Who are the patron saints of entrepreneurs? Technically Saint Homobonus, a 12th- century Italian merchant, is the patron saint of business. But I’m referring to those intellectuals from the humanities and social sciences who have been the greatest advocates for the entrepreneurial life.
Close to the top would be Joseph Schumpeter. He was an Austrian-American economist who understood, perhaps better than anyone before or since from his profession, the importance of the individual founder. As he described it in his book The Theory of Economic Development: “First of all there is the dream and the will to found a private kingdom . . . Then there is the will to conquer: the impulse to fight, to prove oneself superior to others . . . Finally, there is the joy of creating, of getting things done, or simply exercising one’s energy and ingenuity . . . Our type seeks out difficulties, changes in order to change, delights in ventures.”
Schumpeter popularised the term “creative destruction”, which describes how progress happens when the existing economic order is overturned. This leads to waste and chaos – bankruptcies and unemployment for those displaced by new technology – but also innovation and material advancement. And those who lead this endless charge are the entrepreneurs, forever challenging the status quo, trying to make a profit by offering something better, faster, newer.