Chapter 1: Holding the Anchor of Entrepreneurship Across Contexts

At its core, entrepreneurship is dynamic, and it grows through constant evolution, bold experimentation and adaptive thinking. But as the field matures, it has become clear that entrepreneurship is not universally uniform. It is fundamentally shaped by context: by institutions, culture, history and geography. And in the face of ever-greater complexity and disruption, we must ask, what grounds entrepreneurial activity across such diverse and unpredictable environments?

This introductory chapter proposes the concept of an entrepreneurial anchor, a guiding framework that enables entrepreneurship to retain direction, purpose and resilience across diverse settings. As this volume will explore, contexts are not passive backdrops but active forces that shape what entrepreneurship is, who engages in it and how it unfolds. Yet, in a myriad of contexts, what ensures that entrepreneurship remains a driver of economic, social and cultural transformation?