Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Performance-based vs socially supportive culture: A cross-national study of descriptive norms and entrepreneurship

  • Article
  • Published:
Journal of International Business Studies Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

This paper is a cross-national study testing a framework relating cultural descriptive norms to entrepreneurship in a sample of 40 nations. Based on data from the Global Leadership and Organizational Behavior Effectiveness project, we identify two higher-order dimensions of culture – socially supportive culture (SSC) and performance-based culture (PBC) – and relate them to entrepreneurship rates and associated supply-side and demand-side variables available from the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor. Findings provide strong support for a social capital/SSC and supply-side variable explanation of entrepreneurship rate. PBC predicts demand-side variables, such as opportunity existence and the quality of formal institutions to support entrepreneurship.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Similar content being viewed by others

Notes

  1. We refrain from using the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor's Total Entrepreneurial Activity index, which combines the rates of nascent entrepreneurs and new business ownership rate, since we are interested in the prediction of actual behavior, that is, setting up a new firm/running an established firm, and not in claims that one is about to do so (i.e., nascent entrepreneurship).

  2. Another operational definition of values is to ask respondents to indicate what their society should be like (e.g., value measurement in the GLOBE project and the European Values Survey). However, this approach is criticized for capturing a rather abstract notion of the desirable, i.e., people report on what they feel they ought to desire rather than on what they actually desire (Smith, 2005).

  3. The GLOBE project surveyed matched samples of over 17,370 middle managers from 951 local companies and three industry sectors (food processing, finance, and telecommunications). A full description of the method and items can be found in House et al. (2004) and at www.thunderbird.edu/wwwfiles/ms/globe/instruments.asp.

  4. ILSA/CAS stands for Individual-Level Scales, Aggregate/Create Aggregate-level Scales. This reflects Peterson and Castro's (2006) assumption that the GLOBE descriptive norms scales were created at the individual level of analyses and were subsequently aggregated, i.e., the mean country scores per scale calculated (ILSA). These aggregated scores are then subjected to a second-order, country-level factor analysis (CAS). It is the CAS part that we essentially replicate in our paper, i.e., the second-order factor analyses of the mean country scores of the descriptive norm dimensions provided by GLOBE.

  5. We use the response-bias-corrected scores provided by House et al. (2004). Because of high cross-loadings, we drop institutional collectivism. Because of the lack of a clearly based hypothesis, we also drop the gender egalitarianism scale, which loads on a third factor. We repeated the factor analysis on the full sample of 60 societies that took part in the GLOBE project (House et al., 2004) and found a highly similar factor solution.

  6. PBC and SSC themselves may also be useful to delineate country clusters, and future research might elaborate on this. Preliminary work by the authors using discriminant analyses shows that countries can be classified into four cultural groups with an accuracy of 88.2%, according to high or low PBC and high or low SSC. Germanic cultures (House et al., 2004) score low on SSC but high on PBC. Conversely, Southern Asian cultures (and some Confucian Asian cultures) score high on SSC but relatively low on PBC. Nordic and Anglo cultures (House et al., 2004) score high on both dimensions, whereas Eastern and Latin European as well as Latin American cultures tend to score low on both dimensions.

  7. The countries are Argentina, Australia, Austria, Bolivia, Brazil, Canada, China, Colombia, Denmark, Ecuador, Egypt, Finland, Germany, Greece, Hong Kong, Hungary, India, Indonesia, Iran, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Kazakhstan, Malaysia, Mexico, The Netherlands, New Zealand, Philippines, Russian Federation, Singapore, Slovenia, South Africa, South Korea, Spain, Switzerland, Thailand, Turkey, the United Kingdom, the United States, and Venezuela. To obtain country scores for South Africa, Germany and Switzerland country subgroup scores were combined using weighted means based on the proportion of a subgroup relative to that country's population.

  8. A detailed description of this index is available from the authors. We include the following entrepreneurial framework condition scales described in detail in Levie and Autio (2008): policy, regulations, programs, R&D transfer, and physical infrastructure, as well as scales capturing intellectual property rights and high-growth businesses support and encouragement.

