Unpacking the link between entrepreneurs’ intersectional social categorizations and their perceptions of crime in an informal economy context

Crime is a salient yet under-theorized phenomenon in informal economies. While prior research has largely essentialized the environment of informal economy entrepreneurs as homogenously dangerous and pervasive with crime, we draw on environmental criminology and micro-geography studies to explore important variation in entrepreneurs’ crime experience in an informal economy. We leverage a unique 'small area census' dataset of entrepreneurs in a South African township to examine how place (micro-geographic location) and space (proximity to physical environment) influences entrepreneurs’ experiences with crime. First, we pinpoint geographically bound crime hotspots that are centered around high ambient populations, and interestingly, formal economic activity. Second, we find variance in crime experience within versus outside of crime hotspots. Some entrepreneurs within hotspots feel relatively safe; nevertheless, due to the ways in which their businesses’ proximal space is constructed, a phenomenon that we attribute to spatial fortification. Third, we also find that some entrepreneurs outside of crime hotspots still feel threatened by crime due to space considerations as well, a phenomenon that is attributed to spatial vulnerability. As a whole, our paper builds generative links across the literatures of entrepreneurship, space and place, and environmental criminology, which enriches understanding of how crime relates to informal economy entrepreneurship.     «

Crime is a salient yet under-theorized phenomenon in informal economies. While prior research has largely essentialized the environment of informal economy entrepreneurs as homogenously dangerous and pervasive with crime, we draw on environmental criminology and micro-geography studies to explore important variation in entrepreneurs’ crime experience in an informal economy. We leverage a unique 'small area census' dataset of entrepreneurs in a South African township to examine how place (micro-g...     »