The role of the entrepreneurial encounter in the emergence of opportunities: Vallée's Dallas Buyers Club. Issue 7 (8th August 2019)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Duymedjian, Raffi; Germain, Olivier; Ferrante, Guillaume; Lavissière, Mary Catherine
• Is Part Of: Entrepreneurship and regional development. Volume 31:Issue 7/8(2019)
• Page Start: 605
• Page End: 622
• Publication Date: 2019-08-08
• Subjects: Encounter -- Deleuze -- process view -- opportunity -- fiction; Industrial promotion -- Periodicals; Entrepreneurship -- Periodicals; Regional planning -- Periodicals; 338.04
• DOI: 10.1080/08985626.2019.1596358
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0898-5626

Abstract

ABSTRACT: This paper aims to explore the conceptual potential of the Deleuzian notion of the encounter in order to better understand the genealogy of opportunities. We adopt a processual perspective of opportunities. In order to translate this notion to the domain of entrepreneurship, we analysed and interpreted Jean-Marc Vallée's Dallas Buyers Club. This film follows the creation of the first club in the United States that illegally allowed HIV-positive people to supply themselves with foreign antiretroviral drugs from Mexico or Japan. The article highlights encounters in this process that disturb the entrepreneur's belief systems and allow him or her to be open to potential opportunity. It finally explores how the encounter may improve our understanding of the political becoming of opportunities within the entrepreneurial process.