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Research Handbook on Self-Employment and Public Policy
Adopting an interdisciplinary approach, this Research Handbook examines the shifting global landscape of self-employment. It provides an authoritative overview of key theoretical perspectives and empirical findings in the field, and presents evidence-based policy responses to the multifaceted nature of modern self-employment.
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Critical Acclaim
Contents
More Information
Adopting an interdisciplinary approach, this Research Handbook examines the shifting global landscape of self-employment. It provides an authoritative overview of key theoretical perspectives and empirical findings in the field, and presents evidence-based policy responses to the multifaceted nature of modern self-employment.
Contributing authors explore evolving trends, their impacts, and potential policy actions regarding self-employment across diverse welfare state regimes in advanced economies, while also highlighting the parallels and differences with developing and emerging economies. Combining diverse research methods, they bring together insights from fields including sociology, economics, law, political science and management. They analyse the shifting perception of the self-employed, from willing and independent entrepreneurs towards dependent, vulnerable and precarious workers, and the subsequent tensions this creates for policy-makers. Ultimately, this Handbook advances both academic and societal debates on self-employment, highlighting pressing issues that will shape the future of the discipline.
The Research Handbook on Self-Employment and Public Policy is an essential resource for students and scholars of labour policy, industrial relations and public administration. It is also a valuable tool for policy officials seeking to effectively represent the self-employed.
Contributing authors explore evolving trends, their impacts, and potential policy actions regarding self-employment across diverse welfare state regimes in advanced economies, while also highlighting the parallels and differences with developing and emerging economies. Combining diverse research methods, they bring together insights from fields including sociology, economics, law, political science and management. They analyse the shifting perception of the self-employed, from willing and independent entrepreneurs towards dependent, vulnerable and precarious workers, and the subsequent tensions this creates for policy-makers. Ultimately, this Handbook advances both academic and societal debates on self-employment, highlighting pressing issues that will shape the future of the discipline.
The Research Handbook on Self-Employment and Public Policy is an essential resource for students and scholars of labour policy, industrial relations and public administration. It is also a valuable tool for policy officials seeking to effectively represent the self-employed.
Critical Acclaim
‘Self-employment is here to stay in today''s labour market. At the same time, in its present form, it is also a relatively new phenomenon, about which knowledge is only gradually becoming available. The Research Handbook on Self-Employment and Public Policy discusses a wide range of topics around the theme of self-employment in a clear manner, providing an up-to-date and accurate picture of existing knowledge in this area.’
– Joop Schippers, Universiteit Utrecht, the Netherlands
‘This Handbook is a fresh and comprehensive contribution to academic research on self-employment, the absolute protagonist of the new post-industrial order. Its innovative forms in the Global North, driven by technological progress, alongside the more traditional ones in the Global South, open up important challenges to political regulation and collective representation.’
– Renata Semenza, University of Milan, Italy
– Joop Schippers, Universiteit Utrecht, the Netherlands
‘This Handbook is a fresh and comprehensive contribution to academic research on self-employment, the absolute protagonist of the new post-industrial order. Its innovative forms in the Global North, driven by technological progress, alongside the more traditional ones in the Global South, open up important challenges to political regulation and collective representation.’
