Motives for entrepreneurship and establishing one’s own business among people with disabilities: Findings from a scoping review

Abstract

As people with disabilities often face difficulties entering the labour market, entrepreneurship and self-employment are often regarded as an opportunity to gain employment and earn a living. This article presents a scoping review that aims to investigate what establishment motives previous studies have identified for self-employment and entrepreneurship among people with disabilities. Four themes emerged: economic motives; flexibility and self-determination; avoiding discrimination; and personal development and being able to contribute something. In the article we discuss the results and relate them to the general discourse on entrepreneurship, which often includes the concept of autonomy. We argue that the findings suggest implications for how to develop support and strategies for this group, to help them avoid ending up in an even more vulnerable position. In this work, the individual’s own motives for establishment are of great value.

Points of interest

• People with disabilities often find it difficult to find paid work. One way to earn an income is to start their own business.

• This article summarizes the findings of 16 research articles and one book chapter on why people with disabilities start their own business.

• The findings from earlier studies show that people with disabilities have different motives for starting their own business, such as economic reasons; to be independent and be able to decide their working patterns; to avoid being discriminated; for personal development; and to be able to contribute positively to the lives of others.

• To be able to provide appropriate support, different stakeholders, such as politicians and professionals, need to know why people with disabilities start their own businesses.

Keywords:

• Disability, Entrepreneurship
• Self-employment
• Necessity
• Opportunity
• Motives for business start-up

Introduction

Working life is often seen as one of the most central areas for creating social security and participation. For example, the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (United Nations 2008, Article 27) cites the ‘right to earn their living through freely chosen or accepted work in the labour market and in an open working environment that promotes integration and is accessible to persons with disabilities’. However, around the world people with disabilities continue to be positioned far from the labour market (OECD 2014).

Measures taken to change this marginalised position—a position that leads to both economic and social vulnerability—include supported employment, early return to work after sick leave, wage subsidies, and self-employment. Self-employment has been relatively sparsely explored compared to other labour market policy strategies, even though entrepreneurship and self-employment have increased among marginalised groups worldwide (Wood, Davidson, and Fielden 2012). In the US, for example, in 2019 people with disabilities ran their own business to a greater extent than the population without disabilities: 10 per cent of people with disabilities were self-employed, compared to 5.9 per cent in the rest of the population (U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics 2020). The same pattern can be found in Australia (Maritz and Laferriere 2016) and generally in Europe, but with major differences between countries (Pagán 2009). Compared to northern and eastern Europe, in southern Europe it is more common for people with disabilities to be self-employed (OECD 2014).

As the definition of disability differs between countries, caution is needed when comparing national statistics. The vast differences also indicate how any analysis of self-employment and entrepreneurship must be seen in light of the social and cultural context (GEM 2020). Many researchers highlight issues related to the global South, as discussed earlier in this journal (see e.g. Chhabra 2020; Odame et al. 2020; Sherry 2015). However, as we will show in this article, similarities in establishment motives are found despite the differences between countries. These can add to our understanding of work among people with disabilities as well as the field of self-employment and entrepreneurship.

Objectives of this article

Motives behind starting one’s own business can indicate whether companies are started by necessity, and if so, what push factors are involved in the process. Motives for starting one’s own business can also have to do with opportunity. If so, what pull factors are crucial? Both opportunities and motives for, as well as barriers have been studied and compared in different national contexts, often from economic perspectives (GEM 2020). We have found a thorough overview of results from previous studies on such barriers to and opportunities for self-employed people with disabilities establishing themselves in the labour market, but none that summaries results concerning establishment motives among people with disabilities. If people with disabilities are to gain access to work to the same extent as those without disabilities, new kinds of support may have to be developed. Politicians, practitioners, and other stakeholders need to understand the motives behind starting and running one’s own business among people with disabilities. Research stemming from the experiences of people with disabilities can broaden this knowledge.

