Explaining participation in off-the-books entrepreneurship in Ukraine: a gendered evaluation

Abstract

Despite the growing recognition that many entrepreneurs conduct some or all of their trade off-the-books, few have evaluated whether there are variations in the rationales of men and women engaging in this shadow enterprise culture. Reporting face-to-face interviews with 331 entrepreneurs in Ukraine during 2005-06, of whom 90 per cent operated partially or wholly off-the-books, the finding is that women are largely 'reluctant' entrepreneurs and men more commonly chiefly 'willing' entrepreneurs, although both motives are normally co-present to differing degrees in entrepreneurs' explanations and their relative importance changes over time. The paper concludes by discussing the implications for both further research and public policy.

Women’s Resourcefulness in the Informal Economy: Evidence from Jordan

“…As Perry and Maloney ( 2007 , p. 2) point out, 'these two lenses, focusing, respectively, on informality driven by exclusion from state benefi ts and on voluntary exit decisions resulting from private cost-benefi t calculations, are complementary rather than competing analytical frameworks'. Analyses have revealed for instance that deprived populations tend to be driven more by exclusion rationales and affl uent populations more by exit rationales in English localities (Williams, 2006(Williams, , 2009aWilliams & Nadin, 2011 ), Ukraine (Williams, Nadin, & Rodgers, 2012 ;Williams, Round, & Rodgers, 2010 ) and Moscow (Williams & Round, 2009, 2010 ).…”

“…Turning to the motives of women engaged in entrepreneurship in the informal economy, most scholars start from the a priori assumption that women entrepreneurs in the informal economy are necessity-driven by exclusion rationales (Franck, 2012 ;Grant, 2013 ;Williams, 2009aWilliams, , 2009bWilliams & Gurtoo, 2011a, 2011bWilliams & Martinez-Perez, 2014 ;Williams & Round, 2009 ;Williams & Youssef, 2013 ). Based on this assumption, they have then focused on measuring the amount and nature of their access to credit, welfare funds, insurance and so forth.…”

Explaining cross-national variations in the commonality of informal sector entrepreneurship: an exploratory analysis of 38 emerging economies

“…Over the past decade or so, the entrepreneurship literature has recognised that many entrepreneurs operate temporarily or permanently, and partly or wholly, in the informal sector (Antonopoulos and Mitra 2009;Bureau and Fendt 2011;Dana 1998;Gurtoo and Williams 2009;Hudson et al 2012;Ram et al 2006;Rezaei et al 2013aRezaei et al ,b, 2014Small Business Council 2004;Valenzuela 2001;Webb et al 2009Webb et al , 2013Webb et al , 2014Williams 2006Williams , 2008Williams , 2009a. Reviewing this new sub-field of entrepreneurship scholarship focusing upon informal sector entrepreneurship, this literature has begun to identify a range of advantages and disadvantages of entrepreneurs operating in the informal sector.…”

Gender variations in the reasons for engaging in informal sector entrepreneurship: some lessons from urban Brazil

“…Informal sector entrepreneurs were consequently depicted as part of a pre-modern traditional mode of production that survived only at the fringes of modern society in a few minor enclaves. Since the turn of the millennium, however, a burgeoning literature has revealed not only that the informal economy (Charmes, 2009;ILO, 2002a;Jütting and Laiglesia, 2009;Schneider, 2008), but also informal sector entrepreneurship (De Soto, 2001;Minard, 2009;Small Business Council, 2004;Venkatesh, 2006;Volkov, 2002;Webb et al, 2009;Williams, 2006Williams, , 2009aWilliams, , 2009bWilliams and Round, 2009), is an extensive, enduring and expanding phenomenon in the contemporary global economy. The outcome has been the advent of explanations for its persistence and growth.…”

“…Given the size and persistence of this sphere, since the turn of the millennium a growing sub-set of the entrepreneurship literature has sought to explain participation in entrepreneurial endeavour in the informal economy both in the global South (Bhatt, 2006;Bhowmik, 2007;Charmes, 1998;Cross, 2000;Cross and Morales, 2007;Das, 2003;Williams, 2009, 2011;Unni and Rani, 2003) and Global North (Llanes and Barbour, 2007;Small Business Council, 2004;Venkatesh, 2006;Webb et al, 2009;Williams, 2005Williams, , 2006Williams, , 2008Williams, , 2009aWilliams, , 2009bNadin, 2011a, 2011b;Williams et al, 2012). The outcome has been the emergence of competing explanations for informal sector entrepreneurship.…”