Abstract

Entrepreneurship and human rights which comprise two large areas of modern life do not seem to be on talking terms with each other. They appear to inhabit two different worlds with nothing in common, except a bit of antagonism. The view that the perspectives of the two disciplines are incompatible is strengthened by a lack of empirical studies. We utilise the staggered implementation of a human rights awareness and training campaign in central India to identify its effect on the creation of new small businesses. Our estimates indicate that new micro-businesses increased by about five per cent. Similar increases were observed in the investment in new micro-businesses and employment generated by new micro-businesses. We present evidence that this is a causal effect, we find that this increase is not a reversible blip and sustains over a period of time.

Key words: Human rights, entrepreneurship, natural experiment.