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1 ASSOCIATION FOR CONSUMER RESEARCH Labovitz School of Business & Economics, University of Minnesota Duluth, 11 E. Superior Street, Suite 210, Duluth, MN Acculturation Within Small Immigrant Ethnic Minority Communities: a Small Business Opportunity Context Ekant Veer, University of Canterbury, New Zealand Huibert de Vries, University of Canterbury, New Zealand This paper considers how the consumption of small business opportunities can aid the acculturation process of individuals from small immigrant ethnic minority communities. To this end an acculturation model is proposed that links the consumption of the business start-up to social inclusion within the dominant host society. [to cite]: Ekant Veer and Huibert de Vries (2012),"Acculturation Within Small Immigrant Ethnic Minority Communities: a Small Business Opportunity Context", in AP - Asia-Pacific Advances in Consumer Research Volume 10, eds., Duluth, MN : Association for Consumer Research, Pages: [url]: [copyright notice]: This work is copyrighted by The Association for Consumer Research. For permission to copy or use this work in whole or in part, please contact the Copyright Clearance Center at

2 This paper considers how the consumption of small business opportunities can aid the acculturation process of individuals from small immigrant ethnic minority communities. To this end an acculturation model is proposed that links the consumption of the business start-up to social inclusion within the dominant host society. INTRODUCTION Throughout the world there are immigrant ethnic minority communities with small critical mass, such as the Armenian community in Greece (Piperopoulos, 2010), Bangladesh community in Glasgow, Scotland Peoples in Christchurch, New Zealand (Statistics New Zealand, 2006). They have not established large community enclaves or ethno-burbs such as are common with larger ethnic immigrant populations; as in the Chinatowns of San Francisco and Vancouver (Li, 1993), or the Surinamese of the Netherlands population base in their adopted country such as the 1.4 million strong Indian community of the UK do (Dhaliwal and Kangis, 2006). Yet they have communality with all ethnic minority communities in that they seek means by which to interact and gain acceptance with the host societies (Zhou, 2003, Ram, 1997). This process is referred to as the acculturation phenomenon: the immigrant s adoption of the dominant society s attitudes, values and behaviours (O Gunn, Lee and Faber, 1985; p579), at a group or individual level (Berry, Kim, Minde and Mok, 1987), and any subsequent changes in the original culture patterns of both groups (Chapman and Jamal, 1997). This paper considers how the consumption of small business opportunities aids the acculturation process of small ethnic minority communities within a dominant society of a migrant receiving country. We propose an acculturation model that suggests the perceived exclusion felt by individuals from small immigrant ethnic minorities may be mitigated by engaging in a business start-up as a means of generating a desired lifestyle and a perceived social model is to better understand small ethnic minority community behavioural patterns in terms of their Huibert de Vries, University of Canterbury, New Zealand Ekant Veer, University of Canterbury, New Zealand perceptions of inclusion within the small business/ acculturation nexus, which can inform policy makers dealing with how best to integrate small minority communities into a host-country s economic and social infrastructure. LITERATURE Ethnic minorities within a dominant host society are often cast into a variety of different roles in the course of their daily lives. Each role may bring into play a different level of acculturation or ethnicity (O Gunn and Faber, 1985). The acculturation phenomenon considers how groups of individuals having different cultures (the ethnic minorities) come into continuous subsequent changes in the original culture patterns of either or both groups. (Chapman and Jamal, 1997). research is how immigrants adopt the dominant society s attitudes, values and behaviours (Ozcaglar- Toulouse and Ustuner, 2009). process whereby at least some of the cultural patterns of the host country are adopted (Khairullah and Khairullah, 1999). This can be a different levels as individuals might choose to be more ethnic or more host cultural as the situation may warrant (Berry et al., of the original cultural values and norms by one group in the process of learning new ones. The acquisition of a new set of norms and values, however, is expected and behavioural patterns of the individual (Laroche, Kim, Hui and Joy, 1993). A popular theoretical model introduced in 1997 by Berry (Oerlemans and Peeters, 2010) considers two dimensions: culture adaptation, which is the degree to which immigrants are willing to adapt to the dominant culture of the new society; and culture maintenance, which is the degree to which immigrants want to maintain their own ethnic culture in the new society (Oerlemans and Peeters, 2010, p461). This model proposes that there are four possible acculturation orientations: integration - which adaptation and culture maintenance; marginalization

