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What happens when a Silicon Valley model of work and innovation is transplanted onto an ordinary college campus?
In a difficult and daunting labor market for young, often debt-ridden college grads, entrepreneurship beckons as a way to be a heroic creator and disruptor while escaping the drudgery of vanilla jobs and the precarity of low-wage work.
Through immersive, compelling, and often humorous narratives and interviews, Victor Tan Chen and Jesse Goldstein explore the lives of students at a public university that has embraced the entrepreneurial spirit. They show how students adopt but also resist and challenge the mind-sets they are taught in entrepreneurship programs, holding on to hopes for more meaningful opportunities in a world that feels increasingly unwelcoming and unforgiving. The Entrepreneurial Trap is a parable for modern capitalism as encountered by an anxious new generation.
The Entrepreneurial Trap will be published by the University of California Press on February 23, 2027.
Read the Book
Booksellers: University of California Press (use UCPSAVE30 discount code to save 30 percent) | Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Bookshop.org | Bookshop UK
Praise
This deeply researched, insightful, and beautifully written book offers a powerful analysis of the bind faced by many students. An inspired choice for the classroom, it’s also a compelling example of the value of sociology. A “must-read,” and a “should teach.”
—Juliet Schor
Professor of Sociology
Boston College
A vibrant, excellently written, and sociologically rigorous book on student entrepreneurship.
—Martin Ruef
Jack and Pamela Egan Distinguished Professor of Entrepreneurship
Duke University
A nuanced look at why college entrepreneurship programs can be so alluring and yet often so empty. You have to ask: Is this really the best way to prepare young people for today’s world?
—Julie Guthman
Author of The Problem with Solutions
Dwells in the incredible sadness of late capitalism and demonstrates how good people struggle to survive in its wreckage.
—Isaac Kamola
Professor of Political Science
Trinity College
Excerpt
Coming soon.
Media Archive
To read op-eds and essays about The Entrepreneurial Trap, visit the Other Writings page. For media interviews and mentions, visit the Media Archive. For academic writings, visit the Papers page. Media professionals can get more information in the Media Kit.
Blog
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