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“Start-up nation”: The making and performativity of an empty signifier

Author

Listed:
  • C. Champenois

    (Audencia Business School)

  • D. Saurier

    (Audencia Business School)

  • E. Béliard

Abstract

The article sheds light on the process of fabrication of a polysemous, ambiguous and mocking French entrepreneurial expression−the "start-up nation"−construed as an empty signifier. The fabrication of such empty signifiers in the discourses of entrepreneurship and management, what creates them and what they create, remain little explored questions. This article addresses the following question: How do repeated quotations of an empty signifier enable it to perform entrepreneurship? We trace the circulation of the expression from its first utterance in the political sphere by Emmanuel Macron, then French Minister of the Economy, through to the media and the scientific sphere, using a communicative analysis of Emmanuel Macron's speeches (n=4), press articles (n=210) and academic productions (n=30). We show the shifts in meaning and values that take place, in particular the way in which the "start-up nation" takes on denunciatory and pejorative values, and is transformed from a political formula into a pejorative, decontextualized little phrase. Our results enrich the critical literature on management and entrepreneurship, particularly the analysis of the performativity of entrepreneurial discourse. By describing the manufacture of an empty signifier through its circulation in social space, the study reveals the counter-power potential of performativity. The results also highlight the surprising absence of an academic critical dimension

Suggested Citation

  • C. Champenois & D. Saurier & E. Béliard, 2024. "“Start-up nation”: The making and performativity of an empty signifier," Post-Print hal-04752802, HAL.
  • Handle: RePEc:hal:journl:hal-04752802
    DOI: 10.37725/mgmt.2024
    Note: View the original document on HAL open archive server: https://hal.science/hal-04752802v1
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Isabelle Huault & Dan Kärreman & Véronique Perret & André Spicer, 2017. "Introduction to the special issue The evolving debate about critical performativity," Post-Print hal-04053328, HAL.
    2. Louise Nicholson & Alistair R. Anderson, 2005. "News and Nuances of the Entrepreneurial Myth and Metaphor: Linguistic Games in Entrepreneurial Sense–Making and Sense–Giving," Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, , vol. 29(2), pages 153-172, March.
    3. Laure Cabantous & Jean-Pascal Gond, 2011. "Rational Decision Making as Performative Praxis: Explaining Rationality's Éternel Retour," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 22(3), pages 573-586, June.
    4. Barbara Simpson & Nancy Harding & Peter Fleming & Viviane Sergi & Anthony Hussenot, 2021. "The Integrative Potential of Process in a Changing World: Introduction to a special issue on power, performativity and process," Post-Print halshs-03576962, HAL.
    5. Eleanor Hamilton, 2013. "The discourse of entrepreneurial masculinities (and femininities)," Entrepreneurship & Regional Development, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 25(1-2), pages 90-99, January.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

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    Keywords

    Start-up nation; Macron; discourse; entrepreneurship; critical approaches; Butler.;
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