Managerial ties as determinant of social entrepreneurial intentions: Does gender make a difference?

• Published date: 01 May 2021
• Author: Mafia Latif,Sumran Ali
• Date: 01 May 2021
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1002/pa.2183

ACADEMIC PAPER

Managerial ties as determinant of social entrepreneurial

intentions: Does gender make a difference?

Mafia Latif | Sumran Ali

School of Public Affairs, University of Science

and Technology of China, Hefei, China

Correspondence

Sumran Ali, School of Public Affairs, University

of Science and Technology of China, Jinzhai

Road 96, Hefei, Anhui 230026, China.

Email: sumranali@mail.ustc.edu.cn

The notions of social entrepreneurship and social enterprise have been the emerging

trends in the world today, specifically in developing countries. We draw on social net-

work theory to explore causes and situations that encourage individuals to engage in

social activities in an entrepreneurial manner. This article investigates the impact of

business ties and political ties on SEIs and how gender influences the casual relation-

ships. Linear regression is used to analyze the responses obtained from 300 general

populations across three developing countries including Bangladesh, India, and

Pakistan. The findings show that business ties positively affect SEIs, but political ties

are negatively related to SEIs. Furthermore, our results indicate that the gender influ-

ences both the positive impact of business ties on SEIs, which is greater for males,

and the negative impact of political ties, which is stronger for females.

1|INTRODUCTION

In recent years, the field of social entrepreneurship is rapidly emerg-

ing. Around the globe, socially conscious individuals are introducing

and applying innovative business approaches to tackle social issues

previously neglected by governments, nongovernmental organizations

(NGOs), nonprofit organizations (NPOs), businesses, and entrepre-

neurial firms (Bloom, 2009; Zahra, Gedajlovic, Neubaum, &

Shulman, 2009). The domain of social entrepreneurship is still emerg-

ing for academic inquiry. However, we define social entrepreneurship

broadly, as a process of applying combination of resources at hand to

new social problems and opportunities to create social value (Mair &

Marti, 2006). In their review of research on social entrepreneurship,

Short, Moss, and Lumpkin (2009) noted one of more unanswered

research questions as “Are the motives of starting social enterprise

the same as or different from those of creating traditional venture?”

This research question is of particular interest, given the recent argu-

ment by Ruskin, Seymour, and Webster (2016) that “extant literature

explores how social entrepreneurs operate social ventures without

studying why they run their social enterprises.”In addition, there are

several calls that consider contributions toward new theory for social

entrepreneurial motivations (Austin, Stevenson, & Wei-Skillern, 2012;

Miller, Grimes, McMullen, & Vogus, 2012; Short et al., 2009). Past

studies have identified various factors of motivation, including inten-

tions (Krueger Jr, Reilly, & Carsrud, 2000), emotions (Batson &

Shaw, 1991), and past experiences (Delmar & Wiklund, 2008). Accord-

ingly, in this study, we consider intentions for two reasons. First, as

noted in Ajzen (1991), across a broad range of diverse behaviors,

behavioral intentions have been suggested to hold an immediate pre-

cise impact on any real behavior. Second, recognizing, that intention is

a mental state that signifies a commitment to performing an action or

actions (B. Bird, 1988a), therefore, our study considers understanding

of what motivates individuals to intend for social entrepreneurship.

Research on general entrepreneurship tend to study intentions

(Carsrud & Brännback, 2011) and investigate factors such as personal-

ity traits, entrepreneurship education program, individual factors such

as gender, and cultural values that promote a person's entrepreneurial

intentions (Sánchez, 2013; Shinnar, Giacomin, & Janssen, 2012; Zhao,

Seibert, & Lumpkin, 2010). In social entrepreneurial motivation litera-

ture, studies have identified factors including personality traits, and

emotions as precursors for social entrepreneurship (Clark, Newbert, &

Quigley, 2018; Miller et al., 2012; Ruskin et al., 2016). Other factors

such as social and financial sustainability, personal experiences, entre-

preneurial mindsets, social problems and challenges, national policy,

and social networks that promoting social entrepreneurial activity

(Ghalwash, Tolba, & Ismail, 2017; Khieng & Dahles, 2015;

Mottiar, 2016). Consequently, to investigate motives of potential

future social entrepreneurs, researchers have started to develop

intention-based process models. Based on traditional models, Mair

and Marti (2006) have discussed that individual factors are important

Received: 5 May 2020 Accepted: 8 May 2020

DOI: 10.1002/pa.2183

J Public Affairs. 2021;21:e2183. wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/pa © 2020 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd 1of11

https://doi.org/10.1002/pa.2183