Although it’s still a relatively new field there are many books covering entrepreneurial ecosystem building. Below are Ecosystem Builder Hub’s top books on entrepreneurial ecosystem building.

Books – Specific to Entrepreneurial Ecosystem Building

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The Rise of the Rest: How Entrepreneurs in Surprising Places are Building the New American Dream by Steve Case

The Startup Community Way: Evolving an Entrepreneurial Ecosystem by Brad Feld and Ian Hathaway

Startup Communities: Building an Entrepreneurial Ecosystem in Your City by Brad Feld

The Rainforest Blueprint: How to Design Your Own Silicon Valley: Unleash an Ecosystem of Innovation in Your Company, Organization, or HometownThe Rainforest Blueprint by Victor Hwang

The Rainforest: The Secret to Building the Next Silicon Valley by Victor Hwang and Greg Horowitt

Beyond Collisions: How to build your entrepreneurial infrastructure (Changing the Economy) (Volume 1) Maria Meyer & Kate Hodel / Sourcelink

Creating Startup Junkies: Building Sustainable Venture Ecosystems in Unexpected Places by Jeff Amerine & Jeff Standridge

The Kauffman Foundations Entrepreneurial Ecosystem Building Playbook

Energizing Entrepreneurial Communities by Donald Macke & Center for Rural Entrepreneurship

Ecosystem Hacking by Ryan Lilly

Admired Disorder: A Guide to Building Innovation Ecosystems: Complex Systems, Innovation, Entrepreneurship, And Economic Development by Alistair Brett

Entrepreneurial Ecosystems: Theory, Practice and Futures by Ben Spigel

 

2018 ESHIP Summit Ecosystem Builder Library

The following book list was curated by attendees of the 2018 ESHIP Summit, as key books that have informed and inspired ecosystem builders everywhere. Many are repeats of the list above and specific to ecosystem building. Others related to entrepreneurship, community building, leadership, technology, society, and other issues relevant to the field of ecosystem building and the work of ecosystem builders.

