Quality Spirals and Vicious Circles among Children of Immigrant Entrepreneurs: How Immigrant Entrepreneurs’ Resources are Remoulded by the Second Generation

This article investigates educational aspirations and attainments among children of immigrant entrepreneurs in the food business. It reports some of the results of the European research project Ethnogeneration, which conducted biographical, problem-centred interviews with 101 families in five European cities. The overarching research question of the project addresses the consequences of self-employment for the well-being of the second generation. This article examines the sub-question concerning the relation between educational trajectories of second generation immigrants and their upbringing in the immigrant families running food businesses. An inductive analysis of the interviews reveals that this relation can be both ‘virtuous’ and ‘vicious’ and identifies elements and mechanisms that contribute to both outcomes and to a couple of mixtures. The analysis evokes theoretical explanation, involving mainly theories of situated learning, social capital, cultural capital and transmission/transformation.