document analysis provides the macro level understanding (Heilbrunn et al., 2020). At the meso level, managers of technology business incubators (n = 3–5) in each country were interviewed. At the micro level, 10 female technology entrepreneurs in each country were interviewed. We use an inductive research approach, combined with thematic analysis.

Policies differ across the four countries, ranging from women-centred approaches to gender mainstreaming. Macro level policies are interpreted and implemented in different ways amongst actors at the meso level, who tend to act in line with given national policies. Actors at the micro level often understand gender equality in ways that reflect their national policies. However, women in all four countries share similar struggles with work-life balance and gendered expectations in relation to family responsibilities.

The contribution of our paper is to (1) entrepreneurship theory by applying gendered institutionalism theory to (tech) entrepreneurship, and (2) our findings clearly show that the gendered context matters for policy implementation.