  9. Frazier et al. (2004) outline that mediating effects exist when: (1) the predictor is significantly associated with the outcome when the mediator is not included in the model; (2) the predictor is significantly associated with the proposed mediating variable; and (3) the mediating variable is associated with the outcome, even when controlling for the effects of the predictor. Furthermore, mediation effects will lead to a drop in the weight of the predictor when the mediating variables are added to the model. The significance of the drop is tested with the Sobel test (Frazier et al., 2004), for which we used a p<0.10 cut-off criterion to offset the limited statistical power due to the small sample size.

References

  • Aarts, H., & Dijksterhuis, A. 2003. The silence of the library: Environment, situational norms, and social behavior. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 84 (1): 18–28.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Adler, P. S., & Kwon, S. W. 2002. Social capital: Prospects for a new concept. Academy of Management Review, 27 (1): 17–40.

    Google Scholar 

  • Aidis, R., Estrin, S., & Mickiewicz, T. M. 2009. Entrepreneurial entry: Which institutions matter? CEPR Discussion Paper No. DP7278, available at SSRN: http://ssm.com/abstract=1405075.

  • Aldrich, H. E., & Martinez, M. A. 2001. Many are called, but few are chosen: An evolutionary perspective for the study of entrepreneurship. Entrepreneurship Theory & Practice, 25 (4): 41–56.

    Google Scholar 

  • Aldrich, H. E., Rosen, D., & Woodward, B. 1987. The impact of social networks on business foundings and profit: A longitudinal study. In N. Churchill et al. (Ed.), Frontiers of entrepreneurship research 1987: 154–168. Wellesley, MA: Babson College Center for Entrepreneurial Studies.

    Google Scholar 

  • Anderson, N. R., & West, M. A. 1998. Measuring climate for work group innovation: Development and validation of the team climate inventory. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 19 (3): 235–258.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Arenius, P., & Minniti, M. 2005. Perceptual variables and nascent entrepreneurship. Small Business Economics, 24 (3): 233–247.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Arthur, W., Bell, S. T., & Edwards, B. D. 2007. A longitudinal examination of the comparative criterion-related validity of additive and referent-shift consensus operationalizations of team efficacy. Organizational Research Methods, 10 (1): 35–58.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Audretsch, D. B., & Thurik, A. R. 2001. What's new about the new economy? Sources of growth in the managed and entrepreneurial economies. Industrial and Corporate Change, 10 (1): 267–315.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Baer, M., & Frese, M. 2003. Innovation is not enough: Climates for initiative and psychological safety, process innovations, and firm performance. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 24 (1): 45–68.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bandura, A. 1991. Social cognitive theory of self-regulation. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 50 (2): 248–287.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Barley, S. R., & Tolbert, P. S. 1997. Institutionalization and structuration: Studying the links between action and institution. Organization Studies, 18 (1): 93–117.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Baumol, W. J., Litan, R. E., & Schramm, C. J. 2007. Good capitalism, bad capitalism, and the economics of growth and prosperity. New Haven: Yale University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bosma, N., Acs, Z. J., Autio, E., Coduras, A., & Levie, J. 2009. Global entrepreneurship monitor: 2008 executive report, Babson Park, MA, Santiago, Chile and London, UK: Babson College, Universidad del Desarrollo and London Business School.

  • Bowen, H. P., & De Clercq, D. 2008. Institutional context and the allocation of entrepreneurial effort. Journal of International Business Studies, 39 (4): 747–767.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Brinckmann, J., Grichnik, D., & Kapsa, D. 2010. Should entrepreneurs plan or just storm the castle? A meta-analysis on contextual factors impacting the business planning-performance relationship in small firms. Journal of Business Venturing, 25 (1): 24–40.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bruederl, J., & Preisendoerfer, P. 1998. Network support and the success of newly founded business. Small Business Economics, 10 (3): 213–225.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Burt, R. S. 1992. Structural holes: The social structure of competition. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Busenitz, L. W., Gomez, C., & Spencer, J. W. 2000. Country institutional profiles: Unlocking entrepreneurial phenomena. Academy of Management Journal, 43 (5): 994–1003.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Choi, J. N., & Chang, Y. J. 2009. Innovation implementation in the public sector: An integration of institutional and collective dynamics. Journal of Applied Psychology, 94 (1): 245–253.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Choi, J. N., Price, R. H., & Vinokur, A. D. 2003. Self-efficacy changes in groups: Effects of diversity, leadership and group climate. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 24 (4): 357–372.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Cialdini, R. B., & Trost, M. R. 1998. Social influence: Social norms, conformity, and compliance. In D. Gilbert, J. Fiske & G. Lindzey (Eds), The handbook of social psychology: 151–192. New York: McGraw-Hill.

