Collective Entrepreneurship in a Mennonite Community in Paraguay

Introduction: Religion as an Explanatory Variable for Entrepreneurship

“…Mennonites value asceticism, frugality and thrift, but Old Colony Mennonites have traditionally been opposed to the concept of private property. Hence, among Mennonites, individual entrepreneurs are not fl agships of entrepreneurship; instead, entrepreneurial activities take a collective form, as described by Dana and Dana (2007). Indeed, diff erent religions yield unlike patterns of entrepreneurship.…”

Amish enterprise: the collective power of ethnic entrepreneurship

“…The term 'community entrepreneurship' is used by Selsky and Smith (1994) to conceptualise entrepreneurs of non-profit organisations in communities. Dana and Dana (2007) and Franz (2009) describe cooperatives as a collective and communal form of entrepreneurship among the Old Colony Mennonites in Paraguay. The 450 Hutterite colonies in North America eschew private property and, in their communal context, the entire colony (approximately 100 people) owns and operates non-farm enterprises (Janzen and Stanton, 2010).…”

'We are growing Belize': modernisation and organisational change in the Mennonite settlement of Spanish Lookout, Belize

“…Their social networks help the Mennonites to form joint business ventures, long-time business relationships based on trustworthiness, because they provide useful information about the individual's reliability and creditability (Roessingh and Smits, 2010b). Networks have been founded to make important contributions to entrepreneurial firms (Shaw 1999;Granovetter 1992;Arnoldus 2002;Dana and Dana 2007). They provide entrepreneurs with accurate information and tactics.…”

“…In the 18th and 19th century, the Mennonite migrated from Western Europe to areas like Northern America and Russia where they could live in a relatively isolated manner and where they mainly lived as farmers (Dyck, 1993;Loewen 2001;Redekop, 1989;Scott 1996). Later, in the 20th century, the Mennonites moved on to countries in Latin America like Paraguay and Bolivia for several reasons (Dana and Dana, 2007;Hedberg, 2007).…”