IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bla/bstrat/v26y2017i2p253-264.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Waste Livelihoods Amongst the Poor – Through the Lens of Bricolage

Author

Listed:
  • Diane Holt
  • David Littlewood

Abstract

This paper examines two social enterprises and 25+ informal economy micro‐entrepreneurs in Kenya who utilize waste materials to generate income, considered through the conceptual lens of bricolage. Waste materials can all be considered as sources of free or discounted materials that in resource‐constrained and poor communities might be leveraged to generate income in the absence of employment. This paper explores three key themes that emerge from the research findings, namely the various strategic dimensions of the cases, the networks and social capital they leverage and how these livelihood models relate to various dimensions of bricolage such as improvisation, making do and the process of ‘fiddling’ or recombining resources. The findings also suggest that differing waste livelihoods have different rates of return, or profitability, and differing input requirements of capital, skills and knowledge. The paper also stresses the role of boundary spanning organizations such as NGOs and hybrid/social enterprises. © 2016 The Authors. Business Strategy and the Environment published by ERP Environment and John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

Suggested Citation

  • Diane Holt & David Littlewood, 2017. "Waste Livelihoods Amongst the Poor – Through the Lens of Bricolage," Business Strategy and the Environment, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 26(2), pages 253-264, February.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:bstrat:v:26:y:2017:i:2:p:253-264
    DOI: 10.1002/bse.1914
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1002/bse.1914
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1002/bse.1914?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Baker, Ted, 2007. "Resources in play: Bricolage in the Toy Store(y)," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 22(5), pages 694-711, September.
    2. Mair, Johanna & Marti, Ignasi, 2009. "Entrepreneurship in and around institutional voids: A case study from Bangladesh," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 24(5), pages 419-435, September.
    3. Bevin Ashenmiller, 2011. "The Effect of Bottle Laws on Income: New Empirical Results," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 101(3), pages 60-64, May.
    4. Jean Kabongo & Olivier Boiral, 2011. "Creating Value with Wastes: A Model and Typology of Sustainability Within Firms," Business Strategy and the Environment, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 20(7), pages 441-455, November.
    5. Paula Linna, 2013. "Bricolage As A Means Of Innovating In A Resource-Scarce Environment: A Study Of Innovator-Entrepreneurs At The Bop," Journal of Developmental Entrepreneurship (JDE), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 18(03), pages 1-23.
    6. Winborg, Joakim & Landstrom, Hans, 2001. "Financial bootstrapping in small businesses: Examining small business managers' resource acquisition behaviors," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 16(3), pages 235-254, May.
    7. Coviello, Nicole E. & Jones, Marian V., 2004. "Methodological issues in international entrepreneurship research," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 19(4), pages 485-508, July.
    8. MariaLaura Di Domenico & Helen Haugh & Paul Tracey, 2010. "Social Bricolage: Theorizing Social Value Creation in Social Enterprises," Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, , vol. 34(4), pages 681-703, July.
    9. Baker, Ted & Miner, Anne S. & Eesley, Dale T., 2003. "Improvising firms: bricolage, account giving and improvisational competencies in the founding process," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 32(2), pages 255-276, February.
    10. Diane Holt, 2011. "Where are they now? tracking the longitudinal evolution of environmental businesses from the 1990s," Business Strategy and the Environment, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 20(4), pages 238-250, May.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. María José Zapata Campos & Sebastián Carenzo & Goodluck Charles & Jutta Gutberlet & Jaan-Henrik Kain & Michael O Oloko & Jessica Pérez Reynosa & Patrik Zapata, 2023. "Grassroots innovations in ‘extreme’ urban environments. The inclusive recycling movement," Environment and Planning C, , vol. 41(2), pages 351-374, March.
    2. Manyise, Timothy & Dentoni, Domenico, 2021. "Value chain partnerships and farmer entrepreneurship as balancing ecosystem services: Implications for agri-food systems resilience," Ecosystem Services, Elsevier, vol. 49(C).
    3. Yevheniia Varyvoda & Douglas Taren, 2022. "Considering Ecosystem Services in Food System Resilience," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(6), pages 1-16, March.
    4. Andrew Ngawenja Mzembe & Yvonne Novakovic & Frans Melissen & Grace Kamanga, 2019. "Institutional bricolage as an antecedent of social value creation in a developing country's tourism and hospitality industry," Corporate Social Responsibility and Environmental Management, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 26(4), pages 997-1008, July.
    5. Maria Margarida Avillez & Andrew Greenman & Susan Marlow, 2020. "Ethical Judgments About Social Entrepreneurship in Sub-Saharan Africa: The Influence of Spatio-Cultural Meanings," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 161(4), pages 877-892, February.