    Google Scholar 

  • Collins, C. J., Hanges, P. J., & Locke, E. A. 2004. The relationship of achievement motivation to entrepreneurial behavior: A meta-analysis. Human Performance, 17 (1): 95–117.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Davidsson, P., & Wiklund, J. 1997. Values, beliefs and regional variations in new firm formation rates. Journal of Economic Psychology, 18 (2–3): 179–199.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Delmar, F., & Shane, S. 2003. Does business planning facilitate the development of new ventures? Strategic Management Journal, 24 (12): 1165–1185.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Djankov, S., La Porta, R., Lopez-de-Silanes, F., & Shleifer, A. 2002. The regulation of entry. Quarterly Journal of Economics, 117 (1): 1–35.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Edmondson, A. 1999. Psychological safety and learning behavior in work teams. Administrative Science Quarterly, 44 (2): 350–383.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Fischer, R. 2006. Congruence and functions of personal and cultural values: Do my values reflect my culture's values? Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 32 (11): 1419–1431.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Fischer, R. 2008. Multilevel approaches in organizational settings: Opportunities, challenges and implications for cross-cultural research. In F.J.R. Van de Vijver, D.A. Van Hemert & Y. Poortinga (Eds), Individuals and cultures in multi-level analysis: 173–196. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

    Google Scholar 

  • Fischer, R., Ferreira, M. C., Assmar, E., Redford, P., Harb, C., Glazer, S., Cheng, B. S., Jiang, D. Y., Wong, C., Kumar, N., Kaertner, J., Hofer, J., & Achoui, M. 2009. Individualism–collectivism as descriptive norms: Development of a subjective norm approach to culture measurement. Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, 40 (2): 187–213.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Frazier, P. A., Tix, A. P., & Barron, K. E. 2004. Testing moderator and mediator effects in counseling psychology research. Journal of Counseling Psychology, 51 (1): 115–134.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Fukuyama, F. 1995. Social capital and the global economy: A redrawn map of the world. Foreign Affairs, 74 (5): 89–103.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Fukuyama, F. 2001. Social capital, civil society and development. Third World Quarterly, 22 (1): 7–20.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Gartner, W. B. 1989. “Who is an entrepreneur?” is the wrong question. Entrepreneurship Theory & Practice, 13 (4): 47–68.

    Google Scholar 

  • Granovetter, M. S. 1973. The strength of weak ties. American Journal of Sociology, 78 (6): 1360–1380.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hair, J. F., Anderson, R. E., Tatham, R. L., & Black, W. C. 1998. Multivariate data analysis. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hanges, P. J., & Dickson, M. W. 2006. Agitation over aggregation: Clarifying the development of and the nature of the GLOBE scales. Leadership Quarterly, 17 (5): 522–536.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hanifan, L. 1916. The rural school community center. Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, 67 (1): 130–138.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hatch, M. J., & Cunliffe, A. L. 2006. Organization theory: Modern, symbolic, and postmodern perspectives. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hayton, J. C., George, G., & Zahra, S. A. 2002. National culture and entrepreneurship: A review of behavioral research. Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, 26 (4): 33–52.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hébert, R. F., & Link, A. N. 1982. The entrepreneurs: Mainstream views and radical critiques. New York: Praeger.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hofstede, G. 2001. Culture's consequences: Comparing values, behaviors, institutions and organizations across nations. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hofstede, G. 2006. What did GLOBE really measure? Researchers’ minds vs respondents’ minds. Journal of International Business Studies, 37 (6): 882–896.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hofstede, G., Noorderhaven, N. G., Thurik, A. R., Uhlaner, L. M., Wennekers, A. R. M., & Wildeman, R. E. 2004. Culture's role in entrepreneurship: Self-employment out of dissatisfaction. In T. Brown & J. Ulijn (Eds), Innovation, entrepreneurship and culture: The interaction between technology, progress and economic growth: 162–203. Cheltenham, UK: Edward Elgar.

