Informal Entrepreneurship: An Integrative Review and Future Research Agenda

Informal entrepreneurship (IE) has received increased recognition because of its theoreticaldistinctiveness and practical relevance. However, the burgeoning literature on IE is difficult tonavigate, due to its rapid growth across different disciplines. Through an integrative review, weintroduce a novel typology of informal entrepreneurs that captures their heterogeneity acrossvarious contexts. We point out a dynamic perspective of IE, consisting of three pathways—thereactive formalizing, theproactive formalizing, and theinformalizing pathways—along which informalentrepreneurs move, acquiring or foregoing regulative legitimacy. Our review extends the theoryon IE, outlines promising research avenues, and suggests relevant practical implications

Hybrid Organizations: Origins, Strategies, Impacts, and Implications

This introduction to the special issue on hybrid organizations defines hybrids, places them in their historical context, and introduces the articles that examine the strategies hybrids undertake to scale and grow, the impacts for which they strive, and the reception to them by mainstream firms. It aggregates insights from the articles in this special issue in order to examine what hybrid organizations mean for firms and practicing managers as they continue to grow in number and assume a variety of missions in developing and developed countries

Hybrid Organizations: Origins, Strategies, Impacts, and Implications

This introduction to the special issue on hybrid organizations defines hybrids, places them in their historical context, and introduces the articles that examine the strategies hybrids undertake to scale and grow, the impacts for which they strive, and the reception to them by mainstream firms. It aggregates insights from the articles in this special issue in order to examine what hybrid organizations mean for firms and practicing managers as they continue to grow in number and assume a variety of missions in developing and developed countries

Structuring the Field of Social Entrepreneurship: A Transatlantic Comparative Approach

During recent years, social entrepreneurship has been receiving greater recognition from the public sector, as well as from scholars (Stryjan, 2006; Weerawardena and Sullivan Mort, 2006). Encouraging social initiatives has been on our governments' agenda for a while. European policy makers claim the importance of social enterprises as 'they not only are significant economic actors, but also play a key role in involving citizens more fully in Society and in the creation and reproduction of social capital, by organizing, for example, opportunities for volunteering' (European Commission, 2003). Consequently, several European states have created specific legal forms for this kind of initiatives. On the other hand, famous business schools all around the world have created centres for research and education programmes in social entrepreneurship. So far, academic research in social entrepreneurship 'has largely been focused on defining what it is and what it does, and does not, have in common with commercial entrepreneurship' (Nicholls, 2008: 7)

A Behavioral Theory of Social Performance: Social Identity and Stakeholder Expectations

Firms use reference points to evaluate financial performance, frame gain or loss positions, and guide strategic behavior. However, there is little theoretical underpinning to explain how social performance is evaluated and integrated into strategic decision making. We fill this void with new theory built on the premise that inherently ambiguous social performance is evaluated and interpreted differently than largely clear financial performance. We propose that firms seek to negotiate a shared social performance reference point with stakeholders who identify with the organization and care about social performance. While incentivized to align with the firm, firm-identified stakeholders provide intense feedback when there are major discrepancies between their expectations and the firm’s actual social performance. Firms frame and respond to feedback differently depending on the feedback valence: negative feedback will be framed as a legitimacy threat, and firm responses are likely to be substantive; positive feedback will be framed as an efficiency threat, and firm responses are likely to be symbolic. However, social enterprises face a double standard in evaluations and calibrate responses to social performance feedback differently than do nonsocial enterprises. Our behavioral theory of social performance advances knowledge of organizational evaluations and responses to stakeholder feedback

Social Business Education: An Interview With Nobel Laureate Muhammad Yunus

In this interview, Nobel Laureate Muhammad Yunus outlines the role of social business education and its potential in teaching the next generation of social innovation leaders. Our questions and his responses focus on Yunus's experience, drawing on lessons learned from the Grameen Bank and his most recent educational endeavors, including the Yunus Centre and the Grameen Creative Lab. The interview begins with a discussion of the development and evolution of social business and its distinction from social entrepreneurship. Then, we move on to the role of faculty and community engagement and student qualities that should be sought and cultivated in social business education. Next, Yunus formulates recommendations for what business schools and educators can do to prepare students to recognize and implement new social innovations for their communities. We conclude by highlighting some of the challenges involved in incorporating Yunus's social business model into the capitalist economic paradigm that dominates in western business schools and by reflecting on implications for educators as well as the programmatic challenges in integrating social business concepts and initiatives into curriculum and pedagogy

A Genome-Wide Association Study Identifies rs2000999 as a Strong Genetic Determinant of Circulating Haptoglobin Levels

