Cultural entrepreneurship: values, criteria and societal impact

Abstract

The article introduces a theoretical concept of cultural entrepreneurship as an issue combining cultural value, economic benefit with the social impact. The aim of the paper is to determine the properties of cultural entrepreneurship in Ukraine regarding the criteria conceptualized by cultural theorists following the paper of Paul DiMaggio. The article traces the challenges that socioeconomic and cultural sphere with the emergence of cultural entrepreneurship, the sociocultural challenges it meets based on the evidences of the institutionalization of so-called high culture in Boston in the middle of the 19th century and cultural entrepreneurship in Kyiv in the late 19th – 20th centuries. In particular, entrepreneurial activity and the development of book publishing and distribution in 1890-ies reinforce the theoretical assumption that Ukrainian culture and society were/are favorable to entrepreneurship and promoted contrary to the imperial oppression, persecution and repression. Focusing on the cultural entrepreneur the paper highlights the necessity to widen the object-focused research by the process-context method. Researcher’s papers on unique issue are important as a historical source, but the cultural process and social context may contribute to the complexity of theoretical and practical studies. While theoreticized criteria of cultural entrepreneur undergo the process of empirical testing and the methodology is yet to be settled, the societal impact of cultural initiatives meeting the theoretical criteria could boost social and economic development.