– Renata Semenza, University of Milan, Italy
Contents
Contents
1 Introduction to Research Handbook on Self-employment and Public
Policy: shifting patterns and policy issues 1
Wieteke Conen and Enrico Reuter
PART I PATTERNS AND QUALITY OF SELF-EMPLOYED WORK
2 Growth dynamics of solo and employer start-ups during the business
formation stage 30
Jerzy Cieślik, José María Millan and André van Stel
3 Multiple jobholding among the self-employed—trends and implications
of hybrid entrepreneurship for public policy 49
Saidaminkhon Alyavi and Matthias Schulz
4 Uncovering heterogeneity: job quality and well-being among the
European self-employed 66
Jessie Gevaert
5 Poverty, inequality and material deprivation among the self-employed
in Europe 80
Jeroen Horemans and Ive Marx
6 Self-employment in low- and middle-income countries: implications for
public policy 99
Shuting Xia, Iyeyinka Kusi-Mensah, Francis Annor and Brendan Burchell
PART II UNDERREPRESENTED AND DISADVANTAGED GROUPS
IN CONTEXT
7 Combining work and family: the self-employed between autonomy and
work demand 118
Mia Tammelin, Milla Salin and Katri Otonkorpi-Lehtoranta
8 Women, children, and self-employment cross-nationally: do
work-family policy contexts matter? 134
Michelle J. Budig and Misun Lim
9 Female self-employment in India: informality, low pay, and
intersectional disadvantages 155
Tulika Tripathi and Nripendra K Mishra
10 Migrants’ entrepreneurship in Germany: the role of social enterprises in
the implementation of self-employment policies 171
Maria Kontos
11 Self-employment and older workers in the aftermath of the Covid-19
pandemic: seniorpreneurs, senior precarious or somewhere in between? 186
Philip Taylor, Beate Baldauf, Cal Halvorsen and Geoff Pearman
12 Self-employment and disability: evidence for the German case 208
Ricardo Pagan
PART III REGULATION, VISIBILITY AND VOICE
13 Regulating self-employment in advanced and emerging countries 228
Darcy du Toit and Abigail Osiki
14 Exploitation by misclassification of workers’ employment status:
examples from the Swedish road freight transport industry in
a transnational European context 246
Annette Thornquist
15 Red tape and juggling acts: the role of regulation in Australian small business 264
Tui McKeown, Tim Mazzarol, Geoff Soutar, John Rice and Sujana Adapa
16 Perceptions of the self-employed and wage-employed regarding
institutional conditions affecting entrepreneurship 282
Dieter Bögenhold, Martha O’Hagan-Luff, Zulaicha Parastuty and André van Stel
17 Self-employment and social protection in Europe: improved protection
amid persistent gaps and fragmentation 296
Slavina Spasova and Sepi Roshan
18 Interest representation of the solo self-employed 316
Lisa Abbenhardt and Hans J. Pongratz
19 The collective representation of solo self-employed workers in Europe
as an outcome of relations between traditional and new collective
actors. A focus on the Netherlands, Italy, and Slovakia 332
Petr Mezihorak and Annalisa Murgia
20 Work practices among self-employed workers in Nigeria: implication
for occupational safety and health policy 345
Funmilayo Juliana Afolabi and Joshua Oluwafisayo Afolabi
21 Tackling self-employment in the informal economy in Nordic countries:
an evaluation of competing policy approaches 360
Colin C Williams
PART IV TECHNOLOGICAL CHANGE, INNOVATION AND SKILLS:
MOVING INTO THE FUTURE
22 Self-employment, innovation, and digital transformation: a review and
research agenda 378
Isidoro Romero and Juan A. Martinez-Roman
23 Factors enabling and constraining higher levels of data maturity among SMEs 395
Werner Liebregts and Daan Kolkman
24 Platform economy, self-employment and quality of work: an
assessment during the COVID-19 pandemic 422
Karol Muszyński and Valeria Pulignano
25 With or without algorithms: managing the self-employed in the Danish
platform economy 440
Christian Haldrup, Anna Ilsøe and Trine P Larsen
26 Hybrid (solo) self-employment in the digital platform economy: an
upskilling pathway? 456
Konstantinos Pouliakas and Antonio Ranieri
27 Public policy implications of self-employment 484
