Disabled Entrepreneurs: Stories, Spaces, and Ecosystems grew out of research conducted by Julien Billion (E.17) and Claire Doussard with entrepreneurs with disabilities, whose journeys remain largely absent from traditional narratives of entrepreneurship.

The book began with a shared ambition: to gain a deeper understanding of the experiences of entrepreneurs with physical or sensory disabilities. As they met with entrepreneurs and listened to their stories, one finding gradually became clear: entrepreneurship depends on more than an idea, resources or skills. It also depends on something very tangible — being able to access a place, move around it, use its facilities, meet clients and partners, and find one’s place within an entrepreneurial ecosystem.

These observations led the two researchers to shift their perspective. Rather than viewing disability as an individual characteristic or simply as an obstacle to overcome, their research explores the interactions between people and their environment. Inadequate support systems or inaccessible environments — from public transport to the workplace itself — can restrict entrepreneurial activity. Conversely, accessible environments, relationships built on trust and appropriate forms of support can open up new possibilities.

This reflection shaped the book’s interdisciplinary approach. Julien Billion and Claire Doussard bring together perspectives from management, sociology and geography to explore individual journeys, the spaces in which they unfold, and the ecosystems that enable them — or, at times, constrain them.

Entrepreneurs themselves are at the heart of this approach. Their stories provide the starting point for the analysis. They reveal challenges related to accessibility and mobility, but also strategies for adapting, professional aspirations, innovation, and a determination to build businesses on their own terms.

Gradually, the research moved beyond the issue of disability alone to raise a broader question: what does it mean to be an entrepreneur when the conditions for participation are not the same for everyone? Who truly has access to entrepreneurial resources? How do spaces and ecosystems shape people’s ability to act? And how can policies and support programmes be designed so that the burden of adaptation does not fall solely on individuals, but also leads to changes in the environments around them?

It is this shared ambition that gave rise to Disabled Entrepreneurs: Stories, Spaces, and Ecosystems: to bring greater visibility to experiences that are still too rarely heard and, through them, to rethink entrepreneurship through the lens of accessibility, equity and inclusion.

Julien Billion (E.17) and Claire Doussard

 

 

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