Entrepreneurial Orientation and the Performance of Religious Congregations as Predicted by Rational Choice Theory

John A. Pearce, David A. Fritz and Peter S. Davis

Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, 2010, vol. 34, issue 1, 219-248

Abstract: Empirical and anecdotal evidence suggests that businesses that act with an entrepreneurial orientation enjoy superior performance. Our research investigates whether nonprofit, religious congregations can benefit from similar initiatives. We based our hypotheses on the Rational Choice Theory of Religion, which was developed by social scientists to bring economic analysis to the understanding of the effects of competition among nonprofit organizations. Using a sample of 250 religious congregations in five different geographical markets, an entrepreneurial orientation is found to be positively associated with organizational performance. A hypothesized interaction effect between environmental munificence and entrepreneurial orientation is assessed.

Date: 2010
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (54)

Downloads: (external link)
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1111/j.1540-6520.2009.00315.x (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:entthe:v:34:y:2010:i:1:p:219-248

DOI: 10.1111/j.1540-6520.2009.00315.x

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice
Bibliographic data for series maintained by SAGE Publications ().