Abstract
Purpose: This study reconceptualizes women’s entrepreneurial challenges by framing women entrepreneurs as structurally positioned at the edges of entrepreneurial ecosystems. Moving beyond deficit-based explanations, the study examines how gendered institutional logics, power hierarchies, and resource allocation structures collectively shape women’s entrepreneurial positioning across diverse socio-economic contexts including contexts beyond Western-centric entrepreneurial ecosystem.
Design/methodology/approach: Adopting a PRISMA-guided systematic literature review, the study synthesizes 184 peer-reviewed articles published between 1990 and 2023. A grounded theory-informed thematic analysis is combined with bibliographic coupling to identify dominant challenge patterns contributing towards pushing women entrepreneurs to the edges, their evolution over time.
Findings:The analysis identifies seven interrelated structural dimensions shaping women’s edge positioning through which women are systematically positioned at the margins of resource flows and institutional support: confidence and capability (personal), decision-making power (family), legitimacy (societal), networks and markets (structural), capital systems (financial), policy design (government), and economic stability (contextual). These dimensions are interconnected and vary intersectionally across rural and urban settings, minority status, informal economies, and fragile or crisis-prone contexts. The findings also show that these barriers collectively situates women entrepreneurs at the edge of resource flows, decision making structures and institutional support systems. Over time, the literature has shifted from emphasizing individual-level barriers toward recognizing deeper structural and institutional inequalities.
Originality/value: This study advances women’s entrepreneurship scholarship by introducing seven dimensions pushing women entrepreneurs to the edges that shifts the field away from deficit-based explanations toward a systemic understanding of gendered entrepreneurial positioning. By integrating thematic synthesis with bibliographic coupling, the study offers a multilevel framework that captures how women’s entrepreneurial challenges are contributing to push these entrepreneurs at the margins of entrepreneurial ecosystems, with implications for theory development, policy design, and inclusive ecosystem interventions. In doing so, the study challenges universalized and Western-centric assumptions about entrepreneurial success, agency, and ecosystem participation.