Social Entrepreneurship as an INGO: Exploring the Challenges of Innovation and Hybridisation

This introductory article to the special issue, Social Innovation, Social Enterprise, and Social Entrepreneurship (SE/SI) in Social Work and Human Services, positions SE/SI as embedded in the profession’s history as an integral sub-field of practice and research. It advances three arguments: SE/SI has been part of social work practice since the inception of the profession; social work entrepreneurship is globally distributed and contextually responsive; and deliberate engagement with SE/SI is necessary for the field’s future relevance. This article outlines foundational concepts, traces historical developments from settlement houses and early work-integration initiatives to contemporary hybrid models, and situates this legacy within current global challenges. It also introduces the contributions in this issue, grouped into three thematic areas that reflect these arguments. The introduction underscores SE/SI as vital to social work and human services’ capacity to address complex crises in turbulent times while advancing equity, sustainability, and well-being.

Social Entrepreneurship and COVID‐19

Over the past years, institutional theory has become an increasingly utilized theoretical lens for social entrepreneurship (SE) research. However, while there is a rapid growth of SE research that employs an institutional perspective, researchers have yet to systematically understand the wide-ranging application of institutional theory to SE study. Thus, a review of existing SE literature that employs institutional theory seems warranted and timely. Accordingly, we initially review the current use of institutional theory in SE research based on 101 peer-reviewed articles published between 2008 and 2020. More specifically, drawing on four critical institutional perspectives that have long been used in entrepreneurship research (including institutional context, legitimacy, institutional logic, and institutional entrepreneurship), we provide the first comprehensive analysis of the uses of institutional theory in SE literature. We then offer a comparative analysis of the application of institutional theory to SE and commercial entrepreneurship based on these four institutional perspectives, especially considering the similarities and differences between social and commercial entrepreneurship. Based on our review, we finally identify gaps in the existing SE study and provide several promising avenues for future SE study, as well as contribute to advancing institutional theory development.

Social entrepreneurship is one of the fastest growing areas of entrepreneurship. Since the beginning of 21st century, the popularity of social entrepreneurship steadily, but gradually increases. Currently, social enterprises are operating similarly to traditional ones and thus can be seen separate from charity organizations. This concept is well practiced in emerging economies. The concept of a social enterprise and entrepreneurship can be approached in many different ways. The European Union has an operational definition of a social enterprise. In addition, in various European countries, there are some additional laws and regulations defining social entrepreneurship or a social enterprise. In Latvia, both the definition of social entrepreneurship and social enterprises are included in the Law on Social Entrepreneurship. In Sweden or Estonia, there are no common definition or legal framework for social enterprises. In Finland, the situation is the same, but there is a law concerning work integration enterprises. The EU´s operational definition for social enterprises is common for all European countries. The Baltic States and the Scandinavian countries have different perceptions of social entrepreneurship among the population and entrepreneurs. The paper analyses social enterprises in four European countries: Latvia, Estonia, Sweden and Finland by using national and EU-level knowledge sources. In the next phase, two case studies of social enterprises from each country are analysed according to the EU´s operational definition. As a result, the authors identified the similarities and differences of social enterprises in terms of their social mission, business models and governance models and suggested directions for future research.

In Europe 160 million people are members of social economy enterprises and mutual societies. Members that work at social enterprises usually are bound with an employee relationship with their organization; on the other hand participating in a social enterprise could be their only chance to find a job, especially for economies that face a long-term recession such as the Greek economy. Social enterprises and entrepreneurs invest in reciprocity which represents that positive actions will inspire reciprocal positive actions. The main objective of this study is to examine the effect of reciprocity on members’ decision either to invest in social enterprises or to work for them acquiring in both cases the necessary shares. For this reason, a survey was conducted among Greek members of social enterprises listed in the Greek Social enterprises directory, to investigate their aspects about reciprocity and if these aspects affect their decision to work in a social enterprise or support financially them. The survey process returned 142 fully completed questionnaires. The analysis identified a sub group (5 over 27 items) of the questions used to measure reciprocity that can be used to classify participants into shareholders - members (investors) and shareholders - workers in social enterprises. It is worth mentioning that sex or other demographic characteristics of the respondents do not affect this classification while there are only aspects of positive reciprocity that have either positive or negative effect on the possibility to work in social enterprises. Social entrepreneurs and the Greek state could use these findings in order to direct and manage their expansion efforts.

