The lebanese Brazilian entrepreneurs: entrepreneurship in building an elite

• Autor(a) principal: El Khadir, Marouane
• Data de Publicação: 2016
• Tipo de documento: Dissertação
• Idioma: eng
• Título da fonte: Repositório Institucional do FGV (FGV Repositório Digital)
• Texto Completo: http://hdl.handle.net/10438/17519
• topic: Entrepreneurship; Ethnic entrepreneurship; Lebanese entrepreneurs; Arab Brazilian; Ciência política; Empreendedorismo; Empresários - Brasil; Libaneses; Imigrantes - Brasil

Brazilians of Lebanese descent occupy high positions in economic, political and cultural fields. This community is widely associated with the image of success in the country’s collective psyche. Historically, most of the first Lebanese immigrants have started their journey in Brazil as entrepreneurs, concentrating on trade and moving later to industry. This focus on entrepreneurial activities still holds true today. Their early success in business then led to the emergence of a powerful elite whose influence goes beyond the economic sphere. This study deals with this case of ethnic entrepreneurship and aims at presenting and explaining why and how this phenomenon took place. It also shows that entrepreneurship can not only be an economic activity but also lay the foundation of a community and structure its identity. This work thus brings a contribution to the study of ethnic entrepreneurship which can be important in order to understand the economic and social rise of certain minorities or immigrant groups and draw up possible inspirational models. This dissertation also outlines several factors that participate to the success of entrepreneurs.