Cultural knowledge as international business: entrepreneurial style in the UK traditional Chinese medicine sector

摘要

The field of international entrepreneurship has received considerable academic attention over the past 20 years, although paucity remains in our understanding of entrepreneurs as key actors in the transfer of business knowledge across national boundaries. Three types of potential entrepreneurial activity have been identified which can facilitate such processes of knowledge exchange: international, transnational and ethnic. This article sets out to identify characteristics which delineate these different entrepreneurial categories. It focusses on a study of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) in the UK, a case of non-Western therapeutic practice, where entrepreneurs must transfer knowledge from China to the UK. In the business sample reported below, we discuss the differences between the three entrepreneurial types in transferring knowledge from one cultural context to another.