Social enterprises, social entrepreneurship and sustainable business models are increasingly common in sectors where Fair Trade does not have a strong presence (e.g. mobile phones and software). This research asks: To what extent do social and sustainability enterprises and entrepreneurship (SSEEs) in these ‘distant’ sectors engage the principles of Fair Trade? It draws on an in-depth, multi-method case study of SSEEs in the legal cannabis sector in Portland, Oregon, US. It analyzes data from magazine advertisements, public and industry events, and visits to 85 cannabis retailers. The results suggest that SSEEs in distant sectors may not be engaging some of the principles that are at the heart of Fair Trade. These include transparency, accountability, collaborative price-setting, pre-payment, honouring contracts, inclusive governance and worker organizing. SSEEs appear more engaged with the environment and buy-cotting (privileging) small producers, sustainable businesses and marginalized groups. How can Fair Trade encourage and empower SSEEs in distant sectors to engage more principles of Fair Trade?

The main specific objective of this paper is to explore the content of research as well as methodological issues on social entrepreneurship in the context of corporate social economics and entrepreneurship. Therefore, in order to obtain an overview of the research done on this theme, we conducted a literature review using the exploratory analysis as methodology. We focused on the studies and articles which were published in the most important academic periodicals that cover subjects as management, economics and business. The articles were identified based on the presence of selected keywords in their title, abstract and body of the article: ‘social entrepreneur’, ‘social enterprise’, ‘social entrepreneurship’, ‘corporate social entrepreneurship’ and ‘social economy’. Using this method, there were selected articles and studies published starting from the last decade of the 1990s up to 2015. We were also interested in international publications on the topic and also in books that approached social entrepreneurship.

Purpose– Sweden, and many other countries, has, during the twentieth century, developed a rather large public sector providing social welfare services to citizens. Only to a small extent were private for- or nonprofit organizations providing these services. During the last decade we have seen a shift towards more services being provided by private for- and nonprofit actors. This shift means that roles are reconsidered, renegotiated and reconstructed. In this debate social entrepreneurship, social enterprises and innovation are emphasized. The aim of this paper is to problematize and analyze how social entrepreneurship and social enterprises relate to public sector management and governance.Design/methodology/approach– In the paper theories on (social) entrepreneurship and innovation is combined with theories focusing on welfare structures. Empirically, the analysis is based on the current policy development in Sweden and five social entrepreneurship initiatives.Findings– The analysis discloses the relationship between the public sector and social entrepreneurship as negotiation of emerging social enterprise markets in which aspects as the creation of value, dependencies and innovation are emphasized. Even if the study has a geographical focus both theoretical contributions and implications for policy and practice can be of use also in other contexts.Originality/value– Through combining social entrepreneurship with welfare services and public management this empirically based study contributes both to problematize and align the emerging field of social innovation.

This bibliography is an attempt to list the most relevant material on the topic of ‘social entrepreneurship’ published within the past two decades. The Academic Search Complete and Web of Science databases were used to conduct a literature search using the keywords ‘social enterprise’, ‘social entrepreneurship’ and ‘social entrepreneur’. The literature search was limited to peer-reviewed journal articles and books published between 1989 and 2009. Since academic interest in social entrepreneurship is a relatively new phenomenon, very little research in this area was conducted before 1989. Two seminal pre-1989 articles were included in this list: Banks (1972), who first coined the term ‘social entrepreneur’ in the context of the sociology of social movements; and Drucker (1979), who first introduced the concept of ‘social enterprise’ while advocating ethical responsibilities of corporations. Only articles and books in which ‘social entrepreneurship’, ’social enterprises’ or ‘social entrepreneurs’ were the main focus and had an important role in either the formulation of an empirical study or the development of a conceptual framework were included in this list. Articles that merely mentioned these terms or in which these concepts did not play a major role were not included. Mention may be made of online resources, such as technical reports, unpublished manuscripts, conference papers and white papers. All but two such articles, Dees (2001) and Alter (2004), were excluded from this list. The artcile by Dees (2001) titled, ‘The meaning of “social entrepreneurship”’, is a significant conceptual contribution to the field and has been cited 211 times since its publication online. Alter’s article (2004) that presents a typology of social enterprises is yet another important theoretical contribution and has been cited 35 times since it was published online. It is hoped that this systematic and thorough listing of relevant work in the area of social entrepreneurship will be of assistance to scholars in a field in which the literature, to date, has been fragmented and disjointed. It will be much appreciated if the unintentional omission of any relevant articles and books is brought to the attention of the author.

