Tales of Tension and Morality: Analyzing Tensional Interplays Across Cultural Resources in Entrepreneurial Storytelling

Research in cultural entrepreneurship has shown how entrepreneurs gain legitimacy through entrepreneurial storytelling. Entrepreneurs are seen as strategic cultural operators who draw on cultural resources to gain support from audiences. There have been calls to move beyond consensual views of culture to examine the diverse cultural resources actors mobilize. We conduct a qualitative study of an entrepreneurial program and ask: How do tensions across cultural resources shape entrepreneurial storytelling? Drawing on the ventriloquial approach, we trace how varied concerns—what actors value and are attached to—are voiced, negotiated, and contested. Our findings demonstrate the ways in which entrepreneurial storytelling is shaped by tensions between competing cultural resources, such as market expectations and scientific rigor. These tensions influence entrepreneurial decisions, including choices about business models, target markets, and engagement with stakeholders. Our study highlights the tension-driven dynamics and moral dimension embedded in the deployment of cultural resources in entrepreneurial storytelling.