ENTREPRENEURSHIP AND THEORY DEVELOPMENT: THE USE OF THE CONSTRUCTIVIST APPROACH IN THEORIZING PROCESSS

Erno Tornikoski

Abstract The researchers in the entrepreneurship field seem not to be able to agree whether we have solid theories to be tested or not. It is clear that we need more systematic research in the field to understand the unique processes, and we need to develop distinctive methodologies and approaches to explore them. The point of departure of this conceptual paper is grounded in three general statements. First, a theory should be taken as a continuum, rather than a dichotomy. Second, multiparadigm perspectives should be used in theory building. Third, the theories of entrepreneurship should be grounded in psychology and sociology, if they are going to have any theoretical validity. As such, this paper explores what is theorizing process, and how different paradigmatic approaches can be used in this process. Furthermore, this paper explores the use of the constructivist approach. A central part of the constructivist approach is structuration theory, which is a challenging and complex version of sociological theory, and offers a multiparadigmatic perspective. This paper claims that by adopting these new views one could overcome the distinction between objectivist and subjectivist research traditions, and combine the structure/agency paradox. This could result better theories and theorizing processes in entrepreneurship research. Introduction As the research on entrepreneurship has increased considerably during the last years, the field should be progressing. Yet, the research field seems not to be able to agree whether we have solid theories to be tested (Low, MacMillan, 1988) or not (Bygrave, 1989; MacMillan, Katz, 1992). The research seems to be focused on empirical studies with a rather low level of abstraction (Landstom, 1998). Furthermore, entrepreneurship research seems to be done mostly in accordance with positivistic ideologies. We try to find average entrepreneurs and typical venture processes, when entrepreneurship is usually considered to be an atypical phenomenon: a departure from norms of the average behaviour (Stevenson, Jarillo, 1990) along a discontinuous, non-linear, and usually unique process (Bygrave, 1989). It is a time to accept that there are many kinds of entrepreneurs and many kinds of new venture processes. It is also clear that more systematic research is needed in the field to understand these processes and distinctive methodologies and approaches need to be developed to explore them. Indeed, some researchers invent new methodologies, like 'case-surveys' (e.g. Larsson, 1993) to bridge the cap between nomothetic and ideographic studies. Similarly, researchers use different metaphors to describe the essentials of the phenomenon: entrepreneurship is associated with social networking, management of ambiguity (Johannisson, 1992), and emergence of an organization (Gartner, Bird, Starr, 1992).

However, this paper claims that we will not achieve progress in entrepreneurship research by inventing new methods or developing new metaphors as such. Instead, one should recognize their role and use in the theorizing process in the first place. According to this view a theory should be taken as a continuum, rather than a dichotomy. Furthermore, multiparadigm perspectives should be used in theory building (Gioia, Pitre, 1990). Last, seems that the theories of entrepreneurship should be grounded in psychology and sociology, if they are going to have any theoretical validity (Bygrave, 1989). This paper aims to explore what is theorizing process, and how different paradigmatic approaches can be used in this process. Furthermore, this paper introduces the constructivist approach in form of Giddens' (1984) structuration theory, which is a challenging and complex version of sociological theory (Tucker, 1998). It is also regarded as a multiparadigmatic perspective bridging positivistic and subjectivistic research traditions (Gioia, Pitre, 1990), and thus seems to be a potential approach for the present purpose. By adopting these new views one could overcome the distinction between objectivist and subjectivist research traditions and the structure/action paradox, which in turn could result better theories and theorizing processes in entrepreneurship research. Entrepreneurship: theorizing and structuring What is a theory and theory development? Usually theory is regarded to be an answer to a question 'why': "Theory is about the connections among phenomena, a story about why acts, events, structure, and thoughts occur. Theory emphasizes the nature of causal relationships, identifying what comes first as well as the timing of such events." (Sutton, Staw, 1995, p. 378). So, a theory is good and useful when it describes, explains, and predicts (Whetten, 1989; Bacharach, 1989). As such, one takes the standpoint of positivism, which holds that science can generate objective knowledge. Scientific knowledge is cumulative, and the role of individual studies is to contribute to the existing knowledge. Knowledge is originated from experience obtained through the senses. Experience reflects the organized properties of the outside material, social, or psychological world. The source of knowledge is thus the object. On the other hand, anti-positivists reject these assumptions. For anti-positivists science is subjective rather than objective: one can understand human activities only by occupying the frame of reference of the participant in action. Scientific knowledge does not exist in the sense that it would consist of universal laws and causalities. The perceived organized properties of the known objects are subject dependent: reality is the product of human consciousness. The source of knowledge is thus the subject. The subjectivist approach holds that a theory is in fact constructing reality, rather than describing it (Landry, 1995). According to Bacharac (1989), space and time dimensions restrict the use of theories. For example in the organizational studies, when a theory applies only to specific types of organizations, the theory has a spatial boundary. According to the temporal restriction, a theory can either apply over different historical periods or just one specific period. Four distinct types of theories can be identified by using the space and time dimensions (Table 1).

