Gender and opportunity recognition: does social capital rank higher than human capital among poor women?

摘要

In many developing countries, it has been noted that women lack human capital in the form of education and work experience and consequently create social capital and networks to account for the deficit. This paper seeks to find if women are more inclined to utilise social capital to identify opportunities. The study is based on a comparison of male and female micro-entrepreneurs from Kenya. The results showed that while both forms of capital were equally important, men and women utilised different aspects of human and social capital to identify opportunities. Culture was noted to contribute to formation of social capital among women.