    6. Jackson Musona & Kaisu Puumalainen & Helena Sjögrén & Anna Vuorio, 2021. "Sustainable Entrepreneurship at the Bottom of the Pyramid: An Identity-Based Perspective," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(2), pages 1-37, January.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Reypens, Lina & Bacq, Sophie & Milanov, Hana, 2021. "Beyond bricolage: Early-stage technology venture resource mobilization in resource-scarce contexts," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 36(4).
    2. Onwuegbuzie, Henrietta N. & Mafimisebi, Oluwasoye P., 2021. "Global relevance of scaling African indigenous entrepreneurship," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 166(C).
    3. Gras, David & Nason, Robert S., 2015. "Bric by bric: The role of the family household in sustaining a venture in impoverished Indian slums," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 30(4), pages 546-563.
    4. Mansi Singh & Sanjay Dhir & Harsh Mishra, 2024. "Synthesizing research in entrepreneurial bootstrapping and bricolage: a bibliometric mapping and TCCM analysis," Management Review Quarterly, Springer, vol. 74(1), pages 487-520, February.
    5. Scazziota, Vanessa & Serra, Fernando & Sarkar, Soumodip & Guerrazzi, Luiz, 2023. "The antecedents of entrepreneurial action: A meta-synthesis on effectuation and bricolage," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 155(PA).
    6. Markus Perkmann & André Spicer, 2014. "How Emerging Organizations Take Form: The Role of Imprinting and Values in Organizational Bricolage," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 25(6), pages 1785-1806, December.
    7. Mansi Singh & Sanjay Dhir & Harsh Mishra, 2023. "Analysing the Antecedents of Entrepreneurial Bootstrapping and Bricolage: A Modified Total Interpretive Structural Modelling and MICMAC Approach," Journal of Entrepreneurship and Innovation in Emerging Economies, Entrepreneurship Development Institute of India, vol. 32(1), pages 7-38, March.
    8. Hertel, Christina & Binder, Julia & Fauchart, Emmanuelle, 2021. "Getting more from many—A framework of community resourcefulness in new venture creation," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 36(3).
    9. Milena Gojny-Zbierowska & Przemysław Zbierowski, 2021. "Improvisation as Responsible Innovation in Organizations," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(4), pages 1-20, February.
    10. Matthew P. Johnson & Stefan Schaltegger, 2020. "Entrepreneurship for Sustainable Development: A Review and Multilevel Causal Mechanism Framework," Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, , vol. 44(6), pages 1141-1173, November.
    11. Molecke, Greg & Pinkse, Jonatan, 2017. "Accountability for social impact: A bricolage perspective on impact measurement in social enterprises," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 32(5), pages 550-568.
    12. Christian Busch & Harry Barkema, 2021. "From necessity to opportunity: Scaling bricolage across resource‐constrained environments," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 42(4), pages 741-773, April.
    13. Mengmeng Meng & Jiasu Lei & Jie Jiao & Qiuyan Tao, 2020. "How does strategic flexibility affect bricolage: The moderating role of environmental turbulence," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 15(8), pages 1-18, August.
    14. Bede Akorige Atarah & Augustine Awuah Peprah & Abednego F. Okoe Amartey & Bylon Abeeku Bamfo, 2021. "Making do by doing without: bricolage in the funding sources of female entrepreneurs in resource-constrained environments," Journal of Global Entrepreneurship Research, Springer;UNESCO Chair in Entrepreneurship, vol. 11(1), pages 361-378, December.
    15. Andrew Ngawenja Mzembe & Yvonne Novakovic & Frans Melissen & Grace Kamanga, 2019. "Institutional bricolage as an antecedent of social value creation in a developing country's tourism and hospitality industry," Corporate Social Responsibility and Environmental Management, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 26(4), pages 997-1008, July.
    16. Tobias Kollmann & Simon Hensellek & Philipp Benedikt Jung & Katharina de Cruppe, 2023. "How bricoleurs go international: a European cross-country study considering the moderating role of governmental entrepreneurship support programs," The Journal of Technology Transfer, Springer, vol. 48(3), pages 1126-1159, June.
    17. Liu, Wentong & Kwong, Caleb C.Y. & Kim, Young-Ah & Liu, Hongfei, 2021. "The more the better vs. less is more: Strategic alliances, bricolage and social performance in social enterprises," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 137(C), pages 128-142.
    18. Mario Pansera & Fabien Martinez, 2017. "Innovation for development and poverty reduction: an integrative literature review," Post-Print hal-02887777, HAL.
    19. Witell, Lars & Gebauer, Heiko & Jaakkola, Elina & Hammedi, Wafa & Patricio, Lia & Perks, Helen, 2017. "A bricolage perspective on service innovation," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 79(C), pages 290-298.
    20. Jianyu Zhao & Yining Huang & Xi Xi & Shanshan Wang, 2021. "How knowledge heterogeneity influences business model design: mediating effects of strategic learning and bricolage," International Entrepreneurship and Management Journal, Springer, vol. 17(2), pages 889-919, June.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bla:bstrat:v:26:y:2017:i:2:p:253-264. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/10.1002/(ISSN)1099-0836 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.