Table 1 - Time and space boundaries of theories TIME Bounded Bounded SPACE Unbounded I (time and context dependent theories) III (time dependent, but spaceless theories) Unbounded II (context dependent, but timeless theories) IV (universal laws)

Then, in general, where can entrepreneurship theory be places? Is entrepreneurship theory unbounded both by the time and the space (IV)? In other words, could there be a grand entrepreneurship theory that is timeless and spaceless, that would apply to every entrepreneurship process over long historical periods? This is what positivistic research tradition is more or less claiming. Furthermore, if entrepreneurship would be considered to be a science, the aim of research is to reveal the hidden mechanism that has an independent existence outside the human existence. For example, our universe functions according to the mechanism that is best described at the moment by Einstein's relativity theory and quantum physics: the planets would continue circulate their orbits, even though humans did not exist in the world. By accepting these, determinism takes over; the outcome of the entrepreneurship process is contingent on the environment. Humans may have a freewill, but only in a limited sense: environment constructs 'a room', inside where humans can freely act. Entrepreneurship research can also be biased towards successful individuals (Bouchikhi 1993); the success of entrepreneurship process is attributed to an individual, whereas the context has minimal or no effects on the outcome. In entrepreneurship field researchers often take theories and instruments from other fields to discover individual's underlying (psychological or cognitive) mechanism. Sophisticated measurements are made in order to discover the effects of combinations of different personal variables. These measurements are made with a belief that unique and stable personality or motivational characteristics have significant effects (Carsrud, Krueger, 1995), and that these variables should be consistent across time and in different situations (Stevenson and Harmeling, 1990; Kilby, 1971). As such, this line of research is also following the scientific research traditions. On the other hand, when entrepreneurship theory is bounded both by the time and space (I), this would be the standpoint of subjectivist theorists. The danger here is that there would not be any 'scientific' theories to discuss about. For example, narrative methodology has recently gain some success among entrepreneurship researchers. When one uses narratives in subjectivist terms, stories are fluid and culturally determined forms of discourse whose real meanings can never be known: "...human lives are constituted by stories, stories are forms of discourse embedded in culturally determined language games, all language is indeterminate, and therefore little can be ever really known" (McAdams et al., 1997, p. 690). Thus a single study would not contribute on or develop 'general' knowledge. This gives the positivistic researchers a reason to associate subjectivism with skepticism (e.g. Estany, 1997), which questions the reliability of the knowledge. As a sum, for positivist researchers the goal of the research is to search for regularities and test in order to predict and control. If one accepts subjectivism as point of departure, the purpose of research is to describe and explain in order to diagnose and understand. If something can be learned from this, at least theory building is not a universal and transcendent across disparate paradigmatic assumptions (Gioia, Pitre, 1990) and that a paradigmatic approach should not be criticized in terms of another. Moreover, this paper claims that one can and one should try to bridge