    Google Scholar 

  • House, R. J., Hanges, P. J., Javidan, M., Dorfman, P. W., & Gupta, V. 2004. Culture, leadership and organizations: The GLOBE study of 62 societies. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hunter, S. T., Bedell, K. E., & Mumford, M. D. 2007. Climate for creativity: A quantitative review. Creativity Research Journal, 19 (1): 69–90.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • International Monetary Fund. 2009. World economic outlook database. http://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/weo/2009/01/weodata/index.aspx. Accessed 30 June 2009.

  • Jackman, R. W., & Miller, R. A. 1998. Social capital and politics. Annual Review of Political Science, 1 (1): 47–73.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Javidan, M., House, R. J., Dorfman, P. W., Hanges, P. J., & Sully de Luque, M. 2006. Conceptualizing and measuring cultures and their consequences: A comparative review of GLOBE's and Hofstede's approaches. Journal of International Business Studies, 37 (6): 897–914.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Klapper, L., Laeven, L., & Rajan, R. 2006. Entry regulation as a barrier to entrepreneurship. Journal of Financial Economics, 82 (3): 591–629.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Klein, K. J., & Kozlowski, S. W. J. (Eds), 2000. Multilevel theory, research and methods in organizations. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

    Google Scholar 

  • Koellinger, P. 2008. Why are some entrepreneurs more innovative than others? Small Business Economics, 31 (1): 21–37.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Krueger, N. F. 2000. The cognitive infrastructure of opportunity emergence. Entrepreneurship Theory & Practice, 24 (3): 5–23.

    Google Scholar 

  • Krueger, N. F., Reilly Jr., M. D., & Carsrud, A. L. 2000. Competing models of entrepreneurial intentions. Journal of Business Venturing, 15 (5): 411–432.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Kwon, S.-W., & Arenius, P. 2010. Nations of entrepreneurs: A social capital perspective. Journal of Business Venturing, 25 (3): 315–330.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Landis, D., Bennett, J. M., & Bennett, M. J. 2003. Handbook of intercultural training. Thousand Oaks: Sage.

    Google Scholar 

  • Leibenstein, H. 1968. Entrepreneurship and development. The American Economic Review, 58 (2): 72–83.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lent, R. W., Brown, S. D., & Hackett, G. 2000. Contextual supports and barriers to career choice: A social cognitive analysis. Journal of Counseling Psychology, 47 (1): 36–49.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Levie, J., & Autio, E. 2008. A theoretical grounding and test of the GEM model. Small Business Economics, 31 (3): 235–263.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Licht, A. N., Goldschmidt, C., & Schwartz, S. H. 2007. Culture rules: The foundations of the rule of law and other norms of governance. Journal of Comparative Economics, 35 (4): 659–688.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Maseland, R., & Van Hoorn, A. 2009. Explaining the negative correlation between values and practices: A note on the Hofstede–GLOBE debate. Journal of International Business Studies, 40 (3): 527–532.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • McClelland, D. C. 1976. The achieving society. New York: Irvington.

    Google Scholar 

  • Minniti, M., Bygrave, W., & Autio, E. 2006. Global entrepreneurship monitor 2005 executive report, Babson Park, London and Kansas City, MO: Babson College, London Business School and Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation.

