Rural Entrepreneurship in an Emerging Economy: Reading Institutional Perspectives from Entrepreneur Stories

Abstract

Rural entrepreneurs are of extreme importance in China's progress toward a more market‐oriented economy as the vast majority of hinese live in rural areas. From an institutional perspective and based on content analysis of 91 publicly published stories about rural hinese entrepreneurs broadcast by hina entral elevision, this paper addresses several key aspects of rural entrepreneurship in hina and specifically probes into how different institutional elements (i.e., regulative, normative, and cognitive components) affect the strategic behaviors of rural hinese entrepreneurs. We found that due to weak regulatory protection of intellectual rights, rural entrepreneurs in China tend to work on innovations on their own or with close family members instead of collaborating with external sources; these entrepreneurs use guanxi strategically to deal with constraints from the institutional environment; it is important to build legitimacy by either building alliances with large, established firms, or acquiring approval from people of authority.