The Resources of Institutional Entrepreneurs in Different Structural Settings

As agents of strategic institutional change, entrepreneurs (IEs) draw resources from their structural environment to alter the context in which they are embedded. In this article, we explore IEs mobilize different settings. We distinguish between (positional or free) field and personal resources, all may be material, cultural, social, symbolic political kind. Our review leading case studies entrepreneurship shows that centrally positioned primarily on organizational positional resources. By contrast, peripherally rely mainly skilful mobilization free as well individuals. Also field’s degree institutionalization has an impact IEs’ resources: emerging fields where positions boundaries not yet defined, must imported mature fields. Furthermore, although resource-poor peripheral set off institution-building processes fields, usually superseded by central actors during later stages institution-building.