Index and Abstracts
for Volume 3, 1998
Volume 3, Number 1
Summer 1998
Beyond Creditworthy: Microcredit and Informal Credit in the United States
Ivan Light and Michelle Pham
Rotating Credit Associations and the Diasporic Economy
Michel S. Laguerre
An Overview of Basic Issues Facing Microenterprise Practices in the United States
Margaret A. Johnson
Making the Adaptation Across Cultures and Societies: A Report on an Attempt to Clone the Grameen Bank in Southern Arkansas
Richard P. Taub
Turning the Unemployed into Entrepreneurs: An Evaluation of a Self-Employment Department of a Transitional Economy
Milan Vodopivec
Female Entrepreneurs in a Female-Dominated Health Profession: An Exploratory Study
Carolyn K. Rozier and Mary Thompson
Developing a Typology of Nonprofit Microenterprise Programs in the United States
Margaret Johnson
The Entrepreneur as a Building Block for Community
Jeffrey R. Cornwall
A Qualitative Study of the Management Practices of Rapid-Growth Firms and How Rapid-Growth Firms Mitigate the Managerial Capacity Problem
Bruce Barringer, Ford Jones and Pamela Lewis
Environmental Adversity and the Entrepreneurial Activities of New Ventures
Shaker Zahra and Donald Newbaum
Ivan Light and Michelle Pham
Authors' note: Ivan Light is Professor Sociology and Michelle Pham is a graduate student in the Department of Sociology, University of California, Los Angeles. An earlier version of this paper was presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Sociological Association, Toronto, Canada, Aug. 4, 1997.
Abstract: Muhammed Yunus declares that banks co-cause poverty because they inhibit the poor from managing their personal finances or starting a business. Bankers rejoin that banks do not earn enough revenue from the poor and from small business to serve these constituencies without subsidies. Reviewing the literature, the authors conclude that low revenues are the principal reason banks cannot service the poor, immigrants, and small business. They identify the essential problem as a financial system that relies excessively upon banks to deliver all financial services to all markets. Microcredit and informal credit deliver savings and credit to the poor, to immigrants and to small business now. They succeed where banks fail because they draw upon resources of solidarity in the user pool. The policy implication is a mixed-type financial system that relies less exclusively upon banks, and has more room for non-bank institutions such as microcredit and informal credit.
Key words: Informal credit, microcredit, financial services for the poor, commercial banking and the poor
Michel S. Laguerre
Author's note: Michel Laguerre teaches Social Anthropology and American Studies at the University of California at Berkeley. This is revised version of a paper read at the annual meetings of the American sociological association held in Toronto, Canada, August 1997. I wish to thank Ivan Light, Steve Balkin, Monsieur and Madame Jean A. Desroches and Myoka for their comments on this paper.
Abstract: Caribbean immigrants have participated in rotating credit associations in their adaptation to daily life in New York City. This essay examines the relations between diasporic entrepreneurship and the folk banking system known as sangue or min among the Haitian community in New York. It introduces the transnationality factor to identify the social parameters of the rotating credit association and the challenges such an expansion implies. Focusing on three cases that describe the mode of operation and the risks involved, this essay further maps out key relations of this folk banking institution to ethnic entrepreneurship and explains how they contribute to the success or failure of such ventures. It concludes that the success of the rotating credit association depends on its transitionality which defines its mode of operation and thus makes it unfit for formalization.
Keywords: Rotating Credit Association, entrepreneurship, ethnic business, transnationality, Haitian-Americans, diasporic economy.
Margaret A. Johnson
Author's Note: Margaret A. Johnson is Assistant Professor of Sociology at Oklahoma State University. An earlier version of this paper was presented at the August 1997 American Sociological Association Annual Meeting in Toronto, Canada. The author expresses gratitude to Ivan Light, Steven Balkin, Umasundari Akella, and Julie Lalande for their careful reading and insightful suggestions. The author maintains responsibility for the contents of the paper.
Abstract: Microenterprise programs in a post-industrial society face unique challenges in their implementation. These include decisions about the goals of microenterprise (to create jobs or empower participants through economic self-sufficiency and personal development), whom microenterprise programs should target, how microenterprise programs can empower participants, what resources should be devoted to training, and whether microenterprise programs are helping clients reach self-sufficiency or if clients are becoming overworked, low income entrepreneurs. The diversity of microenterprise programs and their implications for understanding social mobility informs the discussion of issues.
Key words: microenterprise, microcredit, sustainability, entrepreneurship, economic development, social mobility, post-industrial economy, social capital
Richard P. Taub
Author Note: Richard Taub is the Paul Klapper Professor in the Social Sciences at the University of Chicago and professor in Departments of Sociology and Human Development. The author wishes to thank the staff of the Good Faith Fund, who were always cooperative in sharing information and exchanging ideas in the interest of improving knowledge in this area. To do that required considerable personal courage, because discussion of errors could have led to ridicule. I wish also to thank the members of the South Arkansas Rural Development Seminar including: Hal Bass, Ray Granade, Jackie McCray, Jan Phillips, the late Annie Tune, Wali Mondal, and Donald Voth for providing stimulation and fresh ideas. Data on the Good Faith Fund were collected by observation, mailed questionnaires, and interviews with Good Faith Fund employees and Good Faith Fund borrowers conducted by the late Professor Tune, Jan Phillips, and the author. I wish to thank The Ford Foundation and the MacArthur Foundation for their generous support and encouragement. Kelly Daley, Lelia De Andrade, Betty Farrell, Carla Hess and George Surgeon made helpful comments on the manuscript.