Enrico Reuter and Wieteke Conen
1 Introduction to Research Handbook on Self-employment and Public
Policy: shifting patterns and policy issues 1
Wieteke Conen and Enrico Reuter
PART I PATTERNS AND QUALITY OF SELF-EMPLOYED WORK
2 Growth dynamics of solo and employer start-ups during the business
formation stage 30
Jerzy Cieślik, José María Millan and André van Stel
3 Multiple jobholding among the self-employed—trends and implications
of hybrid entrepreneurship for public policy 49
Saidaminkhon Alyavi and Matthias Schulz
4 Uncovering heterogeneity: job quality and well-being among the
European self-employed 66
Jessie Gevaert
5 Poverty, inequality and material deprivation among the self-employed
in Europe 80
Jeroen Horemans and Ive Marx
6 Self-employment in low- and middle-income countries: implications for
public policy 99
Shuting Xia, Iyeyinka Kusi-Mensah, Francis Annor and Brendan Burchell
PART II UNDERREPRESENTED AND DISADVANTAGED GROUPS
IN CONTEXT
7 Combining work and family: the self-employed between autonomy and
work demand 118
Mia Tammelin, Milla Salin and Katri Otonkorpi-Lehtoranta
8 Women, children, and self-employment cross-nationally: do
work-family policy contexts matter? 134
Michelle J. Budig and Misun Lim
9 Female self-employment in India: informality, low pay, and
intersectional disadvantages 155
Tulika Tripathi and Nripendra K Mishra
10 Migrants’ entrepreneurship in Germany: the role of social enterprises in
the implementation of self-employment policies 171
Maria Kontos
11 Self-employment and older workers in the aftermath of the Covid-19
pandemic: seniorpreneurs, senior precarious or somewhere in between? 186
Philip Taylor, Beate Baldauf, Cal Halvorsen and Geoff Pearman
12 Self-employment and disability: evidence for the German case 208
Ricardo Pagan
PART III REGULATION, VISIBILITY AND VOICE
13 Regulating self-employment in advanced and emerging countries 228
Darcy du Toit and Abigail Osiki
14 Exploitation by misclassification of workers’ employment status:
examples from the Swedish road freight transport industry in
a transnational European context 246
Annette Thornquist
15 Red tape and juggling acts: the role of regulation in Australian small business 264
Tui McKeown, Tim Mazzarol, Geoff Soutar, John Rice and Sujana Adapa
16 Perceptions of the self-employed and wage-employed regarding
institutional conditions affecting entrepreneurship 282
Dieter Bögenhold, Martha O’Hagan-Luff, Zulaicha Parastuty and André van Stel
17 Self-employment and social protection in Europe: improved protection
amid persistent gaps and fragmentation 296
Slavina Spasova and Sepi Roshan
18 Interest representation of the solo self-employed 316
Lisa Abbenhardt and Hans J. Pongratz
19 The collective representation of solo self-employed workers in Europe
as an outcome of relations between traditional and new collective
actors. A focus on the Netherlands, Italy, and Slovakia 332
Petr Mezihorak and Annalisa Murgia
20 Work practices among self-employed workers in Nigeria: implication
for occupational safety and health policy 345
Funmilayo Juliana Afolabi and Joshua Oluwafisayo Afolabi
21 Tackling self-employment in the informal economy in Nordic countries:
an evaluation of competing policy approaches 360
Colin C Williams
PART IV TECHNOLOGICAL CHANGE, INNOVATION AND SKILLS:
MOVING INTO THE FUTURE
22 Self-employment, innovation, and digital transformation: a review and
research agenda 378
Isidoro Romero and Juan A. Martinez-Roman
23 Factors enabling and constraining higher levels of data maturity among SMEs 395
Werner Liebregts and Daan Kolkman
24 Platform economy, self-employment and quality of work: an
assessment during the COVID-19 pandemic 422
Karol Muszyński and Valeria Pulignano
25 With or without algorithms: managing the self-employed in the Danish
platform economy 440
Christian Haldrup, Anna Ilsøe and Trine P Larsen
26 Hybrid (solo) self-employment in the digital platform economy: an
upskilling pathway? 456
Konstantinos Pouliakas and Antonio Ranieri
27 Public policy implications of self-employment 484
Enrico Reuter and Wieteke Conen
