The entrepreneurial ecosystem literature paid little attention to policies' effects on the evolution of the regional ecosystem. Scholars underlined the development of the entrepreneurial ecosystem and how different actors affect its dynamics. However, no study focused on the dynamic role and different types of policies in an entrepreneurial ecosystem that evolves or changes. This chapter aims to fill this gap by highlighting the policy directions in addressing regional entrepreneurial ecosystem development. The author presents the results of the thematic content analysis exploring the regional operational programme of three Italian regions - Lombardy, Campania, and Calabria - representative of different development levels. Taking evidence from the analysis, implementing a specific policy direction indicates the entrepreneurial ecosystem stage covered by each region. Results highlight measures employed at different stages of the entrepreneurial ecosystem - nascent, strengthening, and resilient - and identify three policy directions: recovery, reinforcing, and shooting.
TopIntroduction
Given the great importance of entrepreneurship and innovation topics in explaining the development of a territory, in the last decade, some questions emerged in scientific circles regarding the relationship between entrepreneurship and its local context. Indeed, the specific territory’s community and culture could have a meaningful impact on entrepreneurship (Autio et al., 2014). Furthermore, the interaction between the agents leads to a regional environment that fosters the firms’ and territory’s competitiveness. In accordance with these arguments, literature has presented contributions to the entrepreneurial ecosystem (hereafter EE) phenomenon. It is strictly related to the territory it is established, affecting its development and creating networks and relationships between all the actors within the same territory and with other territories. An EE enables entrepreneurship and value creation and fosters and stimulates economic growth by promoting entrepreneurship, social change, and innovation.
Literature on EE is still developing. Although different definitions exist, they share some essential attributes and identify specific components. In this vein, Stam (2015) framed core elements that compose an EE, defining the ecosystem as a set of interdependent actors and factors coordinated to enable productive entrepreneurship. In this definition, three components are shared. The first two are actors - i.e., firms, government institutions, capital providers, academia sector, and the market - and factors, i.e., information, human capital, knowledge, support services, entrepreneurship capability and opportunity, and social culture. Finally, the third component is productive entrepreneurship, i.e., a system that produces “any entrepreneurial activity that contributes directly or indirectly to the net or additional output of the economy” (Baumol, 1993, p. 30).
The literature underlined three critical features of EE, namely dynamism, evolution, and context. Indeed, an EE works through cooperation and synergies among its elements. This means that EE is a highly dynamic phenomenon that changes over time according to the interaction between the different actors and attributes that develop in tandem, influencing and reproducing each other (Spigel, 2017). These interactions also explain the evolutionary aspect. When all the elements within the EE are developed and strictly connected, the ecosystem evolves, leading to the development of the territory in which it is established. Finally, each EE has a different configuration related to the spatial component that can explain the different outcomes. Indeed, an EE reflects the characteristics of the context in which it arises and develops, which explains why every EE is “unique and impossible to replicate” (Fernandes & Ferreira, 2022, p. 190). The context characteristics shape the configurations, the networks, and the actors giving rise to EE with different elements and profiles.
Scholars investigating the influence of single actors in explaining the development of EE have focused mainly on firms, universities, capital providers, and financial intermediaries. At the same time, few studies pointed out the contribution and effects of policies. Regarding the evolutionary aspect over time, some studies have explored the dynamic view of EE development to find evolutive patterns. In this vein, scholars defined different stages of development and different characteristics (Mack & Mayer, 2016). They also studied the different policies adopted by regions with diverse ecosystems (Brown & Mason, 2017). However, no studies focused on the policy types in the different stages of EE, grouping them according to the goals towards which they are directed.
To the best author’s knowledge, no studies investigate the regional policy directions according to the development level in the management domain. To fill this research gap, this study classifies the policies and measures typology and characteristics from the regions studied.
Therefore, this study aims to achieve the following research objectives:
RO1: To identify the main measures related to entrepreneurship and innovation topics, studying the policy documents of three selected regional EEs;
RO2: To categorize and analyse these measures based on the EE’s different development levels to gain more insights into the EE phenomenon.