This article takes a historical perspective to explain the development of the concept of social entrepreneurship, divergence between the forms of social enterprises (SEs) de jure and de facto in a post-Socialist society and approaches to typical tensions experienced by SEs as hybrid organisations. In this respect, the paper presents a framework of eight contrasting conceptual dimensions (i.e. possible institutional tensions) based on the analysis of prior social entrepreneurship studies and identifies respective tensions experienced by SEs based on data from Lithuania. The data were generated from semi-structured interviews (N = 11) with social entrepreneurship experts and from a survey with a semantic differential method in a sample of the participants (N = 98) in the largest conference on social entrepreneurship in Lithuania. This study concludes that understandings of social entrepreneurship in Lithuania are blurred by a dichotomy between SEs de jure and de facto which is set by current legal acts. The findings also indicate that social entrepreneurship insiders no longer perceive any controversy between social mission and businesslike activities. However, external attitudes as expressed in experts’ interviews may still hinder SEs’ attainment of social impact, one of the three dimensions (founding motives and innovation types being the other two) that is little reflected by social entrepreneurship insiders of a post-Socialist society in which the phenomenon is at a nascent stage. Directions for further research to bring contribution to institutional theory are suggested.

This Thematic Issue seeks to explore critical perspectives of an international nature on social innovation (SI), social enterprise (SE) and/or social solidarity economy (SSE). The aim is to examine the grand narrative, explore the ontological assumptions of the field, challenge the normative and present alternatives that draw attention to political economy, critical theory and critical management studies. Critical perspectives emerged in social innovation (SI) literature as a concerted effort sometime in 2008. A few voices sounded from the edges of the field much earlier. Ash Amin, Professor of Geography at Durham University, inspected the new favourite of public policy way back in 2002, discarded it as a "a poor substitute for a welfare state" and never returned to the subject. There were heated debates that challenged the grand narrative of SI at the International Social Innovation Research Conferences (ISIRC) (once called the Social Enterprise Research Conference before becoming ISIRC with the involvement of the social innovation theme from Skoll Centre). The Voluntary Sector Studies Network (VSSN) conferences picked away at the promise of unlimited performance and achievement of the upstart SE in a mature voluntary and charity network (

The development of social entrepreneurship is associated in general with the intellectualization of social activity and in particular with the growth of entrepreneurship as a characteristic of social active life position. The article substantiates the possibility of identifying intellectual social entrepreneurship as one of the directions of its development. The term "intellectual social entrepreneurship" is constructed on the principle of transportability – comparability with intellectual entrepreneurship. Social intelligence and social entrepreneurship have a heuristic meaning for describing the intellectual component of social entrepreneurship. There is a change in the interpretation of social entrepreneurship in modern concepts that are highlighted as key points: the creative abilities of social entrepreneurs, the connection of human capital and social entrepreneurship, the mutual influence of the institutional environment and social entrepreneurship. As a theoretical and methodological basis for studying the intellectual component of social entrepreneurship, the following theories are proposed theories of Spencer G. (actor activity as a result of evolution); Simmel G. (intellectualization as a result of activity through contemplation); Weber М. (consciousness of rational-purposeful action); Mead G (the presence of the actor the subject-object qualities); Schumpeter J. (intellectual content of labor as the basis of entrepreneurial activity); Bourdieu P. (the influence of symbolic capital on the reproducing of economic practices); Becker G. (investments in human capital); Zaslavskaya T. (achieving the goal through your own initiative); Etzkowitz H. and Leydesdorff L. (the triple helix model of innovation). An overview of empirical studies of social entrepreneurship is made. Two directions of intellectual entrepreneurship research are identified and described. They are the warsaw school that puts the focus on the entrepreneur doing business (Kwiatkowski C and Panzhinskiy T); the texas school that focuses on a scientist, an academic figure, believing entrepreneurship to be not a business, but rather an attitude towards mastering the world, a process of cultural innovation (Cherwitz R, Beckman G; Hartelius E; Sullivan S). E. Testi's concept of the social entrepreneurship ecosystem is reviewed. The article describes the trends of state, public and private support for social entrepreneurship in modern Russia. It is noted that social entrepreneurship has the potential for development in the presence of infrastructure support that contributes to the formation of an ecosystem. It is concluded that social intellectual entrepreneurship is aimed at creating and distributing intellectual goods that have social novelty and value. Further study of the intellectual component of social entrepreneurship is associated with the development of its infrastructure development, analysis of effective tools for building social entrepreneurship ecosystems abroad and assessment of the possibilities of their application in Russia.

