Accidental ventures—A materialist reading of opportunity and entrepreneurial potential

SummaryArguably, one of the unspoken philosophical bases of entrepreneurship studies is an unreflected metaphysical idealism, which can be seen in the way in which concepts such as “entrepreneurial potential” have been used in the field. Here, we critique this idealism by presenting a materialist reading of three unlikely entrepreneurial successes, and discuss how theorizing these could be improved by working with notions of arbitrariness, accidents, and “dumb luck”. The paper thus forms a philosophical critique of the field, and presents a recontextualization of how entrepreneurial potential, opportunity discovery, and success can be understood.