[226] It has been suggested that family firms are especially worthy of study precisely because they are so often dynastic (Casson, 1999). ... some would question the extent to which family businesses are entrepreneurial and hence how far the study of family firms can be embedded within the study of entrepreneurship. After all, family firms, through time, have been seen to mitigate agency problems as a reaction to risk and uncertainty and they are associated with securing continuity, rather than being necessarily entrepreneurial (Pollak, 1985; Randoy and Goel, 2003). Nevertheless the founders of a family business would be classified as entrepreneurs within any perspective that defines entrepreneurship as synonymous with new venture creation (Gartner, 1985, 1988; Bygrave and Hofer, 1991; Shaver and Scott, 1991). ...