The scientific interest in family businesses is often limited to the influence of the family(ies) involved on the business. However, the importance of family businesses for the family and especially for the descendants, who must be assigned a key role for the transgenerational existence of the family business, is largely neglected in the academic discussion. There is therefore an urgent need for extensive analysis of how family businesses act as an additional context of socialization on the descendants.
Therefore, the work addresses the question of how the socialization of descendants is influenced by the existence of a family business. For this purpose, a pluralism of theories approach is used, depicting the mechanisms, and influencing variables on the descendants’ socialization and creation of their identity. The comprehensive theoretical examination is also intended to provide the reader with an extensive overview of relevant literature.
Based on the explanations, it becomes clear, that the family business not only has an influence on the descendants, but also on their (non-)desire for succession. This raises the question of whether the issue of generational change should not be considered at an earlier stage, than is often the case in the prevailing succession literature. Therefore, the purpose of this work is, thanks to its all inclusive cross disciplinary approach, to provide further knowledge of family businesses as context of socialization.
Caspary, S. (2024). The Family Business as a Socialisation Context for the Children of Entrepreneurs. Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-658-43657-5