This paper conducts an inductive case study to build a theory on the role of family in both the host and home countries in immigrant entrepreneurs' attempts at creating entrepreneurial opportunities. We used the perspectives of the opportunity creation process and family social capital. We relied on data collected from four cases of immigrant entrepreneurs from Lebanon, Syria, Cameroon and Mexico who have established businesses in Sweden. The paper identified three sources of family social capital: family duties, family trust and family support as being relevant for creating opportunities. While family duties triggered the process of forming an entrepreneurial idea, this process was advanced by the existence of family trust. Family support was then the building block for launching an entrepreneurial idea. By identifying these three sources of family social capital we show that families in the host and home countries contribute to immigrant entrepreneurs' opportunity creation in different ways.
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to conduct an inductive case study to understand how the opportunity creation process leads to integration.
Design/methodology/approach
It examines four cases of immigrant entrepreneurs of Cameroonian, Lebanese, Mexican and Assyrian origins who founded their businesses in Sweden. The study relies on process-oriented theory building and develops an inductive model of integration as an opportunity creation process.
Findings
The suggested model shows immigrants’ acculturation into the host society via three successive phases: breaking-ice, breaking-in and breaking-out. In the breaking-ice phase, immigrants trigger entrepreneurial ideas to overcome the disadvantages that they face as immigrants in the host country. In the breaking-in phase, immigrants articulate their entrepreneurial ideas by bonding with the ethnic community. In the breaking-out phase, the immigrants reorient their entrepreneurial ideas by desegregating them locally. The paper concludes by elaborating theoretical and practical implications of the research.
Originality/value
Immigrants act when they are socially excluded and discriminated in the labor market by developing business ideas and becoming entrepreneurs. By practicing the new language and accommodating native customers’ preferences, immigrants reorient their entrepreneurial ideas. The immigrants tailor their ideas to suit their new customers by strengthening their sense of belonging to the local community.
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