between these two viewpoints by seeing theory development as a theorizing process and using alternative paradigmatic approaches. From theory to theorizing References, data, variables, and hypothesis are not a theory when it is regarded as a product. However, if one takes theory development as a process, the previous ones can be regarded as approximations of theories. In fact, products of theorizing are most often approximations, rather than complete theories Weick (1995). A theory is a continuum rather than a dichotomy (Runkel, Runkel, 1984). Therefore, theorizing can start from concepts so that the process generates possible connections between these concepts. Also metaphors serve as precursors to theories (Bacharach, 1989). Tsoukas (1991) has discussed the role and function of metaphorical and literal language in theory development. His 'metaphorical transformation' describes how metaphors can be used in theorizing process. Tsoukas (1991) points that a metaphorical language is a better alternative than a literal language to express continuous flow of experience. This is because metaphorical language does not contain only statements of 'real' processes, but also evokes commonly upheld images, pass value judgements, and prescribe a mode of behavior (also Steyaert, Bouwen, 199X). Therefore, metaphorical language is mostly used in the subjectivist approach and qualitative research, which enables the researchers to focus upon, explain, and influence different aspects of complex phenomena. However, the use of the metaphorical language means that the humans are less able to abstract and explain their experiences. This is because humans are usually too close to their own experiences: it is rather difficult to detach oneself from experience in order to abstract it and explain it (Tsoukas, 1991). Because of its imprecision and low conceptual content, a metaphorical language is not used in the positivistic research and in most of the quantitative approaches. Instead, the researchers are encouraged to use literal language, i.e. formal theories. Literal language tries to re-describe the world in order to discover the underlying mechanism responsible of the phenomenon (Tsoukas, 1991). So, Tsoukas was indeed speaking on behalf of theorizing process. The next simplified figure (omitted) illustrates the theorizing process. Theorizing process can be started with initial subjective experiences (metaphorical language) in order to pursue formal theories. First, metaphorical language enables a person to express an experience that would otherwise be difficult to conceptualize, because literal terms are not available. Metaphors offer initial insights to lived experience, which may lead to the hypothesis of plausible causal mechanism. These causal mechanism can be found if the literal core of the metaphors are revealed (Tsoukas, 1991): ... the transformational view of metaphors advocated here is a process in which the initial metaphorical insight is progressively disposed of its literal variety through set of homomorphic transformations, until, it is hoped, an invariance is revealed in the form of a scientific model". Existing theories can be taken from other fields to explore entrepreneurship phenomenon. More quantitative techniques are used to test relationships on the basis of confirmed or disconfirmed predictions. However, as the entrepreneurship field is just trying to find its own identity, ideographic approaches allows one to find and explain causal relationships in the first place (Bacharach, 1989). By starting with more grounded approaches, fresh insights could be generated about individuals' experiences in entrepreneurship processes. The task of researchers is to abstract and conceptualize these experiences to be further tested and developed to construct better theories. Yet, even though theory development is taken as a theorizing process and different research approaches are used within the process, a distinction is still made between the different research traditions. Alternative paradigmatic approaches are needed to combine different research traditions into single frameworks.