The presented paper makes the analysis of differences and similarities between social entrepreneurship and corporate social responsibility. It describes the practice of business sector involvement in solving social issues on the example of two different forms of entrepreneurial activity (traditional and social entrepreneurship). The paper reviews in detail the features that characterize social enterprises and responsible businesses, and analyzes the importance of business involvement in solving social issues. The comparison method was used for the study, which focused on the research of social enterprises and corporate social projects. Specifically, social enterprises and social projects implemented by business firms with similar goals in the same geographical zone were selected and compared to each other. The study of the targeted social enterprises reveals that it is entirely possible for a company to achieve commercial and social goals with equal success. As a result, they can contribute to the resolution of social issues such as environmental protection, the employment of vulnerable and underprivileged groups in the open labor market, the development of innovative technologies, and others. Simultaneously, the study confirms that, given their nature, motivation, and goals, responsible business and social entrepreneurship have the full potential to exist and develop independently in the market. Social stability is a key indicator of success for any country, regardless of its social and economic development. Social issues play an important role in the formation of the business environment, on which opportunities for business growth and development highly depend. In the modern world, the role of business in solving social issues is significantly growing, a clear example of which is the UN's "2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development". These goals are of universal importance and represent the highest level of international efforts to ensure that we and future generations live on a more sustainable, safe, and secure planet. The business sector is one of the main stakeholders in the process of implementing sustainable development goals, which should contribute to the recovery of the economic environment. Companies in Georgia have varying opinions on the topic of business involvement in social issues. 34 out of 92 surveyed companies view corporate social responsibility as a capital investment, which can play an important role in attracting foreign investment, and 19 of them think that examples of company participation in social issues are influenced by emotional factors and are driven by spontaneous decisions. According to the same companies, social issues are outside the scope of activities of the business sector and are not a subject of their interest. It is evident that examples of business involvement in social projects are mostly observed in large corporations. At the same time, there is a growing trend of social entrepreneurship in Georgia. Since 2009, when the first social enterprises appeared, 66 businesses haven been identified as social enterprises. Social companies are crucial allies for the government and society, and contribute significantly to tackling pressing problems such as poverty alleviation, access to livelihoods, preservation of cultural heritage, environmental protection, health care, education, and others. That is why, social entrepreneurship, as a socio-economic and organizational phenomenon, has attracted the attention of scientists, representatives of business and government in recent years. Although social entrepreneurship differs from traditional entrepreneurship in terms of content, without in-depth knowledge, it is difficult to draw a line between a social enterprise and the enterprise that implements corporate social responsibility initiatives, which is further complicated by the unregulated legal framework of social entrepreneurship. Taking into account the aforementioned factors, the goal of the conducted study was, on the one hand, to gather information about the activities of social enterprises operating in Georgia, and on the other hand, to analyze the initiatives implemented by business companies under the umbrella of corporate social responsibility. Based on the information gathered, the similarities and differences between the two types of business involvement in social issues were outlined. The study also aimed to evaluate the prospects for the development of social entrepreneurship in Georgia. In the process of the study, desk and qualitative methods were used. Primarily, previous studies and literature were examined. Two focus group meetings were held as part of the qualitative research, one with representatives of traditional businesses that implement social projects and the other with social enterprises operating in Georgia. In order to illustrate the similarities and contrasts between the modes of their activities and the outcomes attained, social initiatives carried out by regular businesses and social enterprises were grouped based on similar content and scope. Due to the fact that social entrepreneurship in general and its development potential have not been thoroughly and widely researched at the academic level we will continue the research of the topic. In the following papers, the role of social entrepreneurship in solving the country's economic and social problems will be analyzed in more detail and the effectiveness of the model will be evaluated, particularly with regard to employing a diverse workforce. Keywords: Social entrepreneurship, a social enterprise, Corporate Social Responsibility, Business Social Responsibility, Responsible Business JEL Codes: L26, L32, M14

El éxito de las Beyoungri Danche depende de las estrategias financieras que sus líderes utilizan para hacerlas sostenibles en el tiempo. La recopilación de buenas prácticas de las Beyoungri Danche coreanas en la literatura y una investigación exploratoria de contenidos web de tres organizaciones exitosas, permite aprender tácticas de otra cultura que ha demostrado un alto nivel organizacional y fortalecer el diálogo alrededor de un tema de interés común.

Although a hybrid logic is widely recognized as the best institutional logic for social enterprises, why and how such a hybrid logic works for social enterprises is under-explored. Based on the institutional logic theory, we conduct a multiple-case study to investigate how and why the two competing logics are combined to form a hybrid logic during social entrepreneurial process. Data are collected from the in-depth semi-structured interviews with social entrepreneurs from three leading social enterprises in China. We categorize a hybrid logic model as a dominant logic model, which includes a social-dominant logic model and a commercial-dominant logic model, and an equality of dual logic model. We find that the adoption of a hybrid logic is affected by the type of a social enterprise and the motivation to acquire different legitimacy. Specifically, an integrated social enterprise adopts a commercial-dominant logic model while an external social enterprise employs a social-dominant logic model to achieve sustainability. An embedded social enterprise can adopt an equality of dual logic model from its establishment. Our study contributes to research on strategic social entrepreneurship by revealing the dynamic relationship among different types of social enterprises, the adoption of a hybrid logic at different entrepreneurial stages, the motivation to acquire different legitimacy, and business outcomes.