A special issue of International Journal of Entrepreneurship and Small Business
Islands, and small islands in particular, are amongst the most heavily themed objects in the context of tourism marketing. Island economies also have serious logistic and scale difficulties in producing manufactures that are export competitive. The notion of developing island-specific brands that piggy back freely on the island allure is therefore one that allows small island entrepreneurs to develop viable export-oriented (including tourist targeted) products. Commodities like Jamaica rum, naturally fragrant soap from Fiji, or decorative glass from Malta, thus develop into niche products that survive by maintaining high quality while avoiding high price sensitivity and elasticity. Viable manufacturing, contrary to its development in the context of industrialisation, can emerge in small island economies as a response to service sector activity.
In this special issue, authors are invited to share their thinking, basing their contributions on empirical data - especially single, comparative or multiple case study methodologies; evidence of best practice; or else adopting a more conceptual or theoretical approach.
Themes of particular interest include, but are not limited to:
- The limits of island branding. Can the island allure be diluted or overdone?
- How do small island entrepreneurs capitalize on islandness?
- How does being on an island - on the periphery, far from the metropole - facilitate or hinder entrepreneurship and small business development?
- What is the role of the diaspora - the population of islanders living away from their island - in promoting island entrepreneurship, small business, and product development with a view to tapping export markets?
- Small island societies are tightly-knit, intensely networked, and very close to their politicians. How does this socio-political context affect island entrepreneurship, small business, and product development?
- How does one develop an island brand that is supportive of business initiatives?
- Any other subject related to island branding, island brands, and their inter-relationship
Deadline for submission of papers: 31 March 2008
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