Guest editorial: Empowering women entrepreneurs in the Global South through leadership and management development – Part 2

Empowering women entrepreneurs in the Global South through leadership and management development -Part 2 1. IntroductionWomen entrepreneurs play an increasingly important role in advancing economic development, innovation, employment creation and social transformation across the Global South (Brush et al., 2009;Dabi� c et al., 2022).Beyond creating businesses, women entrepreneurs contribute to household resilience, community development and inclusive economic growth, while advancing broader sustainable development objectives (Jayachandran, 2021).Despite these contributions, women continue to encounter institutional, sociocultural and structural barriers that constrain entrepreneurial participation, business growth, leadership opportunities and long-term sustainability (Ahl, 2006;Jennings and Brush, 2013;Tlaiss and Kauser, 2019).These persistent challenges have reinforced calls for entrepreneurship scholarship that better reflects the contextual realities of women entrepreneurs operating within developing and emerging economies (Welter, 2011).The first part of this Special Issue examined how women entrepreneurs navigate complex environments through leadership development, organisational resilience, digital transformation and entrepreneurial capability.The articles demonstrated that women entrepreneurs are not merely responding to adversity but are actively shaping businesses, communities and societies through innovation, adaptive leadership and resilience.Building on these insights, this second part shifts attention from entrepreneurial agency towards the broader institutional and ecosystem conditions that influence women's entrepreneurial participation and long-term success.Entrepreneurship is widely recognised as being embedded within institutional, social and economic contexts that shape entrepreneurial behaviour, opportunity recognition and venture development (North, 1990;Scott, 2014;Welter, 2011).Accordingly, the articles included in this second part of the Special Issue examine how institutions, education, technology, public policy, entrepreneurial ecosystems and support mechanisms interact to create environments that either enable or constrain women entrepreneurs across the Global South.Part two comprises 12 articles that examine women's entrepreneurship from complementary yet interconnected perspectives.The contributions explore women's economic inclusion, institutional support, entrepreneurial challenges, informal entrepreneurship, technology adoption, entrepreneurial ecosystems, sustainability, education, gender norms, diversity, equity and inclusion and the broader policy environment supporting entrepreneurial development.Rather than focusing exclusively on the individual entrepreneur, the articles collectively demonstrate that entrepreneurial success is shaped by the interaction between individual capability and the wider institutional and societal environment.Taken together, the two parts of this Special Issue provide a comprehensive perspective on women's entrepreneurship in the Global South.While Part 1 highlighted entrepreneurial leadership, digital transformation and organisational resilience, Part 2 extends the conversation by examining the institutional systems, support mechanisms, policy environments and ecosystem conditions that foster women's entrepreneurial participation and sustainable development.In doing so, the Special Issue responds directly to ongoing calls for more contextually grounded entrepreneurship research capable of informing scholarship, policy and practice in diverse Global South contexts (Welter, 2011;Jennings and Brush, 2013).