Chinese Culture and Its Potential Influence on Entrepreneurship

As an important economic activity, entrepreneurship greatly contributes to economic development. This paper aims to investigate the relationship between Chinese culture and entrepreneurship. From a psychocultural perspective, Chinese culture is considered from the following five aspects – self-construal, self-evaluation, communication style, public attitude toward business failure, and the legal and ethical climate. This study suggests that some of the typical Chinese personality traits are inconsistent with those of a successful entrepreneur, and certain aspects of Chinese sociocultural factors are unfavorable for entrepreneurship. Nonetheless, Chinese culture has some advantages in boosting entrepreneurship, which can partly interpret why many overseas Chinese have achieved phenomenal success in entrepreneurial activities.