A scoping review can constitute a knowledge base, as it might describe in more detail the research findings and range of research in this particular field to policy-makers, practitioners, and consumers who might otherwise lack the time or resources to undertake such work themselves (Antman, Lau, Kupeinick, Mosteller & Chalmers, 1992 in Arksey and O’Malley 2005, 21). Another reason why we have chosen to conduct a scoping review rather than a systematic one is the fact that the research area of disability and self-employment is still limited (Dean, Little, and Dunn 2017; Parker Harris, Caldwell, and Renko 2014). The multidisciplinary nature of the area also made us choose this form of literature review:

If your topic is studied across multiple disciplines and there is little cohesive terminology or approaches, a broad scoping review may be appropriate to understand the breadth of the topic and synthesize thinking across disciplines. Scoping reviews are a good method for getting the “lay of the land” of a particular topic. (Dean, Little, and Dunn 2017, 14)

Thus, the purpose of this article is to summarise, understand, and identify patterns and contradictions in research on establishment motives among self-employed persons and entrepreneurs with disabilities.

Research on self-employment, entrepreneurship, and disability

Disability, self-employment, and entrepreneurship still form a relatively limited research area, possibly because various subjects intersect here. Such subjects include disability and business, for example, resulting in ‘a very complex and disorganized field of research’ (Parker Harris, Caldwell, and Renko 2014, 319). The complexity of the field is reflected in, among other things, the use of different concepts and theories. A recurring discussion concerns the difference between self-employment and entrepreneurship:

Self-employment is defined as performing work for personal profit rather than wages paid by others (Le, 1999). It is, first and foremost, an alternative strategy to salaried employment. Self-employment has been measured, for example, by the number of average weekly hours spent working for one’s own business (Kolvereid & Isaksen, 2006). The focus is on work, no matter how productive or unproductive. However, entrepreneurship refers to bringing something new and innovative to the market, providing a clear differentiation from the concept of self-employment (Schumpeter, 2000; Shane & Venkataraman, 2000). (Parker Harris, Caldwell, and Renko 2014, 318)

These different motives and behaviours might have different social and economic consequences. As research is limited and overlapping, like many other researchers (see, e.g. Castillo and Fischer 2019) we use the terms synonymously except where one or the other is specifically addressed.

The research area is also complex because of two colliding discourses. The entrepreneur is often seen as ‘a proud and independent (white, male) hero achieving something outstanding’ (Ccillag and Gyori 2019, 44). Previous research on entrepreneurship has mainly focused on individual characteristics. Although recent studies have shown that social factors in the entrepreneurial ecosystem must also be taken into account, the discourse of the ‘perfect’ entrepreneur remains strong. In contrast, there is the discourse on people with disabilities as ‘dependent and vulnerable persons, who expect others to make decisions on their jobs or wait for job offers rather than take the initiative and actively seek employment’ (Ccillag and Gyori 2019, 44). This notion may explain why informants in Ccillag and Gyori’s study (2019), themselves having a disability, to some extent distanced themselves from other people with disabilities (Ccillag and Gyori 2019, 59). Rather than talking about themselves as part of a community (people with disabilities), they referred to themselves as entrepreneurs. The fact that in several countries the proportion of self-employed in the group of people with disabilities is actually higher than in the group of people without disabilities highlights that such notions do not correspond with reality (Pagán 2009; U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics 2020).

In 2002, the Journal of Vocational Rehabilitation published a special issue on self-employment and people with disabilities (Griffin 2002). Parker Harris, Caldwell, and Renko (2014) give an overview of opportunities identified in previous research, such as participation in the mainstream economy, promoting economic growth, promoting attitudinal change, improved quality of life, independence, autonomy, and empowerment. Identified barriers include a lack of centrally reported data, financial and economic barriers, attitudinal barriers, traditional expectation barriers, and low readability barriers (such as educational training, technical assistance, business development, and individual characteristics). Other barriers identified in their study are systematic barriers (such as programmatic barriers, insufficient public services and assistance, and technological barriers) and social support barriers. The authors suggest that research now move on to:

(a) support the validity of these stated benefits at the intersection of disability and entrepreneurship; (b) comprehensively evaluate the effectiveness of strategies for addressing the barriers that have been identified; and (c) develop new strategies for addressing barriers where necessary. (Parker Harris, Caldwell, and Renko 2014, 330)

Many of the studies included in this review have been published in the last two years, reflecting how the research area has begun to expand. Also, several of the articles included here are based on results from the research project Disability and Entrepreneurship. Competence Analysis, conducted by researchers at the University of Murcia in 2016–2019. This shows that larger research projects have been conducted recently.