Abstract: Peer group oriented microenterprise loan funds similar to the Grameen Bank in Bangladesh have become very popular in the United States as a means to move low income people off welfare and to become independent business people. Despite the great appeal of this model, there is not much evidence about how well it succeeds. This paper reports on observations of the Good Faith Fund, a well-known attempt to copy the Grameen Bank in Southern Arkansas. To make the program work at all in the United States, the Good Faith Fund had to make many adjustments, and still does not make very many peer group microloans. The paper analyzes why this is true and how the achievements of the program should be understood.
Key words: Microenterprise, peer group lending, economic development, poverty alleviation
Milan Vodopivec
Author's note: Milan Vodopivec is Professor of Entrepreneurship and Dean of the Business School at GEA College of Entrepreneurship in Portoroz, Slovenia.
Abstract: The paper evaluates the performance of a Slovenian Capitalization Program, the program that assists the unemployed to start self-employment by providing them a subsidy in lieu of unemployment compensation. The results indicate that the participants of the program are not as successful as independent entrepreneurs. After three years from starting business, 36 percent of program participants failed, compared to 17 percent failure among independent entrepreneurs. Other results suggest possible improvements to the program, both regarding the selection and business practices of participants. In the area of program selection, we find that more mature participants, those with vocational school training, and those who own assets at the start of the business are more likely to survive. In the area of business practices, we find that training in core skills, i.e. those essential to the production process, is more helpful to the self-employed than training in auxiliary skills like accounting and marketing.
Keywords: self-employment, unemployment, entrepreneurship, employment programs
Carolyn K. Rozier and Mary Thompson
Abstract: While seventy-four percent of physical therapists are female and there are opportunities for self-owned practices, the number of men who open practices exceeds the number of women. This study's purpose is to identify patterns that encouraged women to become entrepreneurs in a female-dominated health profession. Unstructured, in-depth interviews were conducted with nine female physical therapists. Processes and conditions of becoming a female entrepreneur in physical therapy (PT) emerged from the qualitative data. A model was developed to illustrate career as a function of time. The career paths of female owners of practices began with early management experiences. After practicing as PTs, a precipitating event sparked the decision to open a business. Consequences of being a woman entrepreneur in PT included an identity change and personal growth. The experiences of these women may be instructive to others aspiring to similar careers in health care.
Key words: Female entrepreneurs, female career paths, executives, small business owners
Margaret Johnson
Abstract: Using case studies and interviews with practitioners and researchers, this paper develops a typology of microenterprise programs in the United States. The dimensions of organizational mission, characteristics of client populations, lending practices, and training opportunities form a typology that represents the diversity of programs. The typology identifies three major program types: empowerment-oriented, economic development-oriented, and multipurpose. Uses of the typology include describing the population of microenterprise programs, discussing issues of impact, effectiveness, and program sustainability, and avenues for research.
Key words: microenterprise, microcredit, nonprofit, sustainability, entrepreneurship, economic development
Jeffrey R. Cornwall
Abstract: This paper uses the communitarian model of social responsibility to examine the impact that entrepreneurship can have to foster the rebuilding of poor or low-income communities. Specifically, the focus is on the impact of recognizing and acting on the responsibilities entrepreneurs have back to their communities. the entire social web including family, employees, and the community as a whole are considered.
Key words: community, communitarian model, family, social responsibility
Bruce Barringer, Ford Jones and Pamela Lewis
Abstract: This study reports the results of a qualitative examination of the managerial practices of rapid-growth firms and how rapid-growth firms mitigate the managerial capacity problem by in effect outsourcing a portion of their resource needs and monitoring expenses to their alliance partners and employees. With regard to the management practices that typify rapid-growth firms, the 70 rapid-growth firms in our sample emphasize recruitment and selection, customer relations, channels development, alliance formation, employee empowerment, planning, and incentive compensation.
Key words: growth, management capacity constraint, moral hazard, strategy
Shaker Zahra and Donald Newbaum
Abstract: New ventures are important for the growth and prosperity of the US economy. Yet, these ventures must prove themselves, frequently under adverse environmental conditions. One major type of adversity new ventures must address is the hostility in their competitive environments. This hostility is multifaceted and can challenge some ventures and cause their failure. Other ventures, however, rise to this challenge and engage in entrepreneurial activities in their domestic and foreign markets. Such entrepreneurial activities can improve the odds of the new ventures' success and growth. This empirical study attempts to link macro, competitive, market and technological hostility to the entrepreneurial orientation (EO) of 321 new ventures in low and high technology industries. The results show that the associations between different types of environmental hostility and EO are stronger among high than low technology companies.
Key words: adversity, hostility, entrepreneurial orientation, and high technology |
