Guest editors
- Catherine Léger-Jarniou, Emeritus Professor, Université Paris Dauphine PSL legerjarniou@gmail.com
- André Letowski, entrepreneurship expert and author of the blog https://letowski.fr/ andre.letowski@free.fr
This special issue is therefore of real importance for questioning and re-examining what it means to “bounce back” in entrepreneurship. It invites multidisciplinary and critical approaches and cross-perspectives between researchers and practitioners. It also aims to promote dialogue to enrich practitioners’, entrepreneurs’, researchers’ and teachers’ reflections through original contributions and to generate knowledge.
Main questions to address
We invite researchers and practitioners to pursue their reflections by submitting contributions—both academic and practice-based—covering the variety of themes below, which can be considered from three angles: personal, project-related, and environmental.
- Define the concept of rebound and its different forms, particularly in entrepreneurship, and question the concepts of failure and resilience;
- Failure and rebound: which populations (especially women or young entrepreneurs), which types of businesses, which sectors are most affected?
- What motivates rebound? What influence do the social and family environment have on this decision? What is the link with an entrepreneurial project that is still envisioned?
- Understand impacts at the personal level, particularly on mental health;
- Shed light on strategies implemented to rebound and explore rebound trajectories (individual, collective, rebound and takeover/restart, etc.), as well as the different actors involved (court members, judges, insolvency practitioners, etc.) and the strategies implemented;
- Study the missing competencies among entrepreneurs who have failed;
- Analyze the nature and rationale of entrepreneurial rebound projects and their stakes (notably: to meet which needs of the person rebounding—financial needs? needs linked to values, identity, social recognition? etc.);
- Analyze rebound in a temporal manner (how to predict a problem and a potential rebound?);
- How to prepare entrepreneurs for rebound? How to predict a problem and a potential rebound? How to support them, especially on the personal level:
- Is entrepreneurial rebound taught in initial and continuing education?
- To what extent do people who decide to rebound engage in entrepreneurship? Do they seek associative or institutional support? To meet which needs? In what context?
- Is there specific support for people who commit to this rebound logic?
- How can actions carried out by supporting structures be evaluated?
- Isn’t rebound a risky, sometimes cynical initiative, influenced by an entrepreneurial and institutional environment (notably linked to employment) leading certain people to regain professional activity?
- How can the institutional environment (the State, its agencies, local authorities) and the entrepreneurial milieu (funders, support actors and specialized networks such as 60 000 rebonds) be integrated?
- What happens after rebound economically and territorially, but also personally?
- What are the motivations of “career shifters” (bifurqueurs), these young graduates who decide to leave their jobs for reasons of values and who, for some of them, embark on individual and collective entrepreneurial projects strongly oriented toward sustainable, eco-responsible activities… Isn’t this also a form of rebound? And a new generation of “rebounders”?
This list of questions addressing the issues, challenges and perspectives of entrepreneurial rebound is not exhaustive. The call for contributions is open to any proposal without restriction, in order to further encourage and convince entrepreneurs, practitioners and teacher-researchers to continue to deepen their reflections.
Timeline
- Submission of proposals/abstracts: 12 March (mailto:legerjarniou@gmail.com)
- Submission of manuscripts (Version 1): 1 July 2026
- Guest editors’ decision: 1 July to 15 July 2026
- First review round: 15 July to 15 October 2026
- Feedback to authors: 15 October to 15 November 20
- Authors’ revision (Version 2): 15 November 2026 to 15 February 2027
- Second review round: 15 February to 15 May 2027
- Feedback to authors: 15 May to 31 May 2027
- Editing and publication: September 2027