Much ado about very little: The dubious connection between ethnic minority business policy and ethnic minority entrepreneurship
| Published date | 01 April 2023 |
| Author | Trevor Jones,Richard Roberts,Monder Ram |
| Date | 01 April 2023 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/imig.12959 |
International Migration. 2023;61:9–26.
|
9
wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/imig
INTRODUCTION
“What is the conn ection bet ween policies to su pport ethnic m inority busi nesses1 (EMBs) and the ac tuality of
ethnic minority entrepreneurship”? This deceptively simple question is rarely remarked upon in either scholarly or
practitio ner circles. The flurr y of policy measures across Euro pe (Solano et al., 2019) sug gests that practit ioners,
implicitly at le ast, are confident of the ef ficacy of such initiative s. The increasingly criti cal and nuanced scholarl y
discourse (Jo nes & Ram, 2007; Kloosterma n, 2010; Rath & Schutjens , 2019; Romero & Valdez, 2016) ad dresses
the systemic structural constraints on ethnic minority entrepreneur ship, but is surprisingly reticent about prosaic
policy prono uncements (for exceptions, see R am et al., 2015; Rath & Swagerman, 2016). Fo cussed attention on
the extent to whi ch policymakers influe nce the practices of EMBs is l ong overdue.
In this articl e, we argue that the evolutio n of EMBs in Britain— in itself a narr ative of proliferation, g rowth and
diversifica tion (Ram & Jones, 200 8)— has to be seen primar ily in the context of broa der political- economic change.
Received: 6 Marc h 2021
|
Revised: 30 Augu st 2021
|
Accepted: 23 Novemb er 2021
DOI: 10 .1111/imig .12959
SPECIAL ISSUE ARTICLE
Much ado about very little: The dubious
connection between ethnic minority business
policy and ethnic minority entrepreneurship
TrevorJones |RichardRoberts | Monder Ram
Centre for Research in Ethnic Minority
Entreprene urship, Aston Uni versity,
Birmingham, UK
Correspondence
Monder Ram , Centre for Researc h in
Ethnic Minority Entrepreneurship, Aston
Universit y, Aston street, Bir mingham, B4
7ET, UK.
Email: m.ram1@aston.ac.uk
Abstract
This article presents a historical repri se of 40 years of policy
interest in ethnic minority businesses in the UK. It con-
trasts the pro nouncements of poli cymakers with the r eal-
ity of ethnic minority entrepreneurship. Such an exercise is
surprisingly rare g iven the activism of po licymakers in this
arena and growing scho larly interest in this field. O ur histor-
ical overview is infor med by a novel research met hod that
plots references to ethnic minority entrepreneurship in the
British House s of Parliament. Tho ugh the UK has been the
site of some interesting p olicy experiments on et hnic minor-
ity entreprene urship, their impact has been slight wh en set
against the contex t of broader political- economic change.
This is an open ac cess article und er the terms of the Crea tive Commons Attr ibution License, which permits use, distribution and
reproduct ion in any medium, pro vided the origina l work is properly cit ed.
© 2022 The Authors. Int ernational Migrat ion published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd on beha lf of International Organ ization for Migration
JONES Et al.
10
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While th e UK’s indus trial— de- industrial— post- industrial shift has been a key driving fo rce for self- employment,
the emergence a nd development of EMB has also be en affected by part y- political swings, as the gove rning party
has twice switc hed from Labour to Conser vative during the period f rom the 1970s to the present day. Though it
would be mislead ing to downplay the influence of G overnment policy, we argue that th is has made itself felt pri-
marily through general economic policy measures rather than direct entrepreneurial support measures.
