Culture, Entreprenuership and Gendered Entrepreneurial Discourses and Praxis in Africa

Abstract

This paper is a synthesis of earlier studies and recent research on culture and entrepreneurship in terms of which they represent a treatise in cultural theory, entrepreneurship, gender and economic development in two crucial areas; (i) the relationship between cultural values and entrepreneurship in the context of gendered entrepreneurial ideas and its praxis and (ii) the constraints such cultural values and practices may have on the development of entrepreneurship in the context of Africa. The method of inquiry is derived from the tradition of critical theory and discursive praxis. Here, the discourse on the subject of entrepreneurship is subjected to critical inquiry. A critique of the discourse on entrepreneurship from an African experience of it enables one to become resisting, rather than assenting, spectators and readers of entrepreneurial texts, praxis and research. The paper consists of four parts. Part one focuses on the introduction which deals with how the concept of entrepreneurship in Africa has been perceived differently among scholars and researchers. Part two deals with the concept of culture, entrepreneurship and economic development and shows how entrepreneurship is seen as a product of webs of culture. There is evidence that economic underdevelopment and a lack of entrepreneurial ethos in Africa are the results of indigenous cultural practices which are antithetical to the demands of modern economic practices. Part three deals with culture and gendered entrepreneurial discourses and practices. It critically examines how the notion of entrepreneurship and its contiguous concepts privilege masculine-oriented ideas to the exclusion of the feminine half of the gender equation. Part four suggests ways through which African nations can develop entrepreneurship by cultural reprogramming, intervention and re-orientation. Finally, the paper warns about the danger inherent in turning reified concepts into manufactured reality, which then becomes the basis of action.