Gendered Barriers and Opportunities in Entrepreneurship and Innovation

Authors

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.34190/icgr.8.1.3288

Keywords:

gender in entrepreneurship and innovation, strategic approaches to gender equality, gendered barriers, good practices

Abstract

Understanding the gendered barriers and opportunities to entrepreneurship and innovation is crucial to developing effective solutions and strategies to overcome existing barriers. The theory of gendered innovation and the three strategic approaches to gender equality are used to investigate gendered barriers, opportunities and good practices for gender equality in entrepreneurship and innovation in EU countries. A total of 36 semi-structured interviews were conducted and analysed in 10 European countries with experts from the quadruple helix (academia, citizens, industry and government). Our findings suggest that the main barriers are related to the cultural and social environment in which men and women are gender stereotyped which is in line with existing research on the male norm in entrepreneurship and the important role of the cultural context. Building on the theory of three strategic approaches to gender equality we suggest focusing on culture in further theoretical development, research and policy recommendations to effectively reduce barriers and promote inclusive entrepreneurship and innovation ecosystems.

Author Biographies

Alena Křížková, Institute of Sociology of the Czech Academy of Sciences

Alena Křížková is Head of the Gender & Sociology Department of the Institute of Sociology, Czech Academy of Sciences. She uses qualitative and quantitative methodology and develops intersectional approach to research of social inequalities. Her research focus is on economic and social justice, gender wage gap, work/life balance, inequality production in organisations, entrepreneurship and innovations and on technological change.

Marie Pospíšilová, Institute of Sociology of the Czech Academy of Sciences

Marie Pospíšilová is a associate scientist at the Gender & Sociology Department at the Institute of Sociology of the Czech Academy of Sciences. She focuses mainly on qualitative research and on gender inequalities and precariousness in entrepreneurship, inequalities in the impact of crises on entrepreneurs, and the combination of formal and informal care.

Romana Marková Volejníčková, Institute of Sociology of the Czech Academy of Sciences

Romana Marková Volejníčková is a junior researcher at the Institute of Sociology, Czech Academy of Sciences (Gender & Sociology Department). She uses qualitative and quantitative methodology to research gender and social inequalities in health care and during the study of medicine. In previous research, she focused on gender inequalities in entrepreneurship and labour market (as the gender wage gap, gender segregation of labour market etc.)

Markéta Švatcová, Institute of Sociology of the Czech Academy of Sciences

Markéta Švarcová is a sociologist at the Institute of Sociology, Czech Academy of Sciences. Her professional focus is on gender inequalities in the labour market, especially in entrepreneurship from interesectional and gender perspective. She has experience in working with public administration. She research-focuses on the platform economy.

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Published

2025-04-04

Issue

Vol. 8 No. 1 (2025): Proceedings of the 8th International Conference on Gender Research

Section

Academic Papers

License

Copyright (c) 2025 International Conference on Gender Research

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.