Göler, DanielDanielGöler0000-0003-0377-07242019-09-192018-07-242018https://fis.uni-bamberg.de/handle/uniba/44022Abstract Entrepreneurship in the Context of Transition – An Analysis of Regional Business Start-Ups in South-East Europe (with examples from Albania and Serbia) Business start-ups are billed as the drivers of economic development, which is the reason why many people see lively entrepreneurial activities as an indication of a dynamic economy. That is also the case in the context of post-socialist transition, where private entrepreneurship has been the key to the transformation on the market of yesterday and today. Admittedly, from the point of view of the regional economy, business start-ups call for a much more differentiated interpretation acting within the framework of the post-socialist system transformation. This is the reason why we should critically revise our concept of the individual motivations and qualifications of the players. It should not be forgotten that regional environment has a key role to play, which is why this article focuses also attention on the context in the areas of Albania and Serbia under investigation. It provides insights from empirical studies as a contribution to the research on the group of questions addressed in the context of transition. Based on the thesis of non-linear path of transition, fragile regional economic structures and weak public company-related institutions the player-related analysis deals with the effects, the stability and the problems of entrepreneurship. Even though the greater portion of the private economy has a small-business structure, there is an amazing array of phenomena that lead to typifying the paths of business start-ups. The studies from Albania and Serbia both bear out and qualify in relative terms the image of the entrepreneur as the hope for the future: On the one hand, the present economic dynamic in Albania has brought countless success stories to the fore. On the other hand, there are many cases where entrepreneurship gives a suboptimal impression. It is not unusual that the main motivation for taking action is the lack of other means of gainful employment. In Serbia, there is a similar situation, but entrepreneurship is more reflective, less spontaneous and more professionally organised with more of a wait-and-see attitude in a stagnating framework of activities. The Serbian economy may be presumed to have dormant structural development momentum for its contribution to economic stabilisation because most companies are embedded in their environment while medium-sized and large companies have international contacts. In both countries, a quasi-informal capital transfer and knowledge sharing from abroad takes the place of the incubator institutions for business start-ups familiar from Western society: For instance, expertise is acquired along with the funds required in the course of temporary upstream emigration and it is especially the Albanian companies that do not have any relationship to the qualifications the founder has acquired. Changing fields of business activities is also not unusual. Finally, there are hardly any institutions offering promotion for business start-ups, either in terms of finances or the urgently needed qualifications.deuentrepreneurshipSerbiatransformationSouth-East EuropeAlbania910articlehttps://opus4.kobv.de/opus4-bamberg/frontdoor/index/index/docId/21532urn:nbn:de:bvb:473-opus4-522532