Research process

Literature studies can be methodologically designed in a variety of ways. A systematic review usually formulates well designed and highly focused questions, which means that appropriate study designs can be defined, and there is a focus on quality-assessed studies. Dean, Little, and Dunn (2017, 15) state that ‘Scoping reviews are a good method for getting the “lay of the land”’. This type of review is characterised by focusing on the research findings themselves rather than on the primary study designs, which is why different designs may be included (Arksey and O’Malley 2005; Plantin, Olukoya, and Ny 2011).

Although there are several different definitions of a scoping review, the methodology is well described, including formulating a clear research question, clear inclusion and exclusion criteria, defined procedures, and division of responsibilities and work among the researchers (Peterson et al. 2017). After summarising scoping review publications from 1997 to 2013, Colquhoun et al. (2014, 1292) propose the following definition:

A scoping review or scoping study is a form of knowledge synthesis that addresses an exploratory research question aimed at mapping key concepts, types of evidence, and gaps in research related to a defined area or field by systematically searching, selecting, and synthesizing existing knowledge.

The authors (ibid) advocate the use of the six methodological steps proposed by Arksey and O’Malley (2005, 22): (1) Identifying the research question; (2) Identifying relevant studies; (3) Study selection; (4) Charting the data; (5) Collating, summarising, and reporting the results; and (6) (optional) Consulting with practitioners and consumers. Arksey and O’Malley emphasise that the process is not linear but iterative, whereby new findings and insights may lead to necessary changes to certain parameters and the need to repeat certain steps. However, in our continued presentation of the method we will, in principle, follow the first four of these methodological steps. In all these steps and considerations, the research has been guided by the European Code of Conduct for Research Integrity (ALLA 2017).

Research question

In accordance with Arksey and O’Malley (2005) first step, a research question was formulated to address the overall aim, which was to identify studies of self-employment and entrepreneurship among people with disabilities. A broadly defined research question was formulated: What barriers, opportunities, and establishment motives among self-employed people with disabilities have been identified in previous studies? At a later stage in the process (see Selecting relevant studies, below), we discovered that barriers and opportunities were well researched and the knowledge synthesised (e.g. Csillag, Gyori, and Svastics 2019). However, we identified a gap when it comes to synthesising the knowledge of establishment motives. Thus, in order to fill this knowledge gap, the research question was narrowed and reformulated as: What establishment motives for self-employment and entrepreneurship among people with disabilities have been identified in previous studies?

Selecting research databases and identifying relevant studies

In order to identify the applicable databases, two librarians at the Malmö University library were contacted. After discussions, the librarians conducted an initial search in various databases and the following terms were determined:

disabili* OR disabled OR impairment* OR handicap* OR “functional diversity”

AND

selfemployment OR self-employment OR ‘“self employment” OR self-employed OR “self employed” OR entrepreneurship OR entrepreneurs OR “business initiative” OR “small business” OR micro-enterprise OR “micro enterprise”’.

The search was conducted in ten databases (number of results in brackets):

• ABI/INFORM Global (1,414)

• Cinahl (260)

• ERC (198)

• ERIC (205)

• LIBRIS (175)

• MEDLINE (209)

• PSYCINFO (211)

• SCOPUS (645)

• Sociological Abstracts (142)

• SwePub (179)

A total of 3,638 articles were found. As a result of the consultation and a discussion between the researchers and the librarians, to increase precision the following inclusion criteria were established: peer-reviewed, full text available, English language, and publication year 2008–2019. The year 2008 was chosen as the starting point as this was when the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities entered into force, establishing the right to work among people with disabilities. The following exclusion criteria were also formulated: grey literature, intellectual disabilities, and social enterprises. Grey literature was excluded because the main purpose of this scoping review is to identify and present how previous research has studied self-employment among people with disabilities. Social enterprises as an exclusion criterion concerns the fact that we are interested in self-employment as a source of viable income and the same competitive conditions faced by self-employed people without disabilities. In social enterprises, economic gain is only one goal; others are social, such as participation and integration (Andersson 2010). People with intellectual disabilities were also not included in the study, as this group can likely not compete on the same terms as people without intellectual disabilities. With these inclusion and exclusion criteria, and after the exclusion of duplicates in the reference management program EndNote, 736 articles were identified. These were submitted for review in Rayyan, a web tool designed to help researchers working on systematic reviews and other knowledge synthesis projects (see https://rayyan.qcri.org/).

