The “Urbanpreneur”

Article: http://www.citylab.com/work/2016/10/rise-of-the-urbanpreneur/504434/

We’ve read David Pozen, and so we’ve seen how the term “entrepreneur” has come to encapsulate so much over the past few decades, and how the term is always growing (to include “social entrepreneurs,” for example). See David Pozen, “We Are All Entrepreneurs Now.” 43 Wake Forest L. Rev. 283 (2008))

There’s a new spin on the classic definition: the rise of the “urbanpreneur.”

Boyd Cohen, “professor of entrepreneurship and sustainability at EADA Business School in Barcelona, Spain, and joint professor at the Universitat de Vic,” has coined the phrase. Describing the term, he states: “Entrepreneurs can live anywhere in the world and focus on any industry. Urbanpreneurs embed in their socio-ecological environments—cities and towns—to draw influence. They’re tapping into what cities have to offer so they can collaborate and innovate in their community.”

The term seems to share the most similarities with what we refer to as the “social entrepreneur.” Cohen states: “Urban entrepreneurs come in all shapes and sizes and not all of them fit that mode. Many young entrepreneurs aspire to have an impact on their local communities more than becoming the next Bill Gates or Mark Zuckerberg.”

He continues to define the term “urbanpreneur,” and states there are “three distinct types of indie urbanpreneurs: makers, digital indie, and on-demand or gig economy urbanpreneurs.”

Cohen also discusses “civic entrepreneurship,” which, again, aligns naturally with social entrepreneurship.

The article is an example of David Pozen’s theory come to life; Cohen’s descriptions of the urbanpreneur (and the three different types) as well as the civil entrepreneur truly show the malleability of the term “entrepreneurship.”

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