RESPONSIBLE ENTREPRENEURSHIP VISION DEVELOPMENT AND ETHICS

458 RESPONSIBLE ENTREPRENEURSHIP
at other characteristics that could influence such opportunities. The reason for this is that
entrepreneurship cannot solely be studied nor effectively described taking a one-dimensional
approach (Hornaday, 1992; Erikson, 2001), but rather is the sum of all the linked dimensions
(Zahra & Dess, 2001). For this purpose, spatial mobility and spatial capability were introduced
because, on reviewing the context of entrepreneurship in the extant literature, there
appeared to be deficiency and discrepancy between the findings of current research and the
real world experiences. This indicates, as suggested by (Zahra 2007, p. 448), that there is “a
gap in our understanding of the process associated with opportunity recognition, creation,
and exploitation’.
Saudi women entrepreneurs were selected as a case study sample to understand their perception
and experience of spatial mobility and capability. The study context ‘Saudi Arabia’
reflects a unique case of social policy towards women’s mobility in non-western cultures.
The focus of the empirical study lies on understanding the link between actual mobility
(through means such as transportation) and the potential of mobility (one’s freedom of option
to go to certain places and to do certain things) and its influence on nascent women entre -
preneurs. It is possible to argue that the chosen context could have implication in shaping
entrepreneurship, especially when focusing on women as a social group. For example, Birley
(1985) confirmed that context affects an entrepreneur’s activity in terms of how they perceive
it to influence the choice of operating a business. Building upon this, the current study
explains the context by providing a coherent understanding its influence on women in Saudi
Arabia, as it is likely that it will affect the individual in different ways (Sutcliffe, 1994; Castrogiovanni,
1996). The differential of contextual supports the study aim to increase understanding
of the environmental influences on Saudi women entrepreneurs. Nonetheless, this
work does not solely discuss this context on entrepreneurship, but rather focuses on spatial
mobility within this situation. Kaufmann et al., (2004), assert that comprehension about the
territorial constraints of people movements, as well as an understanding of the condition of
mobility within a particular regional context is pivotal. Equally, Church et al. (2000, p. 198)
state that there is a number of contextual factors that effects an “individual’s ability to access
an activity that facilitates participation”, and these therefore need to be examined.
Therefore the study considered actual travel, which included examining whether women
experience ‘mobility social-exclusion’. Mobility social-exclusion as defined by Kenyon et
al. (2002, p. 10) as “the process by which people are prevented from participating in the economic,
political and social life of the community because of reduced accessibility to opportunities,
services, and social networks, due in whole or in part to insufficient mobility in a
society.” The proposition here is that insufficient mobility in a society is equivalent to the
policy on banning women from driving in that society, because such policy reduces women
accessibility to places that encompass opportunities, resources, and networks for their entre -
preneurial activities.
The second concept addressed in the study is related to individual potential to travel, defined
as ‘spatial capability’. The concept of spatial capability is generated from the capability
approach introduced by Amartya Sen (1983; 1990). Sen applies the capability approach to
reflect on human development. The term ‘capability’ indicates individual’s freedom to achieve
‘functioning’ (Alkire & Black, 1997). Therefore, the arguments of such concepts rest on an
objective that goes beyond poverty and justice, to include individual’s freedom to make their
own choice about what matters to them (Alkire, 2005). Freedom in this sense is “the real opportunity
[…] to accomplish what (someone) values’’ (Sen, 1992, p. 31). In this light, employ-