Local developers as virtual entrepreneurs - do difficult surroundings need initiating interventions?

Mauri Laukkanen and Hannu Niittykangas

Entrepreneurship & Regional Development, 2003, vol. 15, issue 4, 309-331

Abstract: This paper discusses the preconditions and strategies of local development and turnaround in difficult surroundings such as peripheral rural communities. Its key premise is that local decision makers' beliefs of how such small economies function and of ‘proper’ interventions are critical. Such thought patterns were studied among Finnish rural municipality directors (RMDs), using comparative cause mapping. The findings show that while private initiative, entrepreneurship, is regarded as key for development, prevalent views of entrepreneurship, especially firm formation, are unsophisticated, stressing personal traits and social factors such as supportive cultures and role models. Paralleling these views, the current developmental doctrine is indirect, focused on resource provision and implying passive waiting for entrepreneurs to emerge before developers ‘can’ act. Considering their bleak perspectives, the paper argues that communities with weak autonomous turnaround capabilities need more interventionist strategies than those built-in the dominant paradigm, whereas current resource-providing models may be suitable in more benevolent environments. To augment the dominant thinking, the paper suggests an initiating ‘business-based development model’ as a parallel approach for a more effective local economic development in difficult surroundings.

Date: 2003
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (10)

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/0898562022000029278 (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

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:taf:entreg:v:15:y:2003:i:4:p:309-331

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.tandfonline.com/pricing/journal/TEPN20

DOI: 10.1080/0898562022000029278

Access Statistics for this article

Entrepreneurship & Regional Development is currently edited by Professor Alistair Anderson

More articles in Entrepreneurship & Regional Development from Taylor & Francis Journals
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Chris Longhurst ().