Chinese entrepreneurship in context: specialization, localization and their impact on Italian industrial districts

Chinese migration flows represent a relatively new phenomenon in Italy. Its entrepreneurial nature is reflected in a massive presence of Chinese businessman employed in manufacturing activities, with a high concentration in industrial districts. The manufacturing microenterprise is a recognized feature of the district model of industrialization. Therefore , the investigation on the presence of manufacturing micro-enterprises run by Chinese migrants in Italy is an issue of particular interest. The aim of the paper is to shed some light on current localization of Chinese micro-entrepreneurs in Italian industrial districts, and their specialization in ‘personal goods’ (textile, clothing, leather and footwear), one of the main sectors of the district made in Italy. Some measurements of Chinese micro-entrepreneurship in this sector and related business services is carried out to test the hypothesis of their co-localization in industrial districts. Data collected from native-Chinese micro-entrepreneurs represents an innovative contribution of knowledge based on ISTAT-ASIA archives. The exercise of explorative analysis based on data processing at the local labour market area (LLMA) level will finally highlight the model of localization of the Chinese micro-entrepreneurship, and its impact on the Italian industrial districts.