Matching Items (4)
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- All Subjects: Small Business
- All Subjects: Social Research
- Creators: Jurik, Nancy
Description
The jobless recovery of the Great Recession has led policymakers and citizens alike to ask what can be done to better protect regions from the cascading effects of an economic downturn. Economic growth strategies that aim to redevelop a waterfront for tourism or attract high growth companies to the area, for example, have left regions vulnerable by consolidating resources in just a few industry sectors or parts of town. A promising answer that coincided with growing interest in regional innovation policy has been to promote entrepreneurship for bottom-up, individual-led regional development. However, these policies have also failed to maximize the potential for bottom-up development by focusing on high skill entrepreneurs and high tech industry sectors, such as green energy and nanotechnology. This dissertation uses the extended case method to determine whether industry cluster theory can be usefully extended from networks of high skill innovators to entrepreneurs in traditional trades. It uses U.S. Census data and in-person interviews in cluster and non-cluster neighborhoods in Dayton, Ohio to assess whether traditional entrepreneurs cluster and whether social networks explain high rates of neighborhood self-employment. Entrepreneur interviews are also conducted in Raleigh, North Carolina to explore regional resilience by comparing the behavior of traditional entrepreneurs in the ascendant tech-hub region of Raleigh and stagnant Rustbelt region of Dayton. The quantitative analysis documents, for the first time, a minor degree of neighborhood-level entrepreneur clustering. In interviews, entrepreneurs offered clear examples of social networks that resemble those shown to make regional clusters successful, and they helped clarify that a slightly larger geography may reveal more clustering. Comparing Raleigh and Dayton entrepreneurs, the study found few differences in their behavior to explain the regions' differing long-term economic trends. However, charitable profit-seeking and trial and error learning are consistent behaviors that may distinguish traditional, small scale entrepreneurs from larger export-oriented business owners and contribute to a region's ability to withstand recessions and other shocks. The research informs growing policy interest in bottom-up urban development by offering qualitative evidence for how local mechanics, seamstresses, lawn care businesses and many others can be regional assets. Future research should use larger entrepreneur samples to systematically test the relationship between entrepreneur resilience behaviors to regional economic outcomes.
ContributorsAuer, Jennifer Claire (Author) / Chapman, Jeffrey (Thesis advisor) / Johnston, Erik W., 1977- (Committee member) / Jurik, Nancy (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2013
Description
This dissertation focused on the links among micro-enterprise development (MD), social capital building, and the accompanying social lives of Chinese female entrepreneurs in two China's urban areas—Nanjing and Haikou. It engaged with a few important discussions concerning China’s liberal politics during the reform era, the global trend of neo-liberal capitalism, and the social construction of a new worker-subject—the Chinese urban female entrepreneur shaped by the hybrid marriage of state politics and global capital. The research findings from this research project contributed to the tradition of feminist theories, which endeavors to explore the relationship between neo-liberalism and gender. In particular, gender was found to concretize the ways in which neo-liberal ideological forces have attempted to capture and exploit the productivity of women’s labor
Drawing upon the data from in-depth interviews, participatory observations, and secondary data gathering, I examined the diffusion of the Western-centric concept and phenomena of social capital building in order to answer the question how Chinese women's life was inscribed in the larger context of China's relationship to global capitalism. My research findings manifested that the respondents considered affections (e.g., inter-dependence, obligation, and mutual trust) to be the foundation of establishing and maintaining their social networks regardless of the government's emphasis on market principles and the utility-based social capital conception. This opened up a new way of re-theorizing social capital. This dissertation also focused on how China’s integration with the global economy has affected women’s social identity construction. It emphasized the interaction between gender and class as one of the most salient sites where ideal citizens of China are imagined. Drawing from the perspectives of the respondents, I found that femininity has never been eliminated by the Chinese government. It has existed in China’s MD to challenge the government’s attempt of promoting the agendered (gender-neutral), universal model of women’s participation in self-employment. Moreover, I asserted that class was individualized while penetrating into other dimensions of identity (especially gender). The transformed dimensions of identity constituted a set of stratification schemes that constantly reshuffled social stratifications for maximizing the state’s profits from the control of citizens.
Drawing upon the data from in-depth interviews, participatory observations, and secondary data gathering, I examined the diffusion of the Western-centric concept and phenomena of social capital building in order to answer the question how Chinese women's life was inscribed in the larger context of China's relationship to global capitalism. My research findings manifested that the respondents considered affections (e.g., inter-dependence, obligation, and mutual trust) to be the foundation of establishing and maintaining their social networks regardless of the government's emphasis on market principles and the utility-based social capital conception. This opened up a new way of re-theorizing social capital. This dissertation also focused on how China’s integration with the global economy has affected women’s social identity construction. It emphasized the interaction between gender and class as one of the most salient sites where ideal citizens of China are imagined. Drawing from the perspectives of the respondents, I found that femininity has never been eliminated by the Chinese government. It has existed in China’s MD to challenge the government’s attempt of promoting the agendered (gender-neutral), universal model of women’s participation in self-employment. Moreover, I asserted that class was individualized while penetrating into other dimensions of identity (especially gender). The transformed dimensions of identity constituted a set of stratification schemes that constantly reshuffled social stratifications for maximizing the state’s profits from the control of citizens.
