创业韧性反映了创业者应对危机、适应环境变化并实现持续成长的动态过程，已成为创业研究领域的重要议题。运用模糊集定性比较分析（fsQCA）方法，系统探究个体、人际关系、环境3个层面的7个关键前因条件对创业韧性的组态效应。研究发现：单个前因条件均不构成高创业韧性的必要条件；影响高创业韧性的差异化路径有5条，包括“需求法则—制度文化”驱动的个人经验匮乏型、“公平—人情法则”驱动的个人经验单备型、“公平法则—制度文化”驱动的个人经验单备型、“需求—公平法则”驱动的关系主导型、“经验—关系—环境”三元协同的经验兼备型；对比分析发现，缺乏个人创业经验的创业者，其高创业韧性形成主要受“需求法则—制度文化”主导，具备个人创业经验的创业者则主要受“个人经验—公平法则”影响，且创业经验、关系网络和环境支持各自发挥独特作用并互补协同，共同构建高水平创业韧性。研究结论揭示了促进创业韧性提升的多重路径，为创业企业实现高质量发展提供参考。

In a business environment where VUCA (Volatility, Uncertainty, Complexity, and Ambiguity) has become the norm, entrepreneurs face the harsh reality of compounding multiple shocks and high failure rates. Entrepreneurial resilience, as a vital construct for coping with crises and explaining entrepreneurial behavior, not only helps entrepreneurs maintain positive psychological states and behavioral patterns amid adversity but also serves as the core capability for startups to achieve sustainable development. As a critical capability enabling entrepreneurs to maintain psychological stability, bounce back quickly, and achieve sustained growth amid adversity, entrepreneurial resilience has emerged as a key research topic in entrepreneurship studies. Existing research has identified several influencing factors across dimensions such as individual traits, social support, and institutional environments. However, most studies have been limited to examining single-dimensional factors, with insufficient attention paid to the interactions among multidimensional factors. How multiple factors synergize to form equivalent pathways for resilience enhancement remains unclear. Particularly within China's unique “guanxi-based” culture and differential social hierarchy, the combinatorial logic of key elements and their underlying mechanisms for fostering resilience remain to be thoroughly elucidated.
To address this theoretical gap, this paper adopts a configurational perspective to construct a theoretical model integrating three levels(individual, interpersonal relationships, and environment) to systematically examining the synergistic mechanism of seven key antecedent variables (personal entrepreneurial experience, family entrepreneurial experience, emotional ties, instrumental ties, mixed ties, government support, and sociocultural factors) on entrepreneurial resilience. Employing fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA), this study calibrates and configures variables using questionnaire data from 199 entrepreneurs participating in 2024 “Thousand Enterprises Survey” project from Shanghai University of Finance and Economics. This study aims to reveal differentiated pathways driving entrepreneurial resilience amid complex multifactor interactions.
Research reveals that entrepreneurial resilience is not determined by a single antecedent condition, but rather emerges from the complex interaction and joint influence of multiple factors. The study identified five typical pathways driving high entrepreneurial resilience: (1) “Need Driven-Institutional Culture” pathway for individuals with limited personal experience, (2) “Fairness-Personal Relationships” driven type with single-source personal experience, (3) “Fairness-Institutional Culture” driven type with single-source personal experience, (4) “Demand-Fairness” driven relationship-dominant type,and (5) “Experience-Relationship-Environment” triadic synergistic type with dual-source experience. Comparative analysis of these pathways reveals that experiential endowment plays a decisive role in shaping entrepreneurial resilience. Those lacking personal experience primarily rely on the dual-wheel drive of “needs-institutional” factors, leveraging emotional ties for psychological buffering and resource support. Those possessing experience predominantly follow the “experience-equity” logic, achieving efficient resource integration through instrumental ties. Guanxi networks and institutional environments exhibit complementary or substitutive relationships. When external support is strong, multiple relationship types synergize with entrepreneurial resilience. When external support is weak, resilience functions are carried by combinations of instrumental, emotional, or mixed ties. When internal experience and relational capital are highly synergistic, the marginal contribution of institutions correspondingly diminishes. Overall, emotional ties act as “stabilizers”, instrumental ties function as “resource levers”, experience forms the “cognitive engine”, while institutions and culture serve as the system's “amplifiers”.
The theoretical contributions of this paper are reflected in three aspects. First, grounded in China's unique relational cultural context, this paper systematically distinguishes the operational mechanisms of emotional, instrumental, and mixed ties within entrepreneurial resilience. This reveals the multifaceted functions of guanxi networks in crisis response that extend beyond mere resource acquisition, offering a new localized perspective for understanding how Chinese entrepreneurs navigate crises. Second, this paper overcomes the limitations of traditional single-level analysis by adopting a configurational perspective to integrate individual, interpersonal, and environmental dimensions. It identifies multiple equivalent pathways to high resilience, constructing a theoretical framework for entrepreneurial resilience drivers. Finally, the methodology incorporates fsQCA to effectively capture nonlinear interactions and concurrent causal relationships among antecedents, thereby enriching analytical paradigms and interpretive tools for entrepreneurial resilience research.