Social Capital and Entrepreneurial Performance in Russia: A Longitudinal Study

Abstract

Drawing on the social embeddedness perspective, this article examines the impact of entrepreneurs' social capital on their firm performance in post-Soviet Russia. Based on face-to-face interviews with 75 Russian entrepreneurs in 1995 and follow-up interviews in 1999, the study examines effects of structural embeddedness, relational embeddedness and resource embeddedness on firm performance. The main finding is that relational embeddedness and resource embeddedness have direct positive impacts on firm performance, whereas structural embeddedness has no direct impacts on performance.