Study selection

The two researchers randomly divided all items in the Rayyan review into two parts, and each read the abstracts and keywords from half of the publications. However, we initially read the same abstracts (n = 100) and discussed and agreed on supplemented exclusion criteria (i.e. medical studies, war veterans, studies on specific interventions). These exclusion criteria became relevant as several studies, especially from the US, have focused on self-employment and entrepreneurship as a form of work-oriented rehabilitation for war veterans. Although such studies can provide knowledge about barriers, opportunities, and motives among people with disabilities, they were regarded as focusing on such specific circumstances—the US context and the infrastructure of war veterans—that it would be difficult to generalise the research findings to people with disabilities outside this group or outside the US. The same argument applies to studies focusing on specific programmes or interventions, thus making the transferability of results to other contexts difficult. If uncertain as to whether an article should be excluded, the researchers agreed to read the entire article.

The reading yielded a total of 117 potentially relevant studies. In the process of reading all articles in full, we found that barriers and opportunities, both part of our initial research question, were well researched and the knowledge synthesised (Csillag, Gyori, and Svastics 2019). A reformulated research question focused on establishment motives among people with disabilities (see Research question, above).

Based on the final research question a new reading was done, resulting in 58 articles being preliminarily included in the study. In this part of the process, the articles were also divided between the researchers, but striving for consensus regarding inclusion or exclusion, we read the first eight articles jointly. After a final careful reading and discussion between the researchers another 40 articles were excluded, as people with disabilities and their establishment motives were not explicitly discussed or were not the focus of the article. One text was excluded as it turned out to be a conference paper. Ultimately, a total of 16 articles and a book chapter were included in the study. In the final stage, the reference lists in the 16 selected articles and the book chapter were searched for publications according to the inclusion and exclusion criteria, but no further articles were included.

Charting the data

An overview of all the selected articles was compiled, including information on the author(s), year of publication, location of the study, study object (including number), and study design (see Table 1). In order to generate themes of different establishment motives, both researchers independently re-examined all the included articles and independently made lists of suggested themes. This part of the process was inductive. When the researchers’ themes were compared, it turned out that they were very much in agreement. At this stage, matching or overlapping themes were merged into four overarching themes, which also form the basis for structuring the presentation of the results.

Table 1. Overview of selected research studies.

Author/year	Title	Sample/country	Study design
Ashley and Graf (2018)	The Process and Experiences of Self-Employment Among People With Disabilities: A Qualitative Study	18 individuals engaged in self-employment endeavours (US)	Qualitative study. Online survey.
Beisland, Mersland, and Zamore (2016)	Field Report: Motivations for business start-up: are there any differences between disabled and non-disabled microfinance clients?	Microfinance clients. 281 respondents, of whom 96 had a disability. (Ecuador)	Telephone survey
Olaz-Capitán and Ortiz-García (2019)	A prospective approach to the moderating elements of entrepreneurial intention in people with disabilities	224 respondents with physical, sensory, and organic disabilities. Data from nationwide survey. (Spain)	Quantitative study with statistical analysis of data
Cooney and Licciardi (2019)	The same but different: Understanding entrepreneurial behaviour in disadvantaged communities	No new empirical data. Builds on previous research.	Qualitative study. Compilation of previous research.
Gallegos-Erazo and Salas-Díaz (2019)	Business-career transition of poor people with disabilities in Ecuador: An exploratory study	Ten people with disabilities who started their own business. Theoretical selection from a database. (Ecuador)	Qualitative study. Analysis using grounded theory, multiple case study approach.
Ortiz-García and Olaz-Capitán (2019)	Gender differences in entrepreneurship of people with disabilities	Residents (n = n/a) with physical, sensory, and organic disabilities (Spain)	Quantitative study. Survey.
García-Palma and Molina (2019)	Disability and entrepreneurship in Spain: Reality and initial hypothesis	224 residents with physical, sensory and organic disabilities (Spain)	Descriptive analysis of obtained survey data
Hsieh, Molina, and Weng (2019)	The road to entrepreneurship with impairments: A challenges-adaptive mechanisms-results model for disabled entrepreneurs	13 entrepreneurs with physical impairments (Honduras, Mexico, Chile, and Spain)	Qualitative study. In-depth semi-structured interviews.
Jones and Latreille (2011)	Disability and self-employment: evidence for the UK	Four quarters from the Labour Force Survey (LFS) data (UK)	Quantitative study. Cross-sectional dataset.
Kašperová, Kitching, and Blackburn (2018)	Identity as a casual power: Contextualizing entrepreneurs’ concerns	Three entrepreneurs with disabilities (UK)	Qualitative study. Interviews. In-depth analysis.
López-Felipe and Valera (2019)	Self-management in entrepreneurship of people with disabilities	172 participants who self-identified as individuals with disabilities (US)	Quantitative study. Online survey.
Maritz and Laferriere (2016)	Entrepreneurship and self-employment for people with disabilities	Earlier studies from other countries, and two cases of successful entrepreneurs with disabilities (Australia)	Qualitative study
Navarro and Martínez (2019)	The variable ‘labour and professional situation’ of people with disabilities	Sample of residents (n = n/a) with physical, sensory and organic disabilities (Spain)	Quantitative study. Statistical analysis of data collected from a survey.
Ostrow, Smith, Penney, and Shumway (2019)	‘It Suits My Needs’: Self-Employed Individuals With Psychiatric Disabilities and Small Businesses	60 adults with a history of psychiatric disability who were self-employed (US)	Web-based survey
Quinton (2014)	Self-employment as a solution for attitudinal barriers: A case study	One person with multiple physical impairments (US)	Case study
Saxena and Pandya (2018)	Gauging underdog entrepreneurship for disabled entrepreneurs	Eight entrepreneurs with locomotor or visual impairment (India)	Qualitative research including case study methodology
Yamamoto, Unruh, and Bullis (2012)	The viability of self-employment for individuals with disabilities in the United States: A synthesis of the empirical-research literature	12 empirical research studies (US) and 15 other publications (international)	Synthesis of empirical research literature