There are impor tant theoretical and p olicy reasons for our examinat ion of the political rhetori c of EMB sup-
port in the context of the wide r political e conomy of the UK over a 4 0- year period. The theoretica l rationale i s
to build on and ext end the contextualist tur n in EMB research, which was given co nsiderable momentum by the
influential Mixe d Embeddedness (K loosterman, 20 10; Rath & Schut jens, 2019) per spective. Mixed Emb eddedness
questions the prevailing tendency— inspired by Light’s (1972) emphasis on so- called ‘ethnic resources’— to account
for the promine nce of EMBs by privileged insider acce ss to co- ethnic communi ties. The one- sided n ature of this
narrative was po werfully corr ected by Mixed Emb eddeness's emph asis on the interpl ay between ethn ic social
capital and the external business env ironment of EMBs. Crucially, this new s tress on the world outside th e pro-
tected social n etwork draws attention to th e severity of the struct ural obstacles facing EMB s; and the failure of
enterprise po licy to grasp this nettl e.
Subsequent re search informe d by Mixed Embedded ness has fleshe d out how the divers e contexts in whi ch
EMBs are embedd ed shape the fortunes of such b usinesses (Jones & Ram, 2 007). But cur iously, the role of time
and the histori cal dimension is underplaye d (Ram et al., 2017). Our fo cus on the historical evolut ion of EMB pol-
icy in the UK the refore addresses two surpri singly enduring gaps in ex tant studies . The firs t is the te ndency to
present theor etical models on EMBs in a kin d of abstract vacuum. Th e post- World War Two rise of migrant busi-
ness in Britai n has taken place as an integral par t of a concrete historical pro cess (Jones & Ram, 2007 ), whereby
overseas migra nts themselve s and their changi ng economic role have b een called for th by evolving econ omic
history: 1945– 1973 Fordist Industria lism and mass migration of labo ur power from former colonies; 1974– 20 00
Post- industrialisation and ethnic minority self- employment; 2000 onwards Globalisation and super- diversity. We
trace the connections between EMB policy developments and these political- economic processes.
Second, an hist orical persp ective facili tates examinat ion of how successfu lly incorporat ed migrant commu-
nities use self- empl oyment as a transit ional foothold to h igh level employm ent (Jones et al., 2 012). Immigrant
entrepreneu rship is far from a contempor ary phenomenon (Bagh diantz et al., 2005)— t here is a tendency in EMB
research to emp hasise novelty rather th an continuity. The impor tance of time and politic al economic changes are
identified in a re cent reappraisal of Mixed Embe ddness (Kloosterman & Rath , 2018) by its originators. This w el-
come recognitio n takes the perspect ive closer to its critical r ealist ontology, which emph asises the importa nce of
temporalit y in its account of struct ure and agency (Archer, 2003). O ur study then provides a co ncrete illustration
of the import ance of foregroun ding political e conomic changes ove r time in order to deve lop an appropri ately
contextualis ed account of EMB policy.
Analysis of the changing pol itical econo my of EMB is necess ary to assess whet her business support initia-
tives can live up to t he rhetoric that often accom pany them. Policymakers an d practitioners involve d in business
support— and innoc ent of the relevant re search— often la ud such business es and view them in a p ositive light.
For ex ample, in the Ac tion Plan for inte grating thir d country nationals and the 2020 Entrepreneurship Action
Plan, the European Commission portrays entrepreneurship as decent and sustainable employment for migrants.
Some enthusiasts even celebrate the supposed innate entrepreneurial drive of particular ethnic groups (Gidoomal,
1997), ob livious to powerful critiqu es that emphasise the politi cal economy of migrant enterpr ise (Jones & Ram,
2007; Rath & Schu tjens, 2019; Rome ro & Valdez, 2016). Drawing a ttention to the politic al economy of EMBs over
time can alert polic y- makers t o the limitati ons of initiative s that are ‘age ncy- centric’. This contributes to a more
nuanced view of the p otential of business suppo rt to facilitate EMB develo pment.
The rest of this ar ticle begins with a summar y of the research technique us ed to allow a closer, time specific
examination of polic y development during the last 40 year s using a significa nt modificat ion to a methodolog y
introduced by Dannreuther and Perren (2013). This approach reveals the s pecific influences on poli cy decisions,
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