Alternative Paradigmatic Approach The paper introduces the constructivist approach. According to Bouchikhi (1993) the grounds of constructivism. are on the works of Piaget (1977) and Giddens' (1984). In this paper more emphasis is given to the Giddens' structuration theory. Structuration refers to the process of production and reproduction of social systems. Human activity is structuring the reality in the first place. However, the structured reality tends to become 'objective' to humans: "...organizational members treat the result of ongoing structuring processes as external, objective reality" (Gioia, Pitre, 1990). So, structures are both the medium and the outcome of interactions, both constraining and facilitating human action (Giddens, 1984). The structuration theory accepts the existence of 'objective' structures, which are the result of individuals' own actions. This is a link to objectivism. However, structures and context are not barriers to action but involved in its production (Pettigrew 1992). Individuals can act against the existing structures, if they are willing to pay the consequences of their deviant behavior; individuals are not totally constrained by the objective structures, at least in the long run. This is a link to subjectivism, and described by Stevenson and Harmeling (1990, p. 6): "Although individual behavior displays inherently conservative characteristics, individuals are important vehicles for and initiators of change over the long run". As such, constructivism is indeed bridging the cap between subjectivism and objectivism (e.g. Gioia, Pitre, 1990). Instead of making a distinction between agent and structure, which is one of the paradoxes of the social sciences (Poole, Van de Ven, 1989), it takes them as a duality by connecting human action with structural explanation (Riley, 1983). Furthermore, in sociological theories the level of analysis is traditionally the society, whereas in the psychological theories it is the individual (Landstrom, 1998). The structuration theory combines these two levels of analysis. The next figure (omitted) summarizes the previous points. Double hermeneutic and entrepreneurship One of the interesting concepts of Giddens' structuration theory is 'double hermeneutic', which characterizes social sciences. Social sciences do not intend to discover hidden mechanisms like natural sciences. Instead, the results of social sciences' studies become parts of the very phenomena they are studying. In other words, when the social scientist's findings can become available to the public, they are integrated into everyday life (Tucker, 1998). This effect or transformation can be demonstrated by looking at the phenomenon of entrepreneurship in the Finnish context. Entrepreneurship was closely associated with capitalism few decades ago in Finland. That is, entrepreneurship did not have very positive image in the society, or at least entrepreneurship or small businesses were not regarded as worth of public policies. It was common to admire a regular salary in a big firm, as a response to the uncertainty people faced in their local agricultural based milieus. Management studies were about long range planning, diversification, and internationalization problems of big corporations. However, somewhere in the 80's there started to be studies that showed the influence of small firms on the job creation. Especially related to the recent economical recession, the public policies started gradually recognize the small business creation phenomenon. Nowadays entrepreneurship is the solution to many economical problems. We have development programs to incorporate entrepreneurship to all levels of our educational system: even at the kindergarten level children are thought to be more entrepreneurial. The transformation that entrepreneurship has faced in the society has been profound. As we became aware of the phenomenon, we have adopted it into our daily practices. Natural sciences do not have this kind of effect on their objects of study. For example, when Einstein's relativity theory replaced the Newton's theory of gravity, it did not change the underlying mechanism of the natural

world. Instead, the relativity theory described it better than Newton's theory did. It was the researchers, and eventually the grand public that had to change their views of the (natural) reality. The production of a 'grand social theory' is not perhaps possible, as the society is under continuous change and scientific findings become part of the daily life. What can be done is to provide better insights into the phenomenon of entrepreneurship, which gradually becomes part of the existing daily life and knowledge. This in turn could foster the overall entrepreneurial behavior in the societies. Social mechanisms and entrepreneurship If there are no 'natural' mechanisms explaining the entrepreneurship phenomenon, perhaps there are 'social' mechanisms. However, the nature of these social mechanisms is different from natural ones: they are not only constraining human action but also facilitating. The role of these social mechanisms can be understood by looking again at the previous illustration. As pointed earlier, few decades ago entrepreneurship was not highly