Turkish Entrepreneurship and Integration in Metropolises and Smaller Towns

Seminar paper from the year 2007 in the subject Business economics - Offline Marketing and Online Marketing, grade: 1,0, Hamburg University of Applied Sciences (Wirtschaft / AIM), course: KUSO Prof. Dr. Iken, language: English, abstract: Ethnic entrepreneurship has experienced significant development during the last decade. Today 8.7% of all immigrants in Germany run their own businesses (Plahuta, 2004, p.1). In the year 2003, 286.000 self-employed migrants were counted in Germany. Out of this number the Turks represent the biggest group with 60.000 entrepreneurships (Leicht, 2005, p.6). Of 10.000 Turkish workers 197 launched their own business as opposed to 122 business foundations among the German population (ibid, p.7). Even though the Turks outnumber the German business foundations, they also experience a higher rate in closedowns (ibid). In some German cities, four out of five Turkish business foundations fail, according to Dr. René Leicht (2005, 'Die Rheinpfalz'). He opens the thesis that this high number is at least partly due to the fact that Turks rather prefer to open their businesses in branches and areas dominated by their own people. As a result of this concentration, Turkish businesses solely depend on the purchasing power of their fellow immigrants. Besides, they unnecessarily create a highly competitive market. Since the preference to live and work in an area inhabited primarily by one's own nationality indicates a rather limited integration, we are going to examine whether integration in general is a driver for financial business success.