Family entrepreneurship

To this end, this special issue focusses on examining how institutional forces affect the entrepreneurial behaviours of business families, family businesses and groups of family businesses. The field of family entrepreneurship[1] is a relatively nascent area of study relative to the expanded understanding of the causes and consequences of entrepreneurial behaviours (Bettinelli et al., 2014). In their work on family entrepreneurship, Bettinelli et al. (2014) demonstrate theoretically that at least three loci of entrepreneurial behaviours exist in the family entrepreneurship context – individuals, families and family businesses – and that these three loci exert reciprocal influences. Indeed, an individual’s perceptions and subsequent actions are strongly influenced by patterns learned during childhood from their parents and members of their family of origin. Further, families, as constructed social units (i.e. family of origin, family of choice, blended families, etc.), influence their members and are
influenced by their members. Finally, the family firm influences the family (e.g. the “enterpriseness” of the firm; see Frank et al., 2019) as well as individuals comprising it (e.g. successor development or new member socialisation). Expanding the scope of research dedicated to outcomes of entrepreneurial behaviours beyond the realm of financial performance, research related to family entrepreneurship seeks to understand the emergence and influences of entrepreneurial behaviours on outcomes such as firm start-up, growth, diversification, CSR and sustainable  development, philanthropy, and beyond (Bergamaschi and Randerson, 2016; Randerson et al., 2016).