Gaddefors, Johan
- Department of Economics, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences
Abstract
Rural areas in most of the world are facing a multi-crisis related to climate change, regional inequalities, and increasing political unrest. This calls for rethinking and exploring forms of entrepreneurial action that can engage with these crises. In this conceptual paper, we conduct a Weberian ideal type analysis and suggest that the prevailing ideal types of rural entrepreneurship run the risk of an epistemic fallacy and of inadvertently legitimizing centralizing policies. To address this, we propose a new ideal type of "entrepreneurship for the rural" that highlights the need to engage with issues of spatial justice, which lie at the heart of the conflicts and potentials that constitute the current multi-crisis. The ideal type of "entrepreneurship for the rural" emphasizes institutional and political forms of entrepreneurship that seek to create changes in the structural conditions of regional inequality and spatial patterns of opportunity. Further research into this type of entrepreneurship is recommended.
Keywords
Rural entrepreneurship; Ideal type analysis; Spatial justice; Institutional entrepreneurship; Political entrepreneurship; L26; M20; O18
Published in
Small Business Economics
2026
Publisher: SPRINGER
SLU Authors
UKÄ Subject classification
Business Administration
Agricultural Economics and Management and Rural development
Publication identifier
- DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11187-026-01184-w
Permanent link to this page (URI)
https://res.slu.se/id/publ/146401