A Test of the Relationship between Cultural Diversity and Entrepreneur’s Innovation: Chinese Immigrant Entrepreneurs In Italy

Yuhong Zhou, Jie Zhang and Mauro Gatti

Cultural capital is the key to determining the quantity and quality of the entrepreneurship with its essence being innovation. Cultural diversity is a powerful driver to entrepreneur’s innovation. Different cross cultural acculturation strategies may have different impact on the immigrant entrepreneur’s innovation. This study intends to determine this relationship by extending the Berry’s cross-cultural acculturation strategies (integration, assimilation, separation and marginalization strategies) model and outlining a conceptual hypothesis framework. Drawing data from a sample of 91 Chinese immigrant entrepreneurs in Italy, this paper confirms the hypothesis that the cultural diversity and information sharing have a positive impact on immigrant entrepreneur’s innovation. The finding obtained is that when immigrant entrepreneur maintain the dominant culture of the host community as well as sharing information with the host, they tend to be more innovative in generating higher quality and different products & services to meet up with the demand of the host country.

DOI : https://doi.org/10.21102/wjm.2016.09.72.04