Purpose The purpose of this paper is to examine the relationships between women entrepreneurs' firm performance and two dimensions (enrichment and interference) of the business-family interface (BFI) in the moderating context of the level of economic development in two emerging countries-Morocco and Turkey. The enrichment perspective was operationalized as family instrumental (financial) and affective (moral) support, while interference was operationalized as genderrelated personal problems. Design/methodology/approach The study drew upon the work-family interface (WFI) theory from the family embeddedness perspective in the context of institutional economics. In Morocco, a purposive sample of 116 women entrepreneurs completed a self-administered questionnaire using field collection, mail, and phone surveying methods. In Turkey, 147 women entrepreneurs completed the questionnaire online and through personal contacts in business organizations. Findings The findings indicated a positive relationship of family financial support with business performance of female entrepreneurs in Morocco, a less economically advanced country. However, family moral support is related to better firm performance in Turkey, a more advanced economy. Gender-related personal problems of women entrepreneurs appear to hamper their business performance in Turkey; while in Morocco, the performance of women entrepreneurs seems to improve in the face of such impediments. Practical implications The results provide initial evidence that female entrepreneurs benefit from the linkages of family-to-business enrichment in different ways, depending on the country's level of economic development. In less economically developed countries, women entrepreneurs benefit more from instrumental rather than affective components of the enrichment dimension of the BFI.

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The paper provides the conceptual and analytical background for the thematic Working Package number 4 "Youth cultures: values, representations and social conditions". It shows the relevance of the cultural dimension in the study of youth condition, in order to understand young people's actions and to recognise youth agency. Nowadays, the transition to adulthood takes place in the context of growing uncertainty and deep social, cultural and political transformations also in contemporary Arab Mediterranean societies.The first part of the paper defines the conceptual framework for the study of youth agency and cultures. After reconstructing the development of the reflexion on youth and youth cultures by sociology and social science from the 1920s to the 2000s, it focuses on the main topics, trends and gaps of contemporary studies on youth cultures in Western contexts and in Arab Mediterranean countries. The second part of the paper outlines the research questions and analytical dimension that will guide the research in WP4. The main questions can be summarised as follows:How the cultural construction of youth is changing in Arab Mediterranean countries? To what extent does youth appear as a condition marked by specific cultural expressions and subjectivities, rather than a mere transitional stage of life? How do the changes in the transition to adulthood impact on the emergence of new cultural trends among Arab youths? Which are the strategies that young men and women deploy for constructing their identity, shaping their biographical projects and giving meaning to their social world, in the changing contexts of Arab Mediterranean countries?

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