Social Entrepreneurship

MODULE NAME: ORGANISATION BEHAVIOUR

Research Paper of Social Entrepreneurship





ABSTRACT

This paper puts forward a view of social entrepreneurship as a process that catalyzes social
change and /or addresses important social needs in the way that is not dominated by direct
financial benefits for the entrepreneurs. Social entrepreneurship is seen as differing from other
forms of entrepreneurship in the relatively higher priority given to promoting social value and
development versus capturing economic value. To stimulate future research the authors
introduce the concept of embeddedness as a nexus between theoretical perspectives for the study
of social entrepreneurship. This paper aims at contributing to the field of social
entrepreneurship by clarifying key elements and providing definitions.


Keywords: Social, Entrepreneurship, Opportunities.











Social Entrepreneurship Research: A source of Explanation

Social entrepreneurship is the process of pursuing suitable solutions to social problems. Social
entrepreneurship as a practice that integrates economic and social value creation has a long
heritage and a global presence. More specifically, social entrepreneurs adopt a mission to create
and sustain social value. Social entrepreneurs are individuals with innovative solutions to
societys most pressing social problems. They are ambitious and persistent, tackling major social
issues and offering new ideas for wide-scale change (www.ashoka.com).
While entrepreneurial phenomena aim at economic development have received a great amount of
scholarly attention (See Busenitz, West III, Sheperd , Nelson, Chanler, & Zacharakis (2003) for
a review of the empirical and theoretical development of the entrepreneurship concept ),
entrepreneurship as a process of foster social progress has only recently attracted the interest of
researchers(Alvord , Brown, & Letts, 2004; Boschee, 1995; Dees and Elias, 1998; Thompson,
2002).
The development of social entrepreneurship as an area for research closely resembles the
development of research on entrepreneurship itself. Over the last few years, a number of
successful business entrepreneurs have dedicated substantial resources to supporting social
entrepreneurship.
The concept of social entrepreneurship is still poorly defined and its boundaries to other fields of
study are still fuzzy. While to some this may appear to be a problem, we see it as a unique
opportunity for researchers from different fields and discipline, such as entrepreneurship,
sociology and organizational theory, to challenges and rethink central concept and assumptions.

Literature Review
The concept of social entrepreneurship means different things to different people and researcher
(Deers, 1998). One group of researcher refers to social entrepreneurship as not-for-profit
initiatives in research of alternative funding strategies, or management schemes to create social
values (Austin, Stevenson, & Wei-Skiller, 2003; Boschees,1998) . A second group of researcher
understands it as the socially responsible practices of commercial businesses engaged in cross-
sector partnerships (Sagawa & Segal, 2000; Waddock, 1998).
And a third group views social entrepreneurship as a means to alleviate social problems and
catalyze social transformation (Alovrd et al., Ashoka innovators, 2000). Definitions of social
entrepreneurship typically refer to a process or behavior; definitions of social entrepreneurship
focus instead on the founder of the initiative; and the definitions of social enterprise refer to the
tangible outcomes of social entrepreneurship. Despite the large numbers definitions, systematic
attempt to map initiatives and definition are rare (See Boschee (1995) and Waddock and post
(1995), for exceptions).
This paper sets out to elucidate the meaning of social entrepreneurship in order to facilitate
further research. Building on established research in entrepreneurship and recent studies on
social entrepreneurship, we propose a working definition of the concept. We view social
entrepreneurship broadly, as a process involving the innovative use and combination of resource
to pursue opportunities to catalyze social changes and address social needs.
We contend, with Low and Macmillan (1988), that definition of entrepreneurial phenomena are
hardly able to capture the whole picture. The definition offered in this paper aims to reflect some
of our basic assumption. First, we view social entrepreneurship as a process of creating value by
combining resources in new ways (Stevenson et al., 1989). Second, these resource combination
are intended primarily to explore and exploit opportunities to create social values by stimulating
social changes (Alvord et at., 2004) or meeting social needs. Importantly, social
entrepreneurship, as viewed in this paper, can occur equally well in a new organization or in an
established organization, where it may be labeled social intrapreneurship.

Objectives
To provide business ownership opportunities for individuals and groups of individuals
who face barriers to business ownership.
To provide training and meaningful employment opportunities for community members,
often for those new to the workforce or facing barriers to employment.
To reduce dependency on charitable donations, grants and government funding.
To reduce the time spent on fundraising efforts and reporting to funders.
To enhance self-reliance, which can result in more freedom and control to fulfill an
overall socio-economic-environment community mission.

Social Entrepreneurship
The terms social entrepreneur and social entrepreneurship were used first in the literature on
social change in the 1960s and 1970s. The terms came into widespread use in the 1980s and
1990s, promoted by Bill Drayton the founder of Ashoka; Innovators for the Public, and others
such as Charles Leadbeater. From the 1950s to the 1990s Michael Young was a leading promoter
of social enterprise and in the 1980s was described by Professor Daniel Bell at Harvard as 'the
world's most successful entrepreneur of social enterprises' because of his role in creating more
than sixty new organizations worldwide, including the School for Social Entrepreneurs(SSE )
which exists in the UK, Australia and Canada and which supports individuals to realize their
potential and to establish, scale and sustain, social enterprises and social businesses. Another
notable British social entrepreneur is Andrew Mawson OBE, who was given a peerage in 2007
because of his regeneration work including the Bromley by Bow centre in East London.
In the next paragraph we will elaborate on the definition put forwards in this paper by
systematically examining the two defining terms of the concept, namely, social and
entrepreneurship. This approach will allow us to capture the essence of social entrepreneurship
and explore potential difference between social entrepreneurship and entrepreneur.
Alvord, Brown, & Letts(2004) Social entrepreneurship creates innovation solution to
immediate social problems and mobilized the ideas, capacities, resources and social arrangement
required for sustained social transformations.
Said Business School (2005) Social entrepreneurship may be defined as a professional,
innovative, and sustainable approach to systemic changes that resolves social market failures and
grasps opportunities.
Bornstein(2004) Social entrepreneur are the people with new ideas to address major problems
who are relentless in the pursuit of their vision, people who simply will not take no for an
answer, who will not give up until they have spread their ideas as far as they possibly can.
Boschee(1998) Social entrepreneur are not for profit executives who pays increasing attention
to market forces without losing sight of their underlying mission, to somehow balance moral
imperative and the profit motives- and that balancing act is the heart and soul of the movement.

Advantage of Social Entrepreneurship
Provides unrestricted earned income
Reduces reliance on traditional funding sources
Allows for financial self-sufficiency
Provides a better understanding of community need
Improves research, planning, and marketing skills
Promotes continuous learning and improvement

Disadvantages of Social Entrepreneurship
Risk of losing your nonprofit status
Possibility that board, staff, volunteers, clients, and other stakeholders will oppose efforts
to generate profit and/or charge for services
Time and money to start a new ventureboth limited commodities for many nonprofits.
No quick return for the investment of money, time, and energy
Fear of financial disaster, damaged reputation, and compromised mission

Challenges faced by Entrepreneur
Funding
Communicating Value Objectively
Strategy and Long-Term Focus
Remaining True to the Mission

Conclusion
The purpose of this paper has been to arouse academic curiosity for social entrepreneurship. We
consider social entrepreneurship to be a particularly exciting and fruitful research topic and it is
our hope that this paper will bring us a step closer toward inspiring social entrepreneurship as a
means to create social and economic values as a field of research.

Web pages
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_entrepreneurship
http://www.ashoka.org
http://www.developmentgoals.org.
http://www.ncoa.org
http://www.yourbusiness.azcentral.com/

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