Haptoglobin is an acute phase inflammatory marker. Its main function is to bind hemoglobin released from erythrocytes to aid its elimination, and thereby haptoglobin prevents the generation of reactive oxygen species in the blood. Haptoglobin levels have been repeatedly associated with a variety of inflammation-linked infectious and non-infectious diseases, including malaria, tuberculosis, human immunodeficiency virus, hepatitis C, diabetes, carotid atherosclerosis, and acute myocardial infarction. However, a comprehensive genetic assessment of the inter-individual variability of circulating haptoglobin levels has not been conducted so far

In search for social impact and financial viability within social entrepreneurial ventures definitional, contextual, and governance issues

This dissertation deals with social entrepreneurship – that is, the pursuit of a social mission by means of entrepreneurial strategies. In their concurrent search for social impact and financial viability, the organizations of social entrepreneurship, called Social Entrepreneurial Ventures, face important challenges. In the four essays that compose this dissertation, we focus on definitional, contextual, and governance issues. In the first essay, by extensively reviewing the literature, we address the lack of clear definitions of social entrepreneurship and its related concepts, and formulate some propositions that help the field move forward. The second essay examines the differences, at the organizational level, between social and commercial entrepreneurship. We stress the influence of the socio-economic-political context on our understanding of social entrepreneurship. In the third essay, we tackle distinctive governance issues that take place in Social Entrepreneurial Ventures. We develop a theoretical argumentation that stewardship theory is more appropriate than agency theory when an organization pursues two objectives that are rooted in competing, if not contradicting, logics. The fourth essay empirically examines the effects of social entrepreneurs’ agency and stewardship mindsets on the development of organizational capabilities that facilitate the concurrent achievement of social impact and financial viability. We conclude by proposing several future research avenues.(IAG 3) -- UCL, 201

Rôle du transporteur de cations organiques 2 dans la clairance des monoamines dans le cerveau et les comportements liés à l'humeur

La neurotransmission monoaminergique est principalement contrôlée par la recapture à l aide de transporteurs à haute affinité, qui sont les cibles de nombreux antidépresseurs. Au cours de ma thèse, je me suis intéressé au rôle d un transporteur à faible affinité des monoamines, le transporteur de cations organiques 2 (OCT2).OCT2 est fortement exprimé dans les régions limbiques, et est retrouvé dans de nombreuses régions régulant la réponse au stress et l axe hypothalamo-hypophyso-surrénalien dans le cerveau ainsi que dans les glandes surrénales. Dans ces régions, OCT2 participe à la clairance de la sérotonine (5-HT) et de la noradrénaline (NE), en complément des transporteurs à haute affinité. Nous avons montré qu OCT2 joue un rôle significatif dans les comportements liés à l humeur, comme l anxiété et le désespoir comportemental. De plus, dans un modèle de dépression chronique, nous avons montré qu OCT2 est requis pour l action à long terme des antidépresseurs. OCT2 joue également un rôle important dans la réponse au stress. J ai montré en effet que les souris OCT2-/- présentent une augmentation considérable (150%) de la sécrétion de corticostérone plasmatique en réponse à un stress aigu, sans suractivité des glandes surrénales. Réciproquement, le transport de 5-HT et de NE ex vivo médié par les OCTs n est pas altéré par la corticostérone. Ces expériences indiquent que l activité d OCT2 dans le cerveau contrôle la réponse hormonale au stress, sans pour autant interagir directement avec la corticostérone. Ce travail a permis de démontrer pour la première fois un rôle d OCT2 dans la clairance des monoamines dans le cerveau et les fonctions centrales régulant l humeurMonoaminergic neurotransmission is primarily controlled by high-affinity reuptake transporters, which are targets of several antidepressants. During my PhD thesis, I studied the role of a low-affinity reuptake transporter, the organic cation transporter 2 (OCT2). I showed that OCT2 is highly enriched in limbic regions, and is also found in several regions regulating the response to stress and the hypothalamo-pituitary-adrenal axis in the brain and in adrenal glands. In these regions, OCT2 is involved in serotonin (5-HT) and norepinephrine (NE) clearance, in complement with high-affinity transporters. We showed that OCT2 plays a significant role in mood-related behaviors, such as anxiety and behavioral despair. Moreover, in a chronic depression-like model, we showed that OCT2 is required for the correct long-term effect of antidepressants. OCT2 also plays an important role in response to stress. Indeed, I showed that OCT2-/- mice present a significant corticosterone secretion increase (150%) in response to an acute stress, without overactivity of adrenal glands. Reciprocally, 5-HT and NE ex vivo OCT2-mediated uptake is not altered by corticosterone. These experiments show that brain OCT2 activity controls the hormonal response to stress, without interacting directly with corticosterone. This work demonstrates for the first time a role of OCT2 in brain monoamines clearance and central functions regulating moodPARIS-BIUSJ-Biologie recherche (751052107) / SudocSudocFranceF