Jacqueline Winstanley FRSA has presented a paper alongside JoAnn Rolle, Dean, Business School, Medgar Evers College, City University of New York, USA; Jacqueline Kisato, Kenyatta University, Kenya and Patricia Rock, BlueSuite Solutions, Inc., USA during the CBER-MEC 9th ICBED-2020, Virtual Conference held during August 20-22, 2020.
The paper - Inclusive Entrepreneurship: A Critical look at Inclusion of Persons with Disabilities - studies the specific challenges in entrepreneurship faced by persons with disabilities.
Following is the abstract of the Paper. Should you be interested in finding out more about this study, please contact Jacqueline Winstanley directly on email.
While there have been many definitions of inclusion as it relates to the underserved and economic empowerment through entrepreneurship, few have focused specifically on persons with disabilities. There are many studies that have looked at increasing economic empowerment through entrepreneurship for women, minorities, youth, seniors, immigrants, and rural residents throughout literature. The gap however is that the lumping of all these categories has led to the overlooking of specific challenges faced by persons with disabilities. This oversight on economic inclusivity has been magnified especially during the Corona virus pandemic.
The paper reviews literature in search of evidence to document programs, projects, and policies used in both developed and developing countries to address the challenges of inclusive entrepreneurship for all. It explores several entrepreneurial studies on inclusivity of business ecosystems in UK, USA, Sub Saharan Africa, and India and highlights public-private partnerships and impact investment as it relates to challenges in increasing inclusivity in businesses.
Results/Findings
It was evident that, while there are many government policies and programs to support entrepreneurship in the USA, UK, Sub Saharan Africa and India, limited empirical studies have been documented to evaluate the impact of these policies on entrepreneurship for persons with disabilities. Some of the challenges cited in literature included gender gap, cost of doing business and the likelihood to be funded to launch a business, as common dominant factors reported on the issue of inclusion.
Practical implications and Conclusions
The authors find that there is much more empirical research and analyses warranted in the study of entrepreneurship inclusion and empowerment of the underserved especially for persons with disabilities and continue reviewing literature and use quantitative and qualitative research such that additional programs, projects and policies may be developed to serve all inclusively.