History of Entrepreneurship Worldwide
History of Entrepreneurship Worlwide The term entrepreneurship can be traced back to as early as the Middle Ages,when the entrepreneur was simply someone who carried out tasks, such as buildings andconstruction projects by applying all the resources at his disposal. However, it was during the16 th century when business was used as a common term, and the entrepreneur came intofocus as a person who is responsible for undertaking a business venture. In the 18 th century,early economists, for instance one known as Richard Cantillon, added that an entrepreneurbears risk as part of his work definition.It was during the 17 th and 18 th centurys Industrial Revolution that business itself was becoming part of the new lifestyle, especially in Europe, where most of this developmentwas taking place. The early economists, such as John Baptiste, John Stuart Mill, and AlfredMarshall all included entrepreneurship into the economic spectrum of the time by defining thevarious skills and features of an entrepreneur. These definitions vary from an entrepreneurbeing responsible for employing resources in high productivity areas to earn profits, to riskbearing, and finally to an entrepreneur being responsible for organization and control.However, the most substantial research into entrepreneurial theory was achieved in the 20 th century, under the aegis of Joseph Schumpeter, who claims that the entrepreneur has acreative destruction innovation by replacing destroying an existing economy by a better,advance one.Where some of the entrepreneurships emerged as a result of innovation basedon new products, others were merely an expansion of existing businesses in markets that nowshowed areas of growth. For instance, railroads and shipping, cargo, transport; factors thatbecame intertwined with growth in commerce during the late 18 th century and early 19 th century. The 20 th century saw the evolution of entrepreneurial history developing its mostrecent form