Enterprise Ritual: A Theory of Entrepreneurial Emotion and Exchange
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8551.2006.00518.x |
| Author | David Goss |
| Date | 01 June 2008 |
| Published date | 01 June 2008 |
Enterprise Ritual: A Theory of
Entrepreneurial Emotion and Exchange
David Goss
School of Management, University of Surrey, Guildford GU2 7XH, UK
Email: d.goss@surrey.ac.uk
Unlike most other areas of social science, emotion has been a neglected concept within
entrepreneurship research. Where it has appeared, it has usually been a marginal or
subsidiary concern, subordinated to the more rational aspects of information processing
and decision-making. This article draws upon ideas from social exchange, interaction
ritual and discourse theory to propose a model that integrates the processes of social
interaction, emotion and cognition. The model supports a set of conjectural propositions
about the role of emotions in shaping entrepreneurial behaviour and suggests a number
of new opportunities for research in this area.
Introduction
Accounting for the emotional dimensions of
work, employment and organization is now a
major research area (see, for example, Ashforth
and Humphrey, 1995; Ashkanasy and Daus,
2002; Ashkanasy, Hartel and Daus, 2002;
Daniels, Harris and Briner, 2004; Fineman,
2003, 2004; Fisher and Ashkanasy, 2000; Forgas
and George, 2001; Fox, 2002; Jordan, Ashkanasy
and Hartel, 2002; Weiss, 2001; Weiss and
Cropanzano, 1996). Comparatively few studies
of entrepreneurship, however, have referenced
emotion as a component of enterprising beha-
viour, and even fewer have made it a central
concern (for exceptions, see Goss, 2005a, 2005b;
Kets de Vries, 1977, 1985). Where emotion has
been acknowledged, it has generally merited a
passing reference or incidental comment rather
than detailed investigation (for example, Baron,
1998; Markman and Baron, 2003; Shane, Locke
and Collins, 2003).
1
This lacunae is worrying for two reasons. First,
it suggests that entrepreneurship research is fail-
ing to capitalize fully on developments that are
widely recognized to have benefited explanation
1
Some commentators might regard such a broad char-
acterization as potentially misleading. It is certainly true
that some writers have recognized the likely involvement
of emotions as a component of entrepreneurial beha-
viour, but this has remained a marginal concern.
Baron’s (1998, p. 280) account of cognitive mechanisms
in entrepreneurship, for instance, refers to ‘counter-
factual thinking’ as having potentially important effects
on emotional states, and points to the role of ‘affect
infusion’ in shaping entrepreneurial decisions, but fails
to elaborate these possibilities in any detail. Shane,
Locke and Collins’s (2003) model of entrepreneurial
motivation associates high self-efficacy with passion –
specifically ‘passionate, selfish love of the work’ (p. 268)
– but leaves this insight unexplored. Markman and
Baron’s (2003) discussion of person–entrepreneurship fit
also focuses on self-efficacy but fails to explore its links
to moods such as happiness and sadness, pride and
shame (Bower, 1981; Jacoby, 1996; Kavanagh and
Bower, 1985); similarly the connection between ‘perse-
verance’ (or rather the lack of it) and ‘increased anxiety
and negative affect’ is acknowledged but unexamined.
Lastly, Chell and Tracey (2005) speak of the relevance of
‘feelings of trust’ but do not give this an explicitly
emotional focus. Much the same applies to the network/
embeddedness theories of entrepreneurship that have
been influential since the 1980s: emotion is frequently
implied but seldom explicated in detail, an ‘absent
presence’, to coin Shilling’s (1999) phrase. We contend,
therefore, that despite these types of ‘suggestive’ insight,
there remains a significant gap in relation to a detailed
and extensive consideration of emotion.
British Journal of Management, Vol. 19, 120–137 (2008)
DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-8551.2006.00518.x
r2007 British Academy of Management. Published by Blackwell Publishing Ltd, 9600 Garsington Road, Oxford
OX4 2DQ, UK and 350 Main Street, Malden, MA, 02148, USA.
and understanding in related areas of social
science (Ashkanasy, Hartel and Daus, 2002;
Fineman, 2003; Gabriel and Griffiths, 2002;
Lupton, 1998). Second, there is a large and
plausible body of material that suggests a prima
facie case for regarding entrepreneurialism as a
deeply emotional activity (in particular, biogra-
phical and autobiographical studies, for example,
Bower, 1993; Branson, 2000; Down, 2006; Kets de
Vries, 1996; Roddick, 2000).
