Challenging Entrepreneurship Research

The growth of entrepreneurship research has been accompanied by an increased convergence and institutionalization of the field. In many ways this is of course positive, but it also represents how the field has become "mainstream" with the concomitant risk that individual scholars become embedded in a culture and incentive system that emphasizes and rewards incremental research questions, while reducing the incentives for scholars to conduct challenging research.

This book aims to challenge this status quo from accepted theories, methodologies and paradigmatic assumptions, to the relevance (or lack of) for contemporary practice and the impact of key journals on scholars’ directions in entrepreneurship research.

An invited selection of the younger generation of scholars within the field of entrepreneurship research adopt a critical and constructive posture on what has been achieved in entrepreneurship research, the main assumptions which underly it, but also open-up new paths for creative entrepreneurship research in the future. This will be a must-read for all scholars, educators and advanced students in entrepreneurship research.

Hans Landstrom holds the Chair in entrepreneurship at Lund University in Sweden. He is co-founder of two large research centers at Lund University: Center for Innovation, Research and Competence in the Learning Economy (CIRCLE) which is a research center on system of innovation research, and Sten K. Johnson Centre for Entrepreneurship (SKJCE) focusing on entrepreneurship research and education. He is visiting professor at the Institute for Small Business Management and Entrepreneurship at Vienna University of Economics and Business Administration. Author of 14 books and edited books, and his articles have been published in journals such asResearch Policy, Journal of Business Venturing, Small Business Economics,Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, Entrepreneurship and Regional Development, andJournal of Small Business Management.

Annaleena Parankangas works as Assistant Professor at University of Illinois at Chicago. During the past years, she also held positions at New Jersey Institute of Technology and Helsinki University of Technology, and visited Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, the Wharton School of Business, and Chalmers University of Technology. She serves on the editorial boards ofJournal of Business Venturing, Venture Capital: Journal of Entrepreneurial Finance andInternational Journal of Technoentrepreneurship. Her research has been published inJournal of Business Venturing, Research Policy, Organizational Studies,Small Business Economics, Entrepreneurship and Regional Development andBusiness Strategy and Environment.

Alain Fayolle is a full professor of entrepreneurship, the founder and director of the entrepreneurship research centre at EM Lyon Business School. He is also visiting professor at Ecole Hoteliere de Lausanne (Switzerland) and is regularly invited by international universities and institutions. He has published over twenty books and over hundred articles in leading international and French-speaking scientific journals. Among his editorial positions, he is an Associate Editor ofJournal of Small Business Management and the Editor of Revue de l’Entrepreneuriat andEntreprendre & Innover, two leading French-speaking journals in entrepreneurship. Fayolle has been the ICSB (International Council for Small Business and Entrepreneurship) Board of Directors as Director-At-Large for the year 2013-2014. He has also been elected as a member of the Executive Board, in the position of PDW Chair for the academic year 2013-2014, of the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. He will become the Chair of the Entrepreneurship Division during the academic year 2015-2016.

Philippe Riot began his career as a professor of Philosophy. He worked several years in Paris Sorbonne’s "Institut d’Histoire des Sciences" (History of Sciences Institute), Director Georges Canguilhem, where he specialized in epistemology and on a critical approach of the modern concept of science. He worked several years in Michel Foucault’s seminar at the French "College de France", where he was involved in the research linked to the preparation of Michel Foucault’s book "Surveiller et Punir" ("Discipline and Punish") and "Moi, Pierre Riviere…" ("I, Pierre Riviere…"). He joined EMLYON Business School in 1995 where he became a fulltime professor of Strategy and Organization. Today, he is the Head of the "Strategy, Organizations and Entrepreneurship" Department of EMLYON. He was also a part time visiting professor at Sabanci University, Istanbul, Turkey, from 2001 to 2008.