Madhu Viswanathan
Business Administration, College of Business
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Sustainable Entrepreneurship for Subsistence Marketplaces
This research focuses on sustainable consumption and production and its interrelationships with entrepreneurship in subsistence marketplaces. A number of factors that characterize the adverse conditions of subsistence marketplaces make entrepreneurship a necessity and entrepreneurial skills a natural outcome. Building on a research program on consumption and entrepreneurship across resource and literacy barriers, this proposal considers the issue of sustainability in its broadest sense, i.e., in terms of considering outcomes for the planet and people along with profits. The research will use a bottom-up approach to examine cognitions, attitudes, and behaviors among micro-entrepreneurs and the customers they serve. Sustainable solutions for a large proportion of humanity will come from an understanding of micro-level human needs and behaviors and their convergence with sustainable technologies and business practices in the arena of entrepreneurship. The role of the micro-entrepreneur who is closest to the marketplaces in implementing sustainable solutions is likely to be critical. Such understanding of subsistence marketplaces and how they can progress toward being sustainable marketplaces would benefit all markets.
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