Tourism entrepreneurship research

Abstract

The emergence and evolution of tourism entrepreneurship as an academic field of study can be dated back some three decades (see for example, Pickering et al., Citation1971; Kibedi, Citation1979; Stallibras, Citation1980; Cohen, Citation1989; Williams et al., Citation1989). They portrayed entrepreneurship as a positive attribute, and a possible panacea to solve wide ranges of social, economic and political issues. The dominant disciplinary lens was that of economics (Rodenberg, 1980) and economic geography (Shaw and Williams, Citation1998). Since then the field has been populated by the research of academics from a wide variety of disciplines, looking beyond the economic to incorporate the social milieu in which entrepreneurs are embedded (Skokic and Morrison, Citation2010). The range of disciplines includes sociology, anthropology, psychology, economics and geography, alongside related fields of study such as rural sociology, entrepreneurship, tourism, gender and family studies, small, micro and medium-size enterprises, regional development and sustainability (Morrison et al., Citation2010). All are concerned with the human beings who are motivated within their own reference and value frame set to act as entrepreneurs. These entrepreneurs socially construct their endeavours on a “world” stage, observed by economists, politicians, and sociologists working from their own reference and value frame set. Academics research the lives, values, meanings, cultures and consequences of ordinary people who are at the same time extraordinary within the context of their micro-worlds (Morrison et al., Citation1999).