ABSTRACT
In the last few decades diaspora entrepreneurship has become a very important phenomenon for developing countries in general. The amount of remittances from African diaspora was estimated at US$40 billion in 2010 (Plaza and Ratha, 2011) compared to US$14 billion in 2009 and US$5.9 billion in 1990 (Oucho, 2008). According to some experts the amount of diaspora remittances from the diaspora to their developing home countries is higher than the amount of development aid given by the international community. Traditionally, a great part of these remittances serves to alleviate poverty by providing for basic needs of diaspora family members left in the home country. However, this trend has been changing for the last few decades and an increasing part of diaspora remittances has been directed to entrepreneurial activities, making diaspora investments an important source of capital in developing countries. More importantly, several scholars have found that unlike multinational corporations, diaspora entrepreneurs do not necessarily consider only profit when it comes to investments in their home countries and do not necessarily refrain from making investments when they face various economic and political risks of their home countries. Many of them are driven by emotional motives and invest in their developing home countries with the purpose of improving their socio-economic development (Gillepsie et al., 1999, 2001; Nkongolo and Chrysostome, 2013). Thus the brain-drain that had been severely criticized for many years because it was worsening the desperate economic situation of developing countries has resulted in a brain gain or a brain circulation that has been significantly contributing to the economic development of developing and emerging countries. The cases of China and India are excellent examples. The diaspora investments in these countries have significantly contributed to important economic transformations. The amount of diaspora investments during the 1990s represents more than 50 percent of foreign direct investments in China (Huang, 2003; Ye, 2010; Graham, 2013) and 20–30 percent of foreign direct investments in India (Ye, 2010; Graham, 2013).
