Entrepreneurship, Human Capital, and Regional Development: Labour Networks, Knowledge Flows, and Industry Growth

Citation

Marina Solesvik (2016), "Entrepreneurship, Human Capital, and Regional Development: Labour Networks, Knowledge Flows, and Industry Growth", International Journal of Entrepreneurial Behavior & Research, Vol. 22 No. 4, pp. 584-586. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJEBR-12-2015-0301

The governments of many countries are concerned with enhancing the level of entrepreneurship, and special programmes are developed to support entrepreneurship. Much attention is paid to enhancing the level of general and specific human capital, since it is believed to influence entrepreneurial capabilites (Martin et al., 2013). The concept of human capital was introduced by Becker more than 50 years ago in 1962. However, it is still a popular research topic and attracts the attention of entrepreneurship scholars (Westhead and Solesvik, in press). There are three main antecedents of human capital: education, training, and experience (Becker, 1962; Baptista and Leitão, 2015). An individual’s human capital can shape productivity (Becker, 1975) and entrepreneurial behaviour (Westhead et al., 2011). Human capital theory is widely used to explain the propensity of individuals to become successful entrepreneurs. General human capital relates to a person’s age, gender, ethnic background, social class, education, etc. Specific human capital relating to management and industry know-how, technical and entrepreneurial assets, ability to acquire resources, and prior business ownership experience is generally associated with better entrepreneur performance than general human capital variables (Unger et al., 2011).

Some issues and gaps in the knowledge base that concern scholars and policy-makers are intended to be covered in the recent book by Baptista and Leitão (2015) titled Entrepreneurship, Human Capital, and Regional Development. The authors identify three broad research questions that they aim to answer: “Is the growth and success of the cluster over time due to conjugating simple effects of concentration and transmission of business competences through spin-offs located in a given regional space?”; “Does increased density of job options outside the workplace contribute to increased mobility of human capital between firms located within clusters, and so improve coordination in the local labor market?”; and “Do spin-offs benefit from hiring workers from successful incumbents, inasmuch as those workers are expected to perform better than workers from different origins?” I think that the book has answered these and other research questions posed by the authors of the articles included in the book.

A number of key themes relating to the field of entrepreneurship and regional development are explored in Baptista and Leitão’s (2015) book. In total, 37 authors from European countries and Turkey contributed to the edited book. The book consists of an introductory chapter and three sections into which 16 chapters are arranged: Part I, Entrepreneurship (five chapters); Part II, Human Capital (five chapters); and Part III, Regional Development (six chapters). In my opinion, the composition of the thematic sections is quite timely and reflects modern trends of interdisciplinary research combining entrepreneurship and regional development as well as innovation. Policy-makers in the EU countries are also concerned with these fields.

The articles in this book nicely reflect the variety of research methods. There is a good combination of quantitative and qualitative studies in the book as well as conceptual papers. The quantitative studies use a variety of techniques, i.e. logit analysis, logistics regressions, probit regression, discrete time duration models, and econometric models. Qualitative approaches applied in the chapters include case studies and qualitative content analysis.

I think Baptista and Leitão’s (2015) book would benefit if a consistent definition of general and specific human capital were provided such that the authors of the chapters could utilise it throughout the book. For example, Alrumaithi, Guerrero, and Peña (chapter 4) use the term generic and specific human capital, while Aliaga-Isla (chapter 10) refers to general and specific human capital. The chapters included in the book are related mainly to a single-country context, and two chapters are based on the data from two countries, i.e. the UK and Italy (chapter 8) and Norway and Spain (chapter 16). One paper (chapter 5) uses a popular Global Entrepreneurship Monitor’s survey data from 55 countries. I noted, however, that nine chapters out of 16 are related to the Portuguese context, four chapters are based on the Spanish context, and four chapters are related to empirical data gathered in Germany, Italy, Norway, Turkey, and the UK. I think such an uneven distribution related to context has pros and cons. On the one hand, this makes the book especially interesting for the scholars, policy-makers, and practitioners in Portugal and Spain. On the other hand, including articles highlighting issues related to entrepreneurship, human capital, and regional development in other countries as well, such as the USA, Canada, and Australia, would be an advantage.

Part I

Five chapters constituting Part I cover different theoretical perspectives and research streams: a knowledge-based perspective on entrepreneurship and entrepreneurship capital perspective (Cabrita, Cabrita, Matos, and Munoz Dueñas, chapter 2); human capital, university status, and role identity (Hesse, chapter 3); work environment and human capital (Alrumaithi, Guerrero, and Peña chapter 4); worker mobility, resource inheritance, and human capital (Nziali and Fayolle, chapter 5); and pushed-pulled spin-off performance literature (Rocha, Carneiro, and Varum, chapter 6). When considered as a whole, the Part I articles show that specific human capital (i.e. entrepreneurial experience, entrepreneurship education) is positively related to entrepreneurial performance, while variables related to general human capital (age, gender, higher level of education) are not always clearly related to entrepreneurial performance.

Part II

This part consists of five chapters that are devoted to the exploration of human capital’s influence on economic outcomes. These chapters, in addition to a human capital perspective, employ: academic spin-off literature (Teixeira and Castro, chapter 7; Uzo, chapter 8); absorptive capacity and coopetition (Pereira and Leitão, chapter 9); entrepreneurial opportunities and business creation (Aliaga-Isla, chapter 10); and creativity (Olim, Mota, and Silva, chapter 11). The authors do a good job exploring in-depth the role of human capital in firm performance, particularly in academic spin-offs. In addition, I liked how the results of the study are presented in Table 7.1 (chapter 7), as well as how the literature review is summarised in Table 11.1 (chapter 11).

Part III

A somewhat different research stream is presented in the chapters in Part III. Government policy documents are analysed related to Turkey (chapter 12), as well as Norway and Spain (chapter 16). Other chapters in Part III use the literature on agglomeration economies (chapters 13, 14, 15), regional knowledge (chapter 13), heritage theory (chapter 14), and firm growth literature (chapters 15 and 17). I think the chapters in Part III provide interesting evidence and link regional-specific characteristics and knowledge to firm growth. The exploration of different governmental programmes aimed to enhance regional development is also interesting.

The chapters in the book also identify the areas where future research is needed. Overall, I recommend Baptista and Leitão’s (2015) book. I think the book is an essential read for PhD students, scholars, policy-makers, and practitioners in EU/EEC countries. Much attention is paid to the policy initiatives supported by EU programmes. Readers from other countries might also be interested in studying the experience of EU member countries and countries that have collaboration agreements with the EU (Norway and Turkey).