recognized or respected phenomenon in Finnish society. The social institutions were against, or at least not supporting entrepreneurial behavior. Yet, there were entrepreneurs and new ventures in the society. Therefore, entrepreneurship was basically a deviant behavior from 'normal' human conduct. Therefore, when someone acted entrepreneurial way and thus against the existing social structures, it manifested the use of free-will. Therefore, it is understandable that researchers, like McClelland (1961), focused their inquiries on the individual and their characteristics hoping that they would understand and explain this deviant behavior. On the contrary, public policies and other means are used to foster entrepreneurship at the present day's society. In fact, social institutions almost require the individuals to behave entrepreneurial way. If one is unemployed, one recommendation is to start one's own business. Employees are encouraged to establish their own businesses, as companies try to downsize and outsource their activities. Entrepreneurship education is becoming part of business schools, which encourage their students to launch entrepreneurial ventures, etc. As such, entrepreneurship is not any more a deviant behavior, instead to act non-entrepreneurial way would be a deviant behavior... In this kind of context one can perhaps use more deterministic models to explain the entrepreneurship phenomenon. The point here is that we cannot understand the entrepreneurship phenomenon, if we don't take into account the duality of structure/agency, and how it manifests itself in the societies. There are many different contexts where entrepreneurship phenomenon can exist in a society. A specific entrepreneurship theory may be developed in a high-tech field, but does not necessarily apply to an agricultural context at the same time. Moreover, an entrepreneurship theory, which is applicable in the West, is not in the East. Therefore, an entrepreneurship theory is likely to be restricted by space. Furthermore, entrepreneurship theory is more likely to be bounded by time. For example, Stevenson and Harmeling (1992) argue that there is no long-run equilibrium in society, instead there is evidence for chaos. Kilby (1971) has already pointed out that the pioneering innovations of Schumpterian entrepreneurship are largely irrelevant in modem economies, instead the operational problems of organizing resources are considerable greater than before. That is, an entrepreneurship theory could only apply to a certain period of time, as institutional changes of the society give new contexts where entrepreneurship phenomena can exist. So, to understand the entrepreneurship phenomenon requires that the social institutions, which are constraining or facilitating entrepreneurial behavior and which are under a constant change, should be recognized. To have a guideline for empirical research and a tool to start a theorizing process in entrepreneurship, this paper presents next a conceptual framework based on constructivism and structuration theory.

A Constructivist framework for entrepreneurship process studies To keep the discussion relatively short in this paper, the next figure presents a framework for entrepreneurship process studies. The framework is a result of a conceptual work. It is based on Bouchikhi's (1993) constructivist framework (see Appendix 1-omitted), Filion's (1990) metamodel of visionary process, Bird's (1988) Intention framework, Weick's (1995) sensemaking framework, personal network theory (e.g. Johannisson 1988), a metaphor of organizational emergence (e.g. Gartner 1985; Gartner, Bird, Starr, 1992) and cognitive dimension in general (for full discussion see Tornikoski, 1999). First, there is a need to define explicitly the entrepreneurship process: "the entrepreneurship process starts with an entrepreneurial mind that conceptually envisions a new business reality and then starts to concretely enact it on the market through committing other actors to the process" (cf. Johannisson 1998). As such, the dimension 'new business reality' is the result of the process. This definition follows loosely the metaphor that sees entrepreneurship as emergence of an organization (e.g. Gartner, 1985; Gartner et al., 1992), where entrepreneurship is defined in terms of actions the individual(s) take, rather than in terms of attributes they possess (e.g. Kilby, 1971). Rather than using a general 'behavior' concept, like (see Appendix 1), this paper uses sensemaking framework (Weick 1995) to combine cognitive and action dimensions of human conduct into one concept. What is interesting in the sense-making framework, is the fact that Weick emphasize the concept of identity. An identity construct can be viewed as an initiator of actions (Wyer and Srull 1984). If a person is unsatisfied of his self-image, he is also motivated to act in a way that his self-image is changed. So, for an entrepreneur it is not easy to decide what he wants to become, without first realizing what he is (Filion 1990; also Gatewood et al. 1995). An individual must identify himself as an entrepreneur, before action is taken towards entrepreneurship. The concept intention is grounded in the cognitive psychology, which