The category of the entrepreneur has been increasingly adopted as a social identity in Brazil, a country where even the term ‘entrepreneurship’ was absent from ordinary language until recently (Melo, 2008). Where did this category come from? How does it disseminate in Brazil? And how do people come into contact and experience it? Research suggests that the end of the twentieth century witnessed the emergence of a socioeconomic agenda, policies, and discourses that placed entrepreneurship and the associated values of individualism, self-reliance, and enterprise culture in evidence (Audretsch, 2007; Boltanski & Chiapello, 1999; Gilbert, Audretsch, & McDougall, 2004; Keat & Abercrombie, 1991). These studies leave largely unaddressed the concrete mechanisms through which the category of the entrepreneur diffuses to the Global South. This thesis addresses this gap in the literature by applying an analytical framework that shines a spotlight on the practices of organizations that promote entrepreneurship in Brazil. Taking Empretec, Endeavor, and Online Networks of Support as case studies, I draw conceptual and methodological insights from policy diffusion and institutional analysis, science and technology studies, and organizational studies (Stone, 2012; Callon, 1998; Tomaskovic-Devey & Avent-Holt, 2019) to analyze data generated through interviews and content analysis. I argue that controversial aspects of post-War knowledge associated with the category of the entrepreneur gave way to an institutionalized normative and seemingly neutral depiction of the entrepreneur. I show how a growing number of organizations deploy varied strategies to encourage entrepreneurship and constitute entrepreneurial subjects in Brazil. It results in new groups performed across gender, racial, and class lines, with varying symbolic capital, and receiving support of different magnitude. Organizations that promote entrepreneurship are thus central in the dissemination of the category of the entrepreneur, but they inadvertently create a system of distribution of resources that exacerbates social inequalities.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:uottawa.ca/oai:ruor.uottawa.ca:10393/41166 |
| Date | 02 October 2020 |
| Creators | de Almeida Coutinho, Aline |
| Contributors | Young, Nathan |
| Publisher | Université d'Ottawa / University of Ottawa |
| Source Sets | Université d’Ottawa |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis |
| Format | application/pdf |
Page generated in 0.002 seconds