Results

The results of this review are presented below in accordance with the four themes of establishment motives in the selected studies.

Economic motives

In several of the studies, the researchers argue that self-employment can be a viable strategy for increasing the participation and inclusion of people with disabilities in the labour market. Also, self-employed people with disabilities themselves indicate that income and self-sufficiency were important reasons for starting their own business. In the Spanish study by Navarro and Martínez (2019), the informants stated that they had become self-employed to increase their income; and in Ostrow et al.s’ US study (2019), more than 80 per cent of respondents cited this reason. Increased income is also an establishment motive in a study from India (Saxena and Pandya 2018) and in a study involving informants from Honduras, Mexico, Chile, and Spain (Hsieh, Molina, and Weng 2019). People having started their own business out of necessity rather than as an opportunity is also evident in Olaz-Capitán and Ortiz-García (2019) Spanish study, in which the most common establishment motive among informants was to increase their own income.

At the same time, several of these studies show that self-employed people with disabilities are an economically vulnerable group. Among self-employed people in the US, their income is lower than that of employees, and self-employed people with disabilities have the lowest income (Gouskova 2020). Moreover, in Ostrow et al.’s (2019) study from the US, respondents both worked less and earned less compared to the rest of the population. This raises the question of whether self-employed people with disabilities possibly suffer from a double loss of productivity—i.e. earning a lower income and working fewer hours a week. Likewise, García-Palma and Molina’s study (2019) shows that while many people with disabilities in Spain start their own business by necessity, they may not have a sustainable business concept, which may explain why company survival in this group is lower.

Do establishment motives look different for people with disabilities compared to people without disabilities? Beisland, Mersland, and Zamore (2016) answer this question by comparing recipients, both with and without disabilities, of micro-loans in Ecuador. Among both groups, the most common reasons for starting a business were to make more money, to supplement the family income, and to be self-employed. Only 24 per cent of the people with disabilities stated that it was because they lacked a chance to be employed in any other way. Another study from Ecuador, focusing on the business-career transition of poor people with disabilities (Gallegos-Erazo and Salas-Díaz 2019), shows that poverty creates worse conditions for access to social and economic capital, both important forms of capital for starting one’s own business. Establishment motives can thus be different within the group of people with disabilities based on class and access to different forms of capital. Furthermore, differences in economic and social welfare design have bearing on establishment motives.

Studies have investigated whether establishment motives can also differ depending on gender. In a Spanish study, while both men and women said an increase in personal income was their main motive for starting a business, a higher proportion of women (49 per cent) than men (46 per cent) said they had left their business because of its lack of profitability (Ortiz-García and Olaz-Capitán 2019).

