Editorial. Enterprising Differently: Markets, Policy Contexts And Social Enterprises

Abstract

Having as a stat point the importance of this new field of analysis for the social sciences, The Social Research International Review of (IRSR) launches a special issue on social enterprises. This special issue of IRSR aims to bring toghether contributions dealing with the trends of development of social enterprises in different societal and organisational contexts. Over the last three decades, social enterprises (co-operatives, mutual organisations, associations and foundations) have raised the interest of both policy makers and scholars from different disciplines concerning the capacity of such initiatives to deal in an innovative way with current problems and challenges, which have a strong impact upon society, including social exclusion, sustainable economic and social local development, social services development. Despite the existence in the international literature of a multitude of definitions of the social enterprise, a growing convergence in meaning has emerged in Europe, where the concept of social enterprise is more and more used to identify a ‘different way’ of doing business that occurs when institutional structures are created in order to pursue specifically social goals. An important contribution in realizing this convergence is due to specialized research networks such as EMES – European Research Network, which created the needed frame for comparative research