3 two domains; whereas a positive orientation towards culture adaptation and a negative orientation towards culture maintenance is referred to as assimilation 1987). Ruvio, Gianfranco, and Sigal (2009) suggest that individual and environmental factors affect immigrants chosen acculturation strategy. To better literature offers some insights. The current ethnic business literature focuses on minority groups with large critical mass in high density population cities, such as Amsterdam, London, and Paris (e.g. Guerassimoff, 2003; Kloosterman, Van der Leun 2003; Smallbone, Bertotti and Ekanem, 2005) and/ or countries in Europe and North America with large populations (e.g. Aldrich, Jones and McEvoy, 1984; Baldock and Smallbone, 2003; Clark and Drinkwater, 2010; Kontos, 2003; Li, 1993; Ram and Smallbone, 2003; Waldinger, Aldrich, Ward and associates, 1990). These studies identify high levels of ethnic social capital, with strong ethnic networks and self- 1997, Zhou, 2004). Theories that attempt to explain the behavioural patterns of ethnic minority entrepreneurship have developed such as ethnic embeddedness (Barrett, Jones, McEvoy and McGoldrick, 2002, Jack and Anderson, 2002; Kontos, 2003, Razin, 2002), including Kloostereman s mixed embeddedness (1999, 2003, 2010) and local embeddedness and Vindigni (2004) alluded to a combination of culturalist and structuralist approaches playing a decisive role in entrepreneurial activity. They drew attention to the importance of both host country and ethnic minorities cultural predisposition. Waldinger, Aldrich, Ward and associates (1990) had previously argued the importance of migration history through a unique mix of pre-migration, migration, and post migration characteristics, setting the parameters of their economic participation. de Vries (2008) attempted to encapsulate the concepts of embeddedness and mix through a set of parameters in a model of ethnic four constructs responding to migrant, settlement, cultural and business phases of acculturation, which encapsulate the entrepreneurial behavioural patterns. Researchers have also considered the importance of immigrant s perceptions (Tang and Rothenberg, 2009) which are most prominent within the settlement phase (de Vries, 2011), cultural composition (Pio, 2007), and environment (Gaddefors, 2007). In practice the as limited employment opportunities and blocked mobility, high rates of unemployment, marriage, family, gender, enclaving, migration timeframes, undertake self-employment (Basu, 2004:Clark and Drinkwater, 2010; Collins, 2003; Hammarstedt, 2004; Hiebert, 2002; Ram 1997; Smallbone, Peters, 2002; Ram, Deakins, and Baldcock; 2003; Zhou, 2004). However, as previously stated, these accretions have generally been established within this context of large ethic populations and by implication small ethnic minority groups have been assumed to behave in similar ways with regard to their business behaviours and subsequentially ascribed to similar acculturation behaviours but is this necessarily so? THEORETICAL MODEL DEVELOPMENT This paper takes the perspective of societal inclusion as a position outcome of immigrant acculturation. Inclusion compasses the value of creating and maintaining relationships within the host country, whilst maintaining cultural identity, as in Berry et al s (1987) integration; or assuming the host characteristics, as in Berry et al s (1987) assimilation. We argue that for the host country and ethnic minority communities. (Chapple, Gorbey and Yeabsley, 1994; Daniels, Radebaugh and Sullivan, 2002; Kloosterman, Van de Leun and Rath, 1999; Masurel et al., 2004; Yeabsley, 1997). However, small ethnic minority communities do not have available to them large ethnic networks or enclaves in which to assess social capital or ethnic embeddedness or cultural composition. Therefore an undesirable outcome of exclusion can occur where there is a lack of connection to other groups and Berry et al s. (1987) model refers to as separation (when they maintain cultural identity and character) or marginalisation (when they lose cultural identity and character). Based on this premise a theoretical model predisposition and the ethnic minority predisposition. These predispositions encapsulate migration,

4 settlement, and cultural factors (de Vries, 2008) and can lead to separation or marginalisation and the perception of exclusion as a negative outcome. Alternatively they can lead to integration or assimilation and the perception of inclusion as a positive outcome. The model then infers that when the predispositions lead to perceived exclusion the consumption of a business start-up either creation or acquisition of a small business - will lead to perceived greater inclusion as individuals to the stronger integration or assimilation acculturations characteristics. This paper therefore contends that the ethnic literature draws strong conclusions on the conditions in which business creation or acquisition occur within large ethnic minority communities (Ram, 1997; Zhou, 2004). It further contends that acculturation literature considers the demographic characteristics which lead to greater acculturation (e.g. Khairalluh and Kairullah, 1999) and the intergroup factors (e.g. business start-up consumption on the acculturation which supports inclusion is not fully considered. This model attempts to conceptualise this relationship. Figure 1. Acculturation/business start-up theoretical construct REFERENCES Aldrich, H. E., T. P. Jones, and D. McEvoy (1984), Ethnic Advantage and Minority Business Development, in Ethnic Communities in Business: Strategies for Economic Survival, ed. R. Ward and R. Jenkins, Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, Barrett, G., T. Jones, D. McEvoy, and C. McGoldrick (2002), The Economic Embeddedness of Immigrants Enterprises in Britain, International Journal of Entrepreneurial Behaviour and Research, 8 (1/2), Baldock, R. and D. Smallbone (2003), Bridging the Gap in Support for Ethnic Minority Owned Businesses: The Case of Devon and Cornwall, Journal of Small Business and Enterprise Development, 10 (1), Berry, J. W. (1997), Immigration, Acculturation, and Adaptation, Applied Psychology An International Review, 46 (1), Berry, J. W., U. Kim, T. Minde, and D. Mok (1987), Comparative Studies of Acculturative Stress, International Migration Review, 21 (3), Chapman, M. and A. Jamal (1997), Acculturation: Cross Cultural Consumer Perceptions and The Host society predisposition (consumer) Ethnic makeup Values and beliefs Settlement Infrastructure Discrimination Blocked mobility (devries, 2008) Perceived Exclusion culture separation culture marginalisation (Berry et al., 1987) Business Start-up (consumption) Creation Acquisition Perceived societal engagement through business activity Perceived Inclusion culture integration culture assimilation (Berry et al., 1987) Ethnic minority predisposition (seller) Homeland history/culture Ethnic networks Identity and beliefs Skills (devries, 2008) Small Ethnic Minority Group Acculturation

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