This article attempts to redress this imbalance
by drawing together insights from contemporary
theories of social exchange, interaction ritual and
symbolic communication to propose a frame-
work for understanding entrepreneurship’s emo-
tional dynamics (Collins, 1990, 2004; Dodd,
2002; Downing, 2005; Lawler, 2001; Lawler and
Yoon, 1996; Moldoveanu and Nohria, 2002;
Nicholson and Anderson, 2005). We begin by
outlining some recent developments in ap-
proaches to emotion and work-related behaviour,
integrating aspects of several related theories to
build a model that encompasses social interac-
tion, emotion and cognition. This model is then
used to explore a number of propositions and
conjectures about the role of emotional dynamics
within entrepreneurial behaviour, and to suggest
how a more emotionally informed understanding
could extend knowledge of this activity.
Emotion and organization
Most accounts of emotion and organization have
tended to fall under one of two broad headings:
cognitive processing or social constructionism
(Lupton, 1998). Within the former, the notion of
‘appraisal’, that is, the assertion that ‘emotion is a
response to meaning’, is a core component of
most theories (Lazarus, 1999, p. 8; Parkinson,
1997). Emotional experiences occur as a result of
an individual’s appraisal or evaluation of the
likely impact of an event for their goals, wellbeing
and coping abilities. For example, experience of a
particular type of event is likely to prompt the
question: ‘Does this situation affect me person-
ally and, if so, in a positive or negative way?’
followed by ‘What, if anything, can be done
about the situation?’ (Parkinson, 1997, p. 63).
The answers to these questions, informed, more
or less consciously, by latent mental models
stored in long-term memory, are thought to
determine both the nature and intensity of the
emotional reaction (Lazarus, 1991; Lazarus and
Folkman, 1984; Lupton, 1998). Thus, although
events may be experienced immediately, it is the
subsequent appraisal that determines whether
this experience will be emotional or non-emo-
tional. However, as the appraisal process fre-
quently appears to operate almost automatically,
drawing upon learned ‘core relational themes’
(Smith and Lazarus, 1993), emotion is usually
experienced as if it were a spontaneous reaction
to an event.
Although cognitive appraisal theories have
tended to focus on the internal aspects of in-
formation processing and decision-making (for
example, Daniels, Harris and Briner, 2004), they
share with social constructionist approaches the
view that emotions are, primarily, psycho-social
‘productions’. However, in contrast to appraisal
accounts, social constructionist analyses of emo-
tion tend to focus on social contexts (from small
groups to whole cultures) and the ways in which
these enable emotional performances: ‘Emotions
are constituted in the act of description through
language and enacted in the presence of audi-
ences. Audience is paramount. Social and cultur-
al contexts provide the rules, scripts and
vocabularies of emotional display for different
audiences: self, loved one, boss, subordinate etc.’
(Gabriel and Griffiths, 2002, p. 216). Here,
socially constructed meaning, if not everything,
is a very large part of what emotional experience
is about. As Harre
´puts it, ‘to be angry [for
instance] is to have taken on the angry role on a
particular occasion as the expression of a moral
position. This role may involve the feeling of
appropriate feelings as well as indulging in
suitable public conduct’ (1991, p. 143).
2
2
Here the notion of social constructionism is used
broadly as a portmanteau term to encompass a range
of approaches that share a ‘family resemblance’ rather
than conformity to single orthodoxy (Burr, 1995;
Nightingale and Cromby, 1999). These can range from
perspectives that are strongly ideographic and relativist
to those that conceive ‘construction’ as part of a
reflexive and mutually constitutive relationship between
actors/agents and social structures/institutions: ‘our
social constructions are always already mediated in
and through our embodied nature, the materiality of the
world and pre-existing matrices of social and institu-
tional power’ (Nightingale and Cromby, 1999, p. 209).
The position favoured by this article is towards the latter
end of this spectrum, emphasizing the situated nature of
Enterprise Ritual 121
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