Flexibility and self-determination

People with disabilities start their own business in order to control their working hours, type of work, and work environment. Wanting the flexibility to be able to meet their needs is closely linked to the nature of the disability. Jones and Latreille’s study (2011) shows that there are generally more similarities between people with disabilities without reduced workability and people without disabilities in the UK, compared to people with disabilities that involve reduced workability. In Ostrow et al.’s study (2019) focusing on self-employed people with mental illness, all respondents stated that flexible times and freedom/control over their work situation were the reasons for their self-employment. The respondents in Ashley and Graf’s US study (2018) stated that self-employment had become their last resort as degenerating health had led to a greater need for adaptation and flexibility. Although self-employment can mean flexibility and self-determination, which facilitate the management of the disability for this group, other limitations such as pain, fatigue, and movement difficulties are at odds with the traditional discourses on entrepreneurship (Kašperová, Kitching, and Blackburn 2018).

The need for flexibility is not always related to the disability. Other factors, for example the number of dependent children in the household, have been shown to increase the probability of self-employment in the UK (Jones and Latreille 2011), indicating that self-employment can offer greater flexibility in combining work and responsibility for children. In Ortiz-García and Olaz-Capitán’s study (2019) conducted in Spain, economic motives were the most common, followed by ‘the need to achieve greater personal independence’. Personal independence was more important to women (30 per cent) than to men (29 per cent), which suggests that it is important to take into account how different social positions, such as disability and gender, intersect.

In their article, Ostrow et al. (2019) make a conceptual distinction between motives that are to be understood as an expression of a desire for autonomy and those that concern flexibility. Autonomy was less often a motive than flexibility was. Ostrow et al. argue that as people with disabilities often have a certain need for support, adaptation, and accommodation, they do not seek autonomy. In other studies, however, it is precisely motives associated with autonomy that are cited as central motives for establishing one’s own business. In Olaz-Capitán and Ortiz-García’s study (2019), 30 per cent of respondents said they had started their own business in order to gain greater personal independence. Similarly, in Navarro and Martínez’s study (2019), a common establishment motive was to ‘increase their personal independence’—which we interpret as a desire for autonomy.

Avoidance of discrimination

Discrimination is a recurring theme in several of the studies on establishment motives. Two US studies point to discrimination as an influencing factor when people with disabilities start their own business. In Ostrow and et al.’s study (2019), more than two-thirds of the respondents reported having experienced discrimination by their employers. The most common problems were negative attitudes from the employer (48 per cent) and from colleagues (38 per cent), worse pay than others with comparable tasks (23 per cent), and employers’ condescending/dissuasive attitudes about their ability (20 per cent). More than 80 per cent of the participants cited ‘avoid employment problems’ as a reason for their own entrepreneurship. In Ashley and Graf’s study (2018), negative work experience from the past—such as an unreasonable salary, no opportunities for promotion, intolerance of mental illness, lack of adjustment, dismissal due to disability, and long working days—was common reason why respondents had started their own business.

In the UK, the proportion of self-employed people with reduced workability is greater than that of self-employed people without disabilities or of people with disabilities without reduced workability. Jones and Latreille (2011) have examined whether discrimination might explain this gap. In their study, they explore ‘the extent to which differences in predicted self-employment probabilities for the (work-limited) disabled relative to other disability groups reflect differences in characteristics (such as age), or differences in the response to those characteristics’ (Jones and Latreille 2011, 4167). The fact that it is more common for people with disabilities leading to reduced workability to be self-employed compared to people with disabilities that do not affect workability may largely be the result of customers’ attitudes and prejudices (Jones and Latreille 2011). However, Jones and Latreille (2011) argue, the main explanation for the gap between these two groups is rather that self-employment means greater flexibility and opportunities to meet the specific needs that the disability creates. For example, it was found that self-employed people with disabilities worked from home or from the same Local Authority District to a greater extent.

Thus, the ability to better manage one’s work-life balance through the flexibility offered by self-employment is a more common establishment motive than discrimination, which a recent US study also shows (Gouskova 2020). It is important to mention here that in this study the incidence of discrimination was measured based on salary and income, and thus on the group that was already in work. Gouskova points out two limitations of this approach. Firstly, the study cannot say anything about people with disabilities who are outside the labour market. Secondly, discrimination can manifest itself in ways other than salary and income, for example employers’ unwillingness to hire or make necessary adjustments in the workplace for people with disabilities.

