From Refugee to Entrepreneur? Challenges to Refugee Self-reliance in Berlin, Germany

The years following the so-called 'refugee crisis' of 2015 saw unprecedented efforts to promote the social and economic inclusion of refugees and asylum seekers. Entrepreneurship has been praised as a promising route to refugee self-reliance, but its viability remains contested and under-researched in developed economies such as Germany. Limited literature on the topic suggests entrepreneurship is a useful route to self-sufficiency, although refugees face more barriers than other immigrant entrepreneurs, such as language barriers and bureaucratic processes. This article uses semi-structured interviews with refugee entrepreneurs, civil society, social enterprises and the public sector to identify the main challenges for refugee entrepreneurs and to examine whether entrepreneurship is effective for achieving self-reliance in one of the most important centres for creating innovative projects supporting refugee inclusion and entrepreneurship, namely Berlin. Though it is too early to demonstrate whether entrepreneurship has long-term economic gains, this research shows that entrepreneurship is not a 'fast track' to economic self-reliance, but has several benefits for social inclusion. It also demonstrates the importance of holistic support systems for refugee entrepreneurs and the difficulty of refugee entrepreneurial success even in the most developed economies.