Pakistani businesses in Barcelona: motivations for entrepreneurship

Abstract

Immigrant entrepreneurship is an important feature of life in many European cities today. Barcelona is not an exception: the entrepreneurial initiatives led by migrant communities are a growing phenomenon – reinforced by the context of crisis – which becomes a part of the existing commercial landscape and highlights cultural diversity in the urban space. The Pakistani community, unlike other immigrant groups settled in Catalonia, stands out for having a large number of self-employed people who run small businesses. This paper contributes to a better understanding of the motivations that Pakistanis have to start up a business, applying the mixed embeddedness theoretical approach on the basis of a specific case in the Raval neighbourhood of Barcelona. In particular, it analyses how the characteristics of this group interact with the socio-economic and politico-institutional structures of the reception-related context. Thanks to a mixed methods design, this study has generated quantitative data by making a census of all the Pakistani establishments in the Raval (244), and qualitative data by participant observation and in-depth interviews.

Keywords: ethnic entrepreneurship; immigrants; Pakistan; Spain; crisis.