Startup Communities by Brad Feld
The Rainforest by Victor Hwang and Greg Horowitt
Maker City: A Practical Guide for Reinventing American Cities
http://www.peterblock.com/_assets/d0ownloads/Civic.pdf
https://strategicdoing.net/knowledge/(articles)
The Coming Jobs War by Jim Clifton
Make Space by Scott Doorley and Scott Witthoft
The Surprising Power of Liberating Structures by Henri Lipmanowicz and Keith McCandless
The Art of the Start by Guy Kawasaki
Preparing for a World that Doesn’t Exist…Yet by Rick Smyre and Neil Richardson
The Entrepreneurial Imperative by Carl J. Schramm
Innovations vol. 8 | issue ¾ by MIT Press
Change by Design by Tim Brown
Deep Economy by Bill McKibben
Creating a World Without Poverty by Muhammad Yunus
Beyond Collisions by Maria E. Meyers and Kate Pope Hodel
Startup Nation the Story of Israel’s Economic Miracle by Dan Senor and Saul Singer
The World is Flat by Thomas L. Friedman
The Rise of the Creative Class by Richard Florida
Digital Entrepreneurship by Nesta
The Coming Prosperity by Philip E. Auerswald
The Metropolitan Revolution by Bruce Katz and Jennifer Bradley
Creative Confidence by Tom Kelley and David Kelley
The Third Wave by Steve Case
Best Practices in Teaching Entrepreneurship and Creating Entrepreneurial Ecosystems in Europe by Leonie Baldacchino, Janne Geurts, Marta Migon, Justyna Politanska, Shirley Xernxen, and Elizabeth Weiner
For The Love of Cities by Peter Kageyama
Zero to One by Peter Thiel
The New Jim Crow by Michelle Alexander
The Second Machine Age by Erik Brynjolfsson and Andrew McAfee
Abundance: The Future is Better Than You Think by Peter H. Diamandis
Buckminster Fuller: Poet of Geometry by Cole Gerst
Blind Spot: Hidden Biases of Good People by Mahzarin R Banaji
Building Communities from the Inside Out by John Kretsmann
Business Model Generation by Alexander Osterwalder
Community: The Structure of Belonging by Peter Block
Creativity, Inc by Ed Catmull
Crucial Conversations by Kerry Paterson
Emergence by Steven Johnson
Good to Great by Jim Collins
Hot, Flat, and Crowded by Thomas L. Friedman
The Industries of the Future by Alec Ross
So You Want to Talk About Race by Ijeoma Oluo
The Innovator’s Dilemma by Clayton M. Christensen
The Innovators by Walter Isaacson
The Lean Startup by Eric Ries
The Tipping Point by Malcom Gladwell
The War of Art by Stephen Pressfield
Tribes: We Need You to Lead by Seth Godin
Winning the Story Wars by Jonah Sacs
Race and Entrepreneurial Success by Robert W Fairlie
The Future Economy and Inclusive Competitiveness by Johnathan M. Holifiel
Presence by Peter Senge, C. Otto Scharmer, Joseph Jaworski, and Betty Sue Flowers
The Regenerative Business by Carol Sanford
The Art of City Making by Charles Landry
Scale by Geoffrey West
Leading from the Emerging Future by Otto Scharmer and Katrin Kaufer
The Innovation Blind Spot by Ross Baird
The Age of Thrivability by Michelle Holliday
Drop the Ball by Tiffany Dufu
The Chessboard and The Web by Anne-Marie slaughter
The Go Giver by Bob Burg and John David Mann
Poke the Box by Godin
Overcoming Bias by Tiffany Jana
The Death and Life of American Cities by Jane Jacobs
The Art of Community by Charles H. Vogl
How the Poor Can Save Capitalism by John Hope Bryant
Caught in the Middle by Richard C. Longworth
We Were 8 Years in Power by Ta-Nehisi Coates
Enabling Entrepreneurial Ecosystems by Phillip Auerswald
The Adaptive Life Cycle of Entrepreneurial Ecosystems by Phillip Auerswald
Declining Business Dynamism: Implications for Productivity by Ryan Decker, John Haltiwanger, Ron Jarmin, and Javier Miranda
The New Economics by W. Edwards Deming
Whistling Vilvaldi by Claude M Steele
The Rainforest Scorecard by Henry H. Doss and Brett Alistair
Zero Barriers by Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation
Dealmakers in Place by Maryann Feldman and Ted Zoller
Innovate Like Edison by Michael J. Gelb, and Sarah Miller Caldicott
Triumph of the City by Edward Glaeser
Top Ten Signs of Declining Business Dynamism and Entrepreneurship in the U.S. by John Haltiwanger
Is Your Entrepreneurial Ecosystem Scaling? by Ken Harrington
An Introduction to Design Thinking by Hasso Plattner Institute of Design
Striking a (Local) Grand Bargain by Neil Kleiman
Strategic Doing by Ed Morrison
Regional Advantage by AnnaLee Saxenian
Measuring an Entrepreneurial Ecosystem by Dane Stangler and Jordan Bell-Masterson
Generalizing the Core Design Principles for the Efficacy of Groups by David Wilson, Elinor Osrom, and Michael E. Cox
https://startout.org/research/by Adres Wydler
https://startupgenome.com/download-report/?file=2018 by Arnobio Morelix
Good Capitalism, Bad Capitalism by William J. Baumol, Robert E. Litan, and Carl J. Schramm
Where Good Ideas Come From by Steven Johnson
Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates’s
Theory U by Otto Scharmer
The Giving Tree by Shel Silverstein
Founders at Work by Jessica Livingston
The Art of Gathering by Priya Parker
Chaos Monkeys by Antonio Martinez
One Mission by Chris Fussell
Beyond Silicon Valley by Michael Goldberg
The Medici Effect: What Elephants and Epidemics Can Teach Us About Innovation by Frans Johansson
The Chaos Imperative by Ori Brafman
Connecting to Change the World: Harnessing the Power of Networks for Social Impact by John Cleveland, Madeleine Taylor, and Peter Plastrik
New Venture Management: The Entrepreneur’s Roadmap by Donald Kuratko and Jeffrey Hornsby
Medium is the Massage by Marshall McLuhan
Social Conquest of the Earth by Edward O. Wilson
Start Your Business on a Ramen Noodle Budget by Felecia Hatcher
Energizing Entrepreneurial Communities by Don Macke