Provocation: what is the world asking of entrepreneurship education?

Abstract

Purpose This paper presents a provocation to conclude the Special Issue “Developing the Future Scholarship of Entrepreneurship Education” (Ramsgaard et al., 2025). It draws on the perspective of Gert Biesta, an esteemed educational scholar whose work was evoked in the original call for papers for the Special Issue. Biesta has a vast body of work which has been signposted as important for entrepreneurship educators to consider. This provocation synthesises key assumptions and ideas in order to prompt different, and potentially difficult, questions for educators and scholars in Entrepreneurship Education (EE) to explore. Design/methodology/approach The contribution is framed as a provocation (Hjorth, 2011). Provocation is vital in education in that it uproots thinking and seeks possibilities to change the status quo. This under-pinning positions the contribution alongside various assumption challenging and critical works. To develop the provocation, authors harnessed the practices of collaborative theorising (Werron et al., 2023). Collaborative theorising involves using everyday research methods–reading, talking and writing together – to evolve a common perspective which could not have been developed alone. Authors use the works of Gert Biesta to provide new assumptions and provoke new questions for EE scholarship. Findings Biesta’s work is particularly relevant for entrepreneurship educators to consider as his ideas speak to some of the concerns that have already been voiced in the field, for example, concerns about EE and democracy (Leffler et al., 2010); concerns about taken for granted practice and institutionalisation (Berglund and Verduijn, 2018; Hytti, 2018) and concerns that EE is failing to transform despite social and ecological breakdown (Loi et al., 2022). Biesta’s work challenges educators to re-visit the purpose of education, asking powerful questions and provoking thinking toward: what is the world asking of EE? Originality/value This contribution to the Special Issue was inspired by and developed through the 3E conference. Its provenance goes back to 3E 2023, when two of the five co-authors presented a review of learning theory, which inspired a further paper at 3E 2024. In this sense it is an exemplar and celebration of the vibrant scholarly community that comes to life through 3E. The provocation speaks directly to this community, and to future EE scholars, providing a satisfying conclusion to the Special Issue celebrating the ten year anniversary of 3E.

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