  • Nolan, J. M., Schultz, P. W., Cialdini, P. W., Goldstein, N. J., & Griskevicius, V. 2008. Normative social influence is underdetected. Personality & Social Psychology Bulletin, 34 (7): 913–923.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • North, D. C. 1991. Institutions. Journal of Economic Perspectives, 5 (2): 97–112.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • O’Donnell, A., Gilmore, A., Cummins, D., & Carson, D. 2001. The network construct in entrepreneurship research: A review and critique. Management Decision, 39 (9): 749–760.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Peng, K., Nisbett, R. E., & Wong, N. Y. C. 1997. Validity problems comparing values across cultures and possible solutions. Psychological Methods, 2 (4): 329–344.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Peng, M. W., Wang, D. Y. L., & Jiang, Y. 2008. An institution-based view of international business strategy: A focus on emerging economies. Journal of International Business Studies, 39 (5): 920–936.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Peterson, M. F., & Castro, S. L. 2006. Measurement metrics at aggregate levels of analysis: Implications for organization culture research and the GLOBE project. Leadership Quarterly, 17 (5): 506–521.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Portes, A. 1998. Social capital: Its origins and applications in modern sociology. Annual Review of Sociology, 24 (1): 1–24.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Powell, W. W., & DiMaggio, P. J. 1991. The new institutionalism in organizational analysis. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Pryor, F. L. 2007. Culture and economic systems. The American Journal of Economics and Sociology, 66 (4): 817–855.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Rauch, A., & Frese, M. 2007. Let's put the person back into entrepreneurship research: A meta-analysis on the relationship between business owners’ personality traits, business creation, and success. European Journal of Work & Organizational Psychology, 16 (4): 353–385.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Rauch, A., Frese, M., & Sonnentag, S. 2000. Cultural differences in planning-success relationships: A comparison of small enterprises in Ireland, West Germany, and East Germany. Journal of Small Business Management, 38 (1): 28–41.

    Google Scholar 

  • Reynolds, P. D., Bygrave, W. D., & Autio, E. 2004. Global entrepreneurship monitor 2003 executive report, Babson Park, London and Kansas City, MO: Babson College, London Business School and Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation.

  • Reynolds, P. D., Bosma, N., Autio, E., Hunt, S., DeBono, N., Servais, I., Lopez-Garcia, P., & Chin, N. 2005. Global entrepreneurship monitor: Data collection design and implementation 1998–2003. Small Business Economics, 24 (3): 205–231.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Schmitt-Rodermund, E. 2004. Pathways to successful entrepreneurship: Parenting, personality, early entrepreneurial competence, and interests. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 65 (3): 498–518.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Shane, S., & Venkataraman, S. 2000. The promise of entrepreneurship as a field of research. Academy of Management Review, 25 (1): 217–226.

    Google Scholar 

  • Shteynberg, G., Gelfand, M. J., & Kim, K. 2009. Peering into the “Magnum Mysterium” of culture: The explanatory power of descriptive norms. Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, 40 (1): 46–69.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Smith, J. R., & Louis, W. R. 2008. Do as we say and as we do: The interplay of descriptive and injunctive group norms in the attitude–behaviour relationship. British Journal of Social Psychology, 47 (4): 647–666.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Smith, P. B. 2005. Culture, leadership, and organizations: The GLOBE study of 62 societies. Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, 36 (5): 628–630.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Smith, P. B. 2006. When elephants fight, the grass gets trampled: The GLOBE and Hofstede projects. Journal of International Business Studies, 37 (6): 915–921.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Swaminathan, A. 1996. Environmental conditions at founding and organizational mortality: A trial-by-fire model. Academy of Management Journal, 39 (5): 1350–1377.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Swidler, A. 1986. Culture in action: Symbols and strategies. American Sociological Review, 51 (2): 273–286.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Thornton, P. H. 1999. The sociology of entrepreneurship. Annual Review of Sociology, 25 (1): 19–46.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Tung, R. L., Walls, J., & Frese, M. 2007. Cross-cultural entrepreneurship: The case of China. In J.R. Baum, M. Frese & R. Baron (Eds), The psychology of entrepreneurship: 265–286. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

    Google Scholar 

  • Uhlaner, L., & Thurik, R. 2007. Postmaterialism influencing total entrepreneurial activity across nations. Journal of Evolutionary Economics, 17 (2): 161–185.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Uslaner, E. M. 2004. Trust and social bonds: Faith in others and policy outcomes reconsidered. Political Research Quarterly, 57 (3): 501–507.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Uzzi, B. 1997. Social structure and competition in interfirm networks: The paradox of embeddedness. Administrative Science Quarterly, 42 (1): 35–67.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Van Oudenhoven, J. P. 2001. Do organizations reflect national cultures? A 10-nation study. International Journal of Intercultural Relations, 25 (1): 89–107.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Van Praag, C. M., & Versloot, P. H. 2007. What is the value of entrepreneurship? A review of recent research. Small Business Economics, 29 (4): 351–382.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Van Stel, A., Storey, D., & Thurik, R. 2007. The effect of business regulations on nascent and young business entrepreneurship. Small Business Economics, 28 (2–3): 171–186.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Venaik, S., & Brewer, P. 2010. Avoiding uncertainty in Hofstede and GLOBE. Journal of International Business Studies, 41 (8): 1294–1315.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Verheul, I., Wennekers, S., Audretsch, D., & Thurik, R. 2002. An eclectic theory of entrepreneurship: Policies, institutions and culture. In D.B. Audretsch, A.R. Thurik, I. Verheul & S. Wennekers (Eds), Entrepreneurship: Determinants and policy in a European-US comparison: 1–71. Boston/Dordrecht: Kluwer.

