Current research on vulnerable and marginalized entrepreneurs investigates how they exploit and benefit from their environments, immediate contexts, and surrounding institutions. Exploitation and utilization, however, may equally occur vice versa, with their environment exploiting the vulnerable entrepreneurs as their entrepreneurial success manifests. This paper reviews extant research to determine such exploitative processes' occurrence, possibility, and nature. An integrative review of 124 peer-reviewed studies identified types of vulnerable entrepreneurs, sources of their vulnerability, and the nature of exploitation these vulnerable entrepreneurs face. Future research avenues are identified by systemically evaluating the interplay between structural inequalities and entrepreneurial exploitation.