attempts to explain or predict human behavior (Boyd, Vozikis, 1994). Intention can be seen as a state of mind that focuses a person's attention, experience, and behavior toward a specific object or method of behaving (Bird 1988). It proves to be the best single predictor of that behavior (Krueger, Brazeal, 1994). According to Fishbein and Ajzen (1975) the origin of behavioral intention is attitudes toward performing certain task based on belief that certain consequence will occur. Intention is thus regarded as an immediate determinant of behavior. For example, most decisions to start up something are affected by how founders perceive and interpret the environment (Bird 1988). In other words, before any action is taken towards entrepreneurship, an individual has to have not only the 'right' identity, but also intention to act towards that direction. The identity structure of an entrepreneur is not a fixed, i.e. it can, and it even should change during the process as a result of the successes or failures along the processes: entrepreneurs are in constant pressure to change and they change (Carsrud, Krueger, 1995). Also, intentions are either strengthened or weakened based on success of the process: for example, success in finding a new idea, getting support, or gathering resources strengthens the entrepreneur's intentions, and vice versa. The environment and its social institutions are either facilitating or constraining the individuals and the venture project. Usually the word 'environment' is used to describe everything that is outside an individual. The danger is that the concept becomes vague if it is used in too many cases (Sanner, 1997). When an individual takes action, he enacts part of the general environment, which can be called context. So, the concept context is used when a specific part of the general environment is enacted. Furthermore, throughout the entrepreneurship process different contexts need to be enacted. In the beginning of the process an entrepreneur's context may be relatively small, as he has an influence only to a small part of the general environment. When an entrepreneur succeeds to enact a new relationship his context grows, as new elements are included into the older one. At the same time his influence over the environment increases. A context can be either 'enactable' or 'un-enactable'. A specific context may be

unenactable for several reasons: there may be a competing enactment, which reaches a critical mass of belief and acceptance, or people may lack sufficient resources to enact a specific relation (Smircich, Stubbart, 1985). The entrepreneur and the different enacted contexts form a relation system, which brings together different actors over time. It consists of the different actors enacted within the process (resource providers, friends, colleagues, etc.) that are all contributing to the outcome. As the process moves on and the relation system takes more permanent forms, the process and the relation system becomes institutionalized, i.e. an 'objective' reality is created for the participants. The relation system enables the individual to get access to different resources. At the same time, the relation system is constraining the individuals, as expectations, trust, and other social institutions are formed. This follows closely the personal networking theory (e.g. Johannisson 1988). Giddens' (1984) structuration theory emphasizes the unintended outcomes of human behavior: even though individuals would be most rational in their decision making, their actions have also unintended outcomes, which are out of their control. Therefore, according to Bouchikhi it is time to accept chance as a part of entrepreneurship processes This is also shared by Gartner (1993), who relates chance and intentions: "Intentions are not necessarily operationalizable without the necessary circumstances". This suggestion is very bold, because normally the role of science is to minimize the role of chance in order to make novel predictions. In the success stories of entrepreneurs, chance or luck seems to play an important role (Bouchikhi, 1993). For example, an individual might give the impression that it was pure chance that he met a particular resource provider. However, the situation can also be interpreted that it was not chance but a determined mind in search of resources that made the individual meet the resource provider, or allowed him to give a meaning to a stranger met 'by accident'. It is the post-rationalization process (sense-making) of the individual that makes him attribute some role to chance. Still, chance may have an impact at the different stages of the process. For example, when a business partner suddenly dies, this unexpected event may jeopardize the whole venture. Chance is thus an unexpected event coming from outside the entrepreneurial process, to which a meaning is given by the participants. Chance has an impact to the relation system, i.e. to the whole process, not to a specific enacted context as such. Indeed, the role of chance is perhaps a matter of philosophical issue. In the framework different sub-process are presented in separate long arrows. Although these subprocesses exist simultaneously, the process can be imagined to