From intersectionality to decolonial feminism: critical perspectives on women and migrant entrepreneurship

This chapter critically examines current analyses of the entrepreneurial practices of migrant women in the Global North, and it proposes a decolonial approach to rethink the connections between patriarchy, postcoloniality, and neoliberal subjectivities. Departing from intersectionality and translocational positionality, we argue that, whilst these theories have been extremely valuable in bringing to the fore the diversity of women migrant entrepreneurs and their relation to the inclusion and exclusion to resources, they have not gone far enough to expose the colonial powers that often undergird these intersections and therefore have circumvented more politically informed debates around entrepreneurship. Drawing on critical contributions from decolonial feminism, this chapter focuses on the ontology and epistemology of decoloniality to address this idea of (colonial) power and politics at its core. It suggests that a decolonial approach turns its attention to the analysis of structures and the colonial powers inherent in women migrant entrepreneurship, and it critically examines with the emancipation rationale that entrepreneurship might bring to migrant women.