    Google Scholar 

  • Verplanken, B., & Holland, R. W. 2002. Motivated decision making: Effects of activation and self-centrality of values on choices and behavior. Journal of Personality & Social Psychology, 82 (3): 434–447.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Weber, M. 1930. The protestant ethic and the spirit of capitalism. New York: The Citadel Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Wennekers, A. W. E., Uhlaner, L. M., & Thurik, A. R. 2002. Entrepreneurship and its conditions: A macro perspective. International Journal of Entrepreneurship Education, 1 (1): 25–64.

    Google Scholar 

  • Wennekers, S. 2006. Entrepreneurship at country level: Economic and non-economic determinants, ERIM PhD Series Research in Management, 81, Erasmus School of Economics, Erasmus University Rotterdam, Rotterdam, NL.

  • Wennekers, S., Van Stel, A. J., Thurik, A. R., & Reynolds, P. 2005. Nascent entrepreneurship and the level of economic development. Small Business Economics, 24 (3): 293–309.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Wennekers, S., Thurik, R., Van Stel, A., & Noorderhaven, N. 2007. Uncertainty avoidance and the rate of business ownership across 21 OECD countries, 1976–2004. Journal of Evolutionary Economics, 17 (2): 133–160.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Werner, A., & Spence, L. J. 2004. Literature review: Social capital and SMEs. In L.J. Spence, A. Habisch & R. Schmidpeter (Eds), Responsibility and social capital: The world of small and medium sized enterprises: 7–24. New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Wicker, A. W. 1969. Attitudes vs actions: The relationship of verbal and overt behavioral responses to attitude objects. Journal of Social Issues, 25 (4): 41–78.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Woolcock, M., & Narayan, D. 2000. Social capital: Implications for development theory, research, and policy. The World Bank Research Observer, 15 (2): 225–249.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Wong, P. K., Ho, Y. P., & Autio, E. 2005. Entrepreneurship, innovation and economic growth: Evidence from GEM data. Small Business Economics, 24 (3): 335–350.

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgements

Data for this study were provided by the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM), which is a consortium of research teams representing more than 60 nations across the globe. Names of the members of national teams, the global coordination team and the financial sponsors are published in the annual Global Entrepreneurship Monitor Reports, which can be downloaded at www.gemconsortium.org. We thank all the researchers and their financial supporters who made this research possible. We thank Niels Bosma, Jolanda Hessels, Martin Lukes, Mark Peterson, Ulrike Roesler, André van Stel and John Whitman for helpful comments on previous versions of this manuscript. The work of the first author on this manuscript was partly supported by the European Commission, Socio-economic Sciences and Humanities Grant Agreement 217622. A previous version of this paper was presented at the Academy of Management Annual Meeting, 8–11 August 2008, Anaheim, CA, USA.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Managerial Economics, Strategy and Innovation, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Leuven, Belgium

    Ute Stephan

  2. EDHEC Business School, France

    Lorraine M Uhlaner

Authors
  1. Ute Stephan
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Lorraine M Uhlaner
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Ute Stephan.

Additional information

Accepted by Rosalie Tung, Area Editor, 21 February 2010. This paper has been with the authors for three revisions.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Stephan, U., Uhlaner, L. Performance-based vs socially supportive culture: A cross-national study of descriptive norms and entrepreneurship. J Int Bus Stud 41, 1347–1364 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1057/jibs.2010.14

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Revised:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/jibs.2010.14

Keywords

Search

Navigation