ContributorsZhang, Dongling (Author) / Jurik, Nancy (Thesis advisor) / Quan, H.L.T. (Thesis advisor) / Mackinnon, Stephen (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2015
Description
This study examines the representation of Asian online brides by studying the images and profiles that are advertised on Asianonlinebrides.com. To do so, I combined the history and growth of the Human Trafficking industry, the idea of the Asian “exotic OTHER,” the power and structured/constrained agency, and social construction of gender theories. In particular, I utilized a mixed methods approach for data collection. The content and visual analysis in this study provided the two sides of the analytic coin: the written and the visual. I am particularly interested in the narrative comments offered by the prospective brides, e.g., what they state to be their preferences in their dream man/husband, and the personality traits, and characteristics that they write about themselves. The following were examined: the gender displays, picture frames, feminine touch, and the ritualization of subordination. For example, body language, clothing, skin, hair color, and texture, bone structure, posture, etc. I argue that this data alerts us to the whole host of ideas, assumptions, social, cultural, and gender constructions. The power relations that exceeds the text and inform us of these online brides. The findings have indicated that these women are vulnerable and caught within oppressive social structures. They have nevertheless utilized those structures to their advantage. By doing so, the brides have acted as assertive agents in that they have looked out for the interests of both themselves and their families. Moreover, a significant body of data was provided first hand through the written and visual narratives of the online brides. These brides have offered valuable insight into the field of Asian online brides. Their stories have presented a unique perspective to the online brides’ process that can only be captured through the narratives provided in this research.
ContributorsDai, Linh K (Author) / Cavender, Gray (Thesis advisor) / Jurik, Nancy (Committee member) / Swadener, Elizabeth (Committee member) / Tibbs, Donald (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2019
Description
As immigrants in the United States, Chinese small business entrepreneurs often encountered social and cultural barriers in the areas of finance, language, and employment in their new environment. This dissertation investigated how they utilized social capital to surmount the embedded disadvantages of an unequal market in their adopted country. The findings presented in this qualitative descriptive multi-case analysis, conducted in the greater metropolitan regions of Phoenix and Los Angeles, demonstrated the importance of social and transnational ties created in the United States within the local Chinese community as well as their social connections brought from China.
Drawing upon the data from in-depth interviews and informal observations, this dissertation was guided by three research questions: (a) What barriers do immigrant small business owners encounter? (b) What social connections provide help for immigrant small business owners to overcome those barriers or intensify their disadvantaged situations? (c) How do social networks influence immigrant small business development? The findings revealed many provocative facts on how social capital stimulated Chinese immigrant small business owners.
The influence of local and strong ties especially provided essential start-up funds, an affordable labor force. Those ties also provided authentication for business information provided by weak ties. Although the governments’ Small Business Administration empowers small business by various programs because it is an important social and economic element in the U.S. market, the Chinese community rarely utilized this support.
Transnational connections played an important role in the relatively mature market found in Los Angeles, but indeed all respondents in both case studies exhibited great interest in utilizing transnational connections to explore business opportunities. Regional connections provided a powerful resource for Chinese small business to create business alliance and increase their market competitiveness. Social capital embeds in a complexity of political, economic, social and personal backgrounds. In summary, social capital was an essential resource for Chinese small business when they encountered the barriers in the local market. From the findings, this dissertation’s scholarly contribution adds to the field of social capital studies by combining the investigation of social capital, embeddedness, intersectionality and transnational connections in respect to study immigrant entrepreneurship.
Drawing upon the data from in-depth interviews and informal observations, this dissertation was guided by three research questions: (a) What barriers do immigrant small business owners encounter? (b) What social connections provide help for immigrant small business owners to overcome those barriers or intensify their disadvantaged situations? (c) How do social networks influence immigrant small business development? The findings revealed many provocative facts on how social capital stimulated Chinese immigrant small business owners.
The influence of local and strong ties especially provided essential start-up funds, an affordable labor force. Those ties also provided authentication for business information provided by weak ties. Although the governments’ Small Business Administration empowers small business by various programs because it is an important social and economic element in the U.S. market, the Chinese community rarely utilized this support.
Transnational connections played an important role in the relatively mature market found in Los Angeles, but indeed all respondents in both case studies exhibited great interest in utilizing transnational connections to explore business opportunities. Regional connections provided a powerful resource for Chinese small business to create business alliance and increase their market competitiveness. Social capital embeds in a complexity of political, economic, social and personal backgrounds. In summary, social capital was an essential resource for Chinese small business when they encountered the barriers in the local market. From the findings, this dissertation’s scholarly contribution adds to the field of social capital studies by combining the investigation of social capital, embeddedness, intersectionality and transnational connections in respect to study immigrant entrepreneurship.
ContributorsKwoh, Jing Yu Xin Yu Xiao (Author) / Jurik, Nancy (Thesis advisor) / Li, Wei (Committee member) / Johnson, John (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2019