start when an individual (1) identifies himself as an entrepreneur. The individual goes through some kind of mental activity or internal struggle before the right identity is formed (e.g. Collis et al. 1964). This is shared also with Schendel and Hofer (1979) and Westley and Mintzberg (1989), who state that an entrepreneurial mind starts the entrepreneurship process. Some authors also speak about an anticipatory socialization process that precedes the cognitive choice to become an entrepreneur (Starr and Fondas 1991). After this, or already during the previous sub-process, (2) the entrepreneur needs to search for a new idea, test and develop it, get support, etc. This is perhaps the most crucial phase or stage of the process: the original idea has to be born before anything can happen. Furthermore, the original idea needs also to be developed into a vision. In the beginning an individual might have initial ideas or scenarios, which can be related to many potential new business concepts. Along the interaction process a central vision may emerge out of the initial ideas. Usually the central vision is not too fixed, as the environment brings changes, new ideas appear, etc. In other words, along the process, new ideas are usually incorporated into the venture-project. So, one or more emerging visions have their influence on the central vision. This follows closely Filion's (1990) Entrepreneurship Metamodel. Also what characterizes entrepreneurship processes is that (3) the unique idea needs to be communicated in order to be realized (e.g. Westley, Mintzberg, 1989). Otherwise, the novel idea will never take more concrete forms. As such, as the vision is diffused to the context, it brings the relation system into the picture: it attracts, stimulates and motivates people around the project (Filion, 1990). Similarly, (4) the entrepreneur and the relation system need to

organize resources so that something concrete could be established before the new business reality could emerge out of these sub-processes and interactions. As a result, new organization starts to take more permanent form (e.g. Gartner, 1985). Although the different sub-processes are presented in a sequential order, in reality it may be very difficult to separate them from each other. The subprocesses are parallel and they affect each other. In a complex process, there is not only one event or one thing, which is done or experienced by the participants. Instead, a process is full of series of events, which have their own separate outcomes (Shaver and Scott 1991). It is a basic human activity to bracket the continuous flow of experience of everyday life to make it more understandable. So, to see the overall phenomenon as a result of several sub-processes makes the whole process more understandable. Summary From positivist point of view, the goal of the research is to search for regularities and test in order to predict and control. According to subjectivism, the purpose of research is to describe and explain in order to diagnose and understand. This paper claims that one should bridge between these two viewpoints in entrepreneurship research. First, traditional views of theory building should be rejected. Theory building is essentially a theorizing process. By using more subjectivist approaches we can produce rich descriptions of the phenomena that can serve as platforms for more positivistic pattern and causality search and testing. As such, metaphorical transformation helps us to bridge the subjectivist and positivistic research traditions. Second, constructivism and structuration theory seems to offer a framework, which could combine different research traditions into single framework. Instead of making a distinction between agent and structure, constructivism takes them as a duality. As such, they have the potential to give quite realistic explanations of human behavior in a social context. Entrepreneurship research is a part of social sciences and a phenomenon. A potential entrepreneurship theory is likely to be bounded by time and space. By using structuration theory and by seeing entrepreneurship as a phenomenon of modem society, we could get deeper understanding of the underlying social mechanisms behind the phenomenon. As such, our societies may foster entrepreneurial behavior when new knowledge becomes part of our every day practices. References Bacharac S.B., (1989), Organizational Theories: Some Criteria for Evaluation, Academy of Management Review, Vol. 14, No. 4, pp. 496-515. Bird B., (1988), "Implementing Entrepreneurial Ideas: The Case for Intention", Academy of Management Review, Vol. 13, No. 3, pp. 442-453. Bouchikhi Hamid, (1993), "A Constructivist Framework for Understanding Entrepreneurship Performance", Organization Studies, Vol. 14, No. 4, pp. 549-570. Boyd Nancy G., George S. Vozikis, (1994), "The Influence of Self-Efficacy on the Development of Entrepreneurial Intentions and Actions", Entrepreneurship Theory and practice, Summer, pp. 63-77. Bygrave W.D., (1989), "The Entrepreneurship Paradigm (1): A Philosophical Look at Its Research Methodologies", Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, Vol. 14, No. 1, pp. 7-26.

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