The Precariousness of Women's Work from the Entrepreneurial Practice: decision-making or survival?
Entrepreneurship; Precarious; Women; Work; Decision-making processes
Methodologically, this research had a qualitative character. The qualitative approach was carried out through the collection of trajectories of working life in order to understand the subjective and temporo-spatial processes related to the efforts, frustrations, challenges and occupational opportunities of the activities of entrepreneurial women-mothers, from the decision to undertake. Through the field diary, the meetings held together with the investigated collective and the collection of the trajectories of working life of two women-mothers inserted in the entrepreneurial practice, we arrived at three categories of analysis: Context, Reproductive Work and Maternity and Entrepreneurial Practice. These categories evidenced the process of pauperization of women-mothers as workers. We also show that these women do not recognize themselves as part of the working class, holders of rights, although they are part of it. And that, unlike what entrepreneurship promised – a better life and even a social ascension with improvement in their consumption basket, these women are free, although disconnected from any social protection. One of the great contributions of this work is the advancement of conceptual discussions about female entrepreneurship and its decision-making process. Finally, it was possible to present a perspective of understanding the alternative phenomenon to the managerialist/functionalist, contributing to theoretical advances in the administration field.