Personal development and contribution of something

Another common establishment motive identified in earlier research is the desire to meet a personal challenge. In the US study by Ashley and Graf (2018), the reason participants most often cited for starting their own company was the opportunity to ‘flourish’ when they had found their niche and marketed their innovation, when it came to not only finances but also contributing to something and building good self-esteem (Ashley and Graf 2018). In a Spanish study examining establishment motives in relation to gender, the third-most common motive for both women and men was ‘to achieve a personal challenge’ [sic] (Ortiz-García and Olaz-Capitán 2019).

In a study conducted in Honduras, Mexico, Chile, and Spain, it appears that the desire to contribute is directed specifically at the group of people with disabilities or at the disability movement, in order to ‘[…] help others with impairments’ (Hsieh, Molina, and Weng 2019, 771) or to change attitudes about people with disabilities by showing that they can also be ‘self-sufficient and contribute to society’ (Hsieh, Molina, and Weng 2019, 771). Contributing to others in the group of people with disabilities is also a common theme in an Indian study, in which entrepreneurs did this either by employing people with disabilities or by inventing assisting rehabilitation devices (Saxena and Pandya 2018).

Discussion

The purpose of this article has been to explore and present establishment motives for self-employment and entrepreneurship among people with disabilities as identified in previous studies. By identifying and summarising patterns, we have found that establishment motives identified in previous research are: economic motives; flexibility and self-determination; avoiding discrimination; and personal development and being able to contribute something.

The studies included in this scoping review come from countries that are vastly different in their economics and welfare state design. Establishment motives need to be understood in relation to the social and cultural context where the study was conducted. Nonetheless, the overall picture of the studies makes it evident that, regardless of nation, people with disabilities are an economically vulnerable group. From earlier studies, we already know that people with disabilities often has limited access to financial resources and education (Boylan and Burchardt 2002; OECD 2014). If they start their own business simply to improve their finances, people from this group risk getting into an even more vulnerable situation, unless the business concept is so sustainable that the company survives (García-Palma and Molina 2019). And if it survives, they risk not being able to work enough, or earn enough, for it to pay off (Gouskova 2020). However, some groups are more vulnerable than others, both in the labour market and socially. People with mental illness are the group with the highest unemployment, and as many in this group have experienced discrimination, this is a common motive among them for starting their own business (Ostrow et al. 2019).

Furthermore, the studies included in this review have shown that not only the type of disability but also its possible impact on workability as well as its consequences—which Carol Thomas (2012) calls impairment effects—are important factors for establishment motives. Thus, there are differences in establishment motives within the group of people with disabilities. If support for entrepreneurs and self-employed people with disabilities is to be developed, such differences must be considered: ‘Differences in impairment characteristics should influence policy attempts to involve and support these entrepreneurial capabilities, as each disability category (intellectual, physical, mental, sensory) demands different forms of support’ (Cooney and Licciardi 2019). The impairment effects are therefore key factors to consider, as they make visible not only the flexibility that persons may need but also the conceptions, attitudes, and responses of those in their surroundings regarding different disabilities. Lately, studies on entrepreneurial identity that challenge the discourse of the lonely individual who has certain characteristics and perspectives, while paying attention to the social context, have become more common. Yet, a disability perspective on entrepreneurship is still lacking. Kašperová, Kitching, and Blackburn (2018) illustrate how the artifacts in culture and the material body both play central roles when persons’ motives are transformed into action. Artifacts, surroundings, and technology, however, are usually created with able-bodied persons in mind. The studies in this scoping review have shown that there may also exist gendered differences in the motives for and experiences of self-employment and entrepreneurship, as women more often than men state that they quit their business because it did not pay off (Ortiz-García and Olaz-Capitán 2019). It is therefore important to undertake studies that further explore the role of gender, material bodies, and artifacts in self-employment and entrepreneurship among people living with disabilities.

As this research area is intersected by different disciplines, it becomes a theoretically widespread area or, as in some cases, an area in which theoretical perspectives are not reported at all. A recurring discussion involves how the concepts of entrepreneur and self-employed should be separated in order to distinguish the driving forces and motives between these two groups. For example, Maritz and Laferriere (2016) point out:

Self-employment is focused on the performance of an individual working for themselves for personal gain and income instead of wages earned from employment (Le, 1999). […] Entrepreneurship on the other hand emphasizes the creation or innovation of bringing something new to the market (Schumpeter, 2000). The introduction of innovation into the market includes business start-up activity. (Maritz and Laferriere 2016, 46)

Parker Harris, Caldwell, and Renko (2014) argue that people with disabilities who drive their own business should be regarded not only as self-employed but also as entrepreneurs whose services, goods, or influence can contribute to change for many others besides themselves, and by extension, to social change at the community level. One of our findings from this scoping review reinforces that one common establishment motive among people with disabilities is precisely a desire to bring about change at the societal level.

