Understanding Place-Based Entrepreneurship in Rural Central Europe. A Comparative Institutional Analysis.

This article provides new insight into the local institutional embeddedness of entrepreneurial behaviour. By introducing a sociological institutional framework to place-based entrepreneurship, the study particularly adds to the knowledge of the role of regulative, normative and cognitive institutions for local entrepreneurial practices in rural Central Europe. Based on extensive case studies in regions across five countries, the analysis suggests that the influence of regulative institutions on local entrepreneurship is tempered, if not superseded, by specific place-dependent normative and cognitive institutions, and that the fit between the different institutions is decisive for the emergence of entrepreneurial practices in a specific location. We provide explanations for why and under which conditions entrepreneurs show different change practices in rural transition and non-transition contexts. The study concludes that institutional mechanisms are place-bound, and that a place-sensitive institutional approach can serve as a fruitful way forward for developing our contextualized knowledge of entrepreneurial behaviour.