| Summary: | Tourism development is an important tool for diversifying the rural economy. The formation of entrepreneurial networks contributes to improving the competitiveness of not only enterprises that are members of such networks, but also the territory as a whole. The aim of the article is to study the theoretical foundations and substantiate the practical feasibility of forming network associations of entrepreneurs on the example of rural tourism sector in the Republic of Karelia. Material and methods. The empirical base of the research was the results of the analysis of business practices in the field of rural tourism, in general, and in the Republic of Karelia, in particular. The research methodology is based on an interdisciplinary approach and relies on the theoretical concepts of economics and psychology. Findings and their discussion. The system of needs of an entrepreneur as a business unit with a multi-level hierarchical structure is proposed. The current motivation of entrepreneurs determines their expectations from participation in the entrepreneurial network and, accordingly, the goals and objectives of the network. Depending on the tasks to be implemented by network, it has been proposed to classify the entrepreneurial networks into the “marketing”, “partner” and “knowledge” types. The usefulness of the network taken as the number of relationships between participants increases as the network evolves from the “marketing” to “knowledge” type; the increase occurs both due to increase in the number of participants, and due to increase in the number of interconnections per participant. The economic effect of the entrepreneurial network is achieved as an economy on transaction costs received by each entrepreneur member of the network. Conclusion. An entrepreneurial network is developing in stages in accordance with the development and complication of the motivation of the entrepreneurs participating in it. The formation of an entrepreneurial network brings a positive economic effect, but its viability depends ...
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