This review has shown that avoiding discrimination is another motive for starting one’s own business. Discrimination is accounted for either by analysing statistics on participants in the labour force collected via labour market surveys (Gouskova 2020; Jones and Latreille 2011), or empirically by noting individuals’ experiences of discriminating employers, colleagues, and clients (Maritz and Laferriere 2016; Ostrow et al. 2019; Quinton 2014). However, few studies have tested the role of discrimination in their research questions. Those that have done so show that flexibility and self-determination are cited as an establishment motive to a greater extent than discrimination. But should not such motives rather be understood as interconnected, as discrimination can hinder persons from achieving the flexibility they need (and in many cases are entitled to) and thereby lead to self-employment or entrepreneurship?

Further research

Establishment motives of self-employed people and entrepreneurs with disabilities have been studied in many different national, economic, and social contexts. Our scoping review shows that the differences and similarities found globally call for more comparative studies.

None of the studies included in our sample examines whether, and if so how, motives for establishment differ between persons with congenital vs. acquired disabilities. However, other previous research has shown that informants with congenital disabilities had conscious strategies by which they developed social capital, educated themselves, and chose to become self-employed. Persons with acquired disabilities benefited from past experience and used their professional network when choosing to become their own entrepreneurs (Csillag, Gyori, and Svastics 2019). The question of congenital or acquired functional disabilities ought to be of significance in further research.

Whether establishment motives are said to concern improving one’s economy, avoiding discrimination, achieving flexibility and self-determination, or personal development and being able to contribute something, they all reflect a common strive for autonomy. One way to understand this is that, regardless of the group, the discourse on entrepreneurship is generally about autonomy. Here, Studies in Ableism (see, e.g. Campbell 2009) can be helpful in further exploring why this autonomy is such a desirable norm when very few persons can live up to it (Scully 2013). Another way to understand this strive involves the fact that people with disabilities often live with different forms of restrictions on their autonomy. Other theoretical perspectives that could lead to different results, and therefore need to be further explored, include whether the arguments for supporting and including self-employed persons and entrepreneurs with disabilities rest on discourses on diversity or rather on work as a right for all.

Limitations

As only scientific, peer-reviewed publications are included in this review, establishment motives that may appear in grey literature, i.e. policy documents or reports, have not been included in our findings. This is a weakness, as there may be relevant research results in this form of publication as well. Another weakness is that only studies in English are included, which risks reproducing disability research from a European/Northern perspective and thereby excluding perspectives and findings from the global South (Meekosha 2011); on the other hand, our review has included studies from different countries around the world, which can be seen as a strength. Another strength is that many of the included studies are relatively recent, which means that the results ought to still be relevant and up-to-date. Another strength of this review is that it has identified certain knowledge gaps and issues important for further research.

Conclusions

In the strive for access to work among people with disabilities to the same extent as for those without disabilities, new kinds of support may have to be developed, in addition to well established support methods. Earlier studies have highlighted self-employment and entrepreneurship as a viable strategy. However, this form of employment must avoid contributing to an even more vulnerable situation for people with disabilities. Transformations and the development of support need to be based on an awareness of barriers and opportunities. Further, more knowledge of how establishment motives among people with disabilities are influenced by type of disability as well as cultural and socioeconomic context is required. In order to provide the best support, politicians, practitioners, social scientists, and other stakeholders must be aware of the differentiation in establishment motives within the group of people with disabilities. But, perhaps more importantly, in order that people with disabilities may reach their full potential as self-employed and entrepreneurs, the support and methods developed for them need to start within their individual establishment motives.

Acknowledgements

This work was supported by FORTE under Grant [2018-01754]. The authors would like to thank the academic librarians Helen Rasmussen, Markus Svensson, and Lena Wennerholm at Malmö University, who assisted with the database searches and the use of EndNote and Rayyan.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflicts of interest were reported by the authors.

Correction Statement

This article has been republished with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.