Story two
Two entrepreneurs in the same country, sector and regulatory regime. One takes the venture across borders, the other never leaves home. Country-level explanations cannot tell you which is which.
40,529 observations across 41 countries. One band per country — each band spreads far wider than the gaps between them. These fields are generated, not plotted. Each draws one mark per observation in the study it belongs to and its structure mirrors the finding, but the coordinates are not measured values.
The idea
National culture does not push every entrepreneur the same way. It recalibrates self-efficacy and opportunity perception substantially, and fear of failure weakly and inconsistently. Selective transmission is what produces the within-country variation that dwarfs the between-country kind.
In the world right now
Coverage by journalists, regulators and research bodies — none of it produced by this research programme. It is included because it is the world the argument speaks to. Every item was checked against the live source.
Across 53 economies, fear of failure deters two in five adults, yet individuals who have previously exited a business are more likely to start again.
An independent replication of the post-exit pattern: exit operates as a mastery experience, not simply as a setback.
A UBS survey finds 63 percent of US founders planning exits, against 38 percent in Europe and 18 percent in Asia-Pacific.
Gaps this large invite a cultural reading, but the survey cannot separate culture from tax regime, market depth or demographics. The mechanism still needs identifying.
On GEM 2025/2026 data the United States ranks fourth, behind Canada, the United Kingdom and Saudi Arabia.
National reputation and measured attitudes have come apart, which is what a selective rather than uniform cultural effect predicts.
Across more than 2,000 SMEs in twelve countries, adoption of off-the-shelf AI tools is accelerating while strategic integration remains inconsistent.
Adoption outpacing integration is what you would expect if engaging with a technology raises deliberation faster than the capacity to act.
The mechanism
The evidence
Peer-reviewed and accepted papers only. Work still under review is summarised below rather than listed, because a manuscript in review is not yet evidence of anything.
Two further manuscripts on post-exit cognition and information environments are under review. Details follow publication.
So what
Export promotion built on one national profile misfires. A programme targeting fear of failure does little where fear of failure is not the binding constraint.
Honestly
The transmission model is established for export intensity. Whether the same selective pattern governs mode choice is the next test, using roughly 25,200 digital ventures. The post-exit finding is observational: entrepreneurs who exit and try again may differ from those who stop in ways no survey captures.