The Entrepreneur and Its Vision of Economic Development: Changes in the Corporate Tissue – Case Study Haiti


Angelica María Jimenez Coronado (Universidad del Norte, Colombia & Universidad del Atlántico, Colombia) and Carmen Esther Marquez Ariza (International Caritas ONG, Colombia)
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-5225-2860-9.ch014


The main objective of this study, developed in the capital of Haiti, is to determine the effect of the business fabric to strengthen the social, economic, political and environmental structure of some variables of economic performance pertinent to the lack of alternatives and the need to meet basic daily needs and to identify innovation factors in different sectors to boost the economy in Haiti, according to the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor study (GEM, 2016). The methodology is based on qualitative descriptive study developed from 17 in-depth interviews to determine the economic strategies of sustainability from the informality in young people and women with a greater perspective of innovation and challenge in spite of the environmental catastrophes that have not allowed the continuous growth of the Business economy. The results suggest some basic elements to build integral and dynamic strategy that seeks to attack the structural aspects and the manifestations to create impacts in the enterprise achieving sustainable and sustainable companies that can achieve changes with capacity for innovation.
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Haiti is the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere and is among the poorest countries in the world, living more than 80% of its population below the absolute poverty level. The economy depends to a large extent on donations and donations received abroad and political stability, which is achieved with the collaboration of the government and its just and honest government to fight corruption.

On January 12, 2010, a devastating earthquake measuring 7.0 hit Haiti and left more than 200,000 dead, 1.5 million refugees and more than 300,000 buildings destroyed. Since then, Haiti has successfully passed the humanitarian recovery stage and achieved significant socio-economic progress. The country has a consistently high net enrollment rate in primary education and has achieved equal access for children.

However, as Haiti moves towards long-term sustainable development, the country continues to face significant challenges. The political system remains fragile, sustainable jobs are scarce and the environment has the same degree of vulnerability as in the past.

The latest World Bank (WB) report argues: “disappointing economic growth” Haiti over the last four decades and called for the creation of a social contract between the state and citizens to help the poorest.

According to the World Bank, Haiti has the advantages of its proximity to the US market and has a predominantly young population. But endemic poverty, weak fiscal revenues, and strong private sector concentration are obstacles that slow the development of the country.

PNUD launched the Laboratory for Innovation and Economic Development (IDE) Project in late 2014 to train young entrepreneurs with innovative projects supported by professional programs. Training is needed to find strategies to co-finance and launch Their own ventures.

In Haiti, nothing seems to be planned and long-term thinking is probably the reason why entrepreneurship is not playing a major role in economic development (Financial Times, 2015). This short term is the majority of the population. However, it is not an absolute truth because the largely minority population group, the wealthy or the economic elite, entrepreneurs responsible for the effects of rich countries, that is, people with a long-term business vision with Perspective of company growth and personal enrichment. Sometimes ‘peppered’ here and there with a social touch, compared to the increasing phenomenon of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR).

This chapter of the book is based on entrepreneurship that points to the Haitian context, where the business focus attaches importance to the lack of alternatives and the need to meet basic daily needs and identify factors of innovation in different sectors to promote the Economy in Haiti.

Certainly there are debates, where the academics have highlighted several dimensions relevant to evidence studies on social entrepreneurship, with implications for the definition of social entrepreneurship, and this is a case without exception; Self-perception as a social enterprise is commonly used in empirical studies to identify social entrepreneurs or social entrepreneurs (Lyon, Teasdale & Baldock, 2010; Mair, Battilana and Cardenas, 2012), Meyskens, Robb-Post, Stamp, Carsrud and Reynolds Suggesting that the fact that individuals consider their company to be a social enterprise is key to understanding their mission and activities. Similarly, some authors have analyzed the choice of activities as well as patterns of profit distribution as a way of assessing the coexistence of social and profitability objectives and thus determining the social entrepreneurial nature of a company (Doherty et al., 2014; Santos, 2012; Zahra et al., 2009). Other research highlights the diversity that exists between social enterprises, leading to the development of typologies based on a variety of dimensions (e.g. Mair et al., 2012; Zahra et al., 2009)

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