5-6 October, 1995
Amsterdam, The Netherlands

ASIAN ENTREPRENEURS IN COMPARATIVE PERSPECTIVE

By Mario Rutten and Hein Streefkerk

The recent interest in big business in South and Southeast Asia has led to
a renewed awareness of the need to build up knowledge about the increased
economic activity and prosperity of business groups operating at the
provincial or regional level of the economy. Over the past decades, various
studies have been devoted to the politico-economic and social aspects of
current capitalist development at the medium and small-scale levels in
South and Southeast Asia. These studies - often based on local research or
sector-wise surveys - have given us detailed knowledge of the economic
behaviour and life-style of a particular group of rural/regional
entrepreneurs operating in a specific locality or subsector of one of the
Asian societies, at present or in the past.
Characteristic of these local studies on the capitalist class in South and
Southeast Asia is that they are not only based on empirical data collection
in one country, but that their data are presented and discussed within the
framework of the theoretical debate specific to the Asian region concerned.
Studies on small and medium-scale entrepreneurs in Southeast Asia usually
address themselves to different questions than these examined in studies on
the same category of entrepreneurs in South Asia. Although studies on the
rural/regional capitalist class in South and Southeast Asia share a common
subject of research, there have been no attempts to discuss the findings on
the nature of this class in South and Southeast Asia within a common
analytical framework.
At the core of the conclusions on the capitalist class in South and
Southeast Asia often seems to lie a specific notion about the origin and
nature of the capitalist class in Europe and East Asia (Japan), at present
and in the past. Viewing the persistence and value attached to these
characterizations, it is important that the tenability of these assumptions
is tested by scholars who have done work on the capitalist class in Europe,
Japan and the Newly Industrializing Countries in East Asia, at present and
in the past. Such a comparison will help us in our analysis and
understanding of the economic and social characteristics of the emergence
of the class of rural/regional capitalists in South and Southeast Asia, and
most recently in China.

THE WORKSHOP
With this in mind, the Centre for Asian Studies Amsterdam (CASA) has
decided to organize a workshop on 'Asian Entrepreneurs in Comparative
Perspective' on October 5-6, 1995 in Amsterdam. This workshop is sponsored
by the European Committee for Advanced Asian Studies of the European
Science Foundation in Strasbourg. The aim of the workshop has a dual
nature. First, we want to obtain a more precise social profile of
rural/regional entrepreneurs (including those living in small towns) who
operate at the local and regional level in Asia and who constitute an
important section within the emerging middle classes of Asia today. Second,
the aim is to study the Asian entrepreneurs in comparative perspective.
Comparisons will be made between empirical findings and theoretical
perspectives on entrepreneurs in different regions of Asia - South,
Southeast and East Asia - both new and in the past, and with their earlier
and present counterparts in Europe. The workshop will bring together
scholars who have done contemporary and historical research on the class of
small and medium scale entrepreneurs in different regions in Asia and
Europe, representing various disciplines in the social sciences: sociology,
anthropology, economics, and history. The participants will be asked to
analyze the entrepreneurial class in a specific region with the theoretical
debates in other regions at the back of their mind. The comparative
perspective we envisage will enlarge our understanding of the specificity
and similarity of the emergence of the entrepreneurial class at the medium
and small-scale levels in Asia and provide us with new ideas for future
research. Active participation in the workshop is possible only by personal
invitation of the organizers, but there is some room for attendance by
those who are interested.

For information please contact:

Dr. Mario Rutten
Centre for Asian Studies Amsterdam (CASA)
Oude Hoogstraat 24
1012 CE  Amsterdam
The Netherlands
Tel: +31-20-5252236/2745
Fax: +31-20-5252446