General Conclusions

After diving into the literature on institutions, entrepreneurship and economic performance, and empirically testing the sequential connection among these factors, this chapter gathers the main findings and discusses implications for entrepreneurship and public policy. Throughout the literature analysis, we find that informal institutions have been less explored by scholars than formal institutions, despite that the former are more beneficial for entrepreneurship than the latter. The empirical chapters enable us to demonstrate the importance of informal institutions, especially observed through the social progress orientation, for entrepreneurial activity (directly) and development (indirectly). Additionally, our findings reveal that opportunity over necessity entrepreneurship increases not only economic performance, but also social progress. Based on these results, our book may serve to inspire scholars and policy makers to study and discuss strategies to achieve a higher economic performance by promoting entrepreneurial activity. Practitioners may also find useful this book as it reveals how different markets are characterized by different values that condition productive decisions such as entrepreneurship.