Working with Refugee women to explore barriers and facilitators of entrepreneurial intentions in Middlesbrough: A co-production-informed qualitative study.

Purpose
This paper introduces the concept of intersectional deprivation to explain how overlapping structural, psychological, and relational disadvantages shape refugee women’s entrepreneurial intentions in deprived UK contexts. Drawing on Crenshaw’s intersectionality and place-based marginalisation, the study addresses the absence of an integrated mechanism-based framework by focusing on Middlesbrough, a paradigmatic asylum dispersal city in North-East of England, shaped by austerity, immigration policy, and spatial stigma

Design/methodology/approach
The study adopts a co-production methodology and an interpretive case-study design. Data were generated through fifteen semi-structured interviews, focus groups, storytelling workshops, with refugee women. Analysis followed Braun and Clarke’s reflexive thematic approach, incorporating iterative coding, memo writing, participant feedback, and constant comparison to ensure theoretical depth, credibility, and epistemic justice.

Findings
The analysis identifies three mutually reinforcing mechanisms of intersectional deprivation: (1) psychological erosion, where trauma, uncertainty, language barriers, and caregiving responsibilities undermine self-efficacy; (2) structural and institutional inertia, including bureaucratic opacity, credential devaluation, fragmented support systems, and financial exclusion; and (3) relational load and collective coping, where community-based networks provide emotional and material support while simultaneously reproducing unpaid care work and limiting access to formal entrepreneurial ecosystems. These mechanisms form a cyclical process that both constrains and generates situated, collective forms of agency.

Originality/value
The study offers a novel mechanism-based framework that extends the 5M model, Mixed Embeddedness, and epistemic-injustice perspectives by integrating intersectionality with spatial deprivation and psychological experiences of exclusion. It centres refugee women’s lived experiences through co-production and provides actionable insights for policy, ecosystem development, and gender-just entrepreneurship support in overlooked UK regions and comparable international contexts