Social entrepreneurship: A silent support for business and society

Social enterprises are significant to improve the gaps in the market and support the government. The researchers have shown great interest in social enterprises to bring social change, empowerment, and economic development. The social entrepreneurship process consists of social opportunity and has an enterprise concept. The resources are identified and acquired to achieve the enterprise’s goals. Social entrepreneurs are also called social innovators. They are the agents of change and create significant change using innovative ideas. They identify the problems and build the difference by their plan.

Social entrepreneurship helps to succeed in economic initiatives, and all the investment focuses on the social and environmental mission. Social Entrepreneurship is an innovative solution and a catalyst for transforming businesses. It is adopted in several parts of the world. It is a construct that blends the idea of a commercial enterprise with the tenets of a charitable nonprofit organization. Cross-country comparative research is rare in the area of social entrepreneurship. For example, countries such as Thailand are different from the rest of East Asia in social enterprise terms because of government backing. It is worth noting that the research in Social entrepreneurship shows the disparity in thoughts on the geographical boundaries.

Prior research has identified the eight most common critical success factors for social enterprises, mainly relating to those operating in Western Europe or the United States. Governments across the globe, including Europe, the United States, and Asia, are willing to create the awareness for social entrepreneurship as a driver of innovation that offers a set of solutions to the complex social problems that the world faces today. In countries like Belgium, France, Germany, and Ireland, nonprofit private organizations, as regulated by public bodies, provide social services that are part of social entrepreneurship. 

The social enterprises originate in the developed world. In developing countries like Bangladesh, one enterprise named BRAC is engaged in the alleviation of poverty. Another example, Mann Deshi Foundation, in India, is meant for women empowerment in rural areas by teaching entrepreneurial skills. Their company aims to create 1 Million women entrepreneurs in India. The researchers have presented the two schools of thought. Namely, the first one refers to the use of commercial activities by nonprofit organizations. The second one supports social innovation.

Various organizations provide resources to increase the social entrepreneurial ventures.  The need for social change and potential payoff makes them the transformational organization. The key factors have given a competitive advantage to the organization. Dr Mohammed Yunus, with his social entrepreneurship venture of Grameen Bank, become successful in poverty alleviation in Bangladesh. The Cawthorne Children’s Centre, U.K., offers affordable and top quality childcare for local working families. The social enterprise in China has thrived since 2009, but the access to investment and management training is the biggest challenges for social enterprise growth. Frederick K.W. Day, Buffalo Bicycle Company, Southern Africa was Africa Social Entrepreneur of the year in 2013.      

A social entrepreneur may generate profits, but for her or him, it is not the main reason for the venture. The self-sustainability depends on the profit and works as an instrument for self-monitoring.  The outcome for a social entrepreneur is Social welfare, as shown in Figure 1. The Kisan Network is an online marketplace meant to develop small-scale farmers in India. The Co-Founder of Kisan Network, Aditya Agarwal, is ranked as a leading Social Entrepreneur by Forbes in 2017. On the other hand, it’s tough to survive as an enterprise in Africa. Hence, enterprises need to be robust and secure themselves and improve the resilience of the societies in which they operate.

 Kisan Network

Twenty thousand social enterprises in Australia employ more than 300,000 and give 2-3% of GDP, as per the report of the Centre for Social Impact. Another example in this area of social entrepreneurship featured in Forbes magazine is Devi Prasad Shetty, the Bangalore based Entrepreneur in India who attempts to make affordable medical care people of all economic strata and geographical location. The study on social entrepreneurship in Germany requires more effort. Social entrepreneurs in America, Asia, and Africa know that there are some easy ways of working with people living in the slums who understand how they can overcome poverty.

The need for Social Entrepreneurship has helped in uplifting the economy of countries in the world. The business and Society get supported by social entrepreneurs as they develop different solutions to social problems. The discussions among the experts through the online focus group have resulted in fruitful findings on social entrepreneurship at the Global level. For instance, Esoko is engaged in improving the technology support for the farmers in Uganda and other countries in Africa.

Social Enterprises with their Success Factors

Table 1 indicates that their success factors are responsible for the economic growth of Social Enterprises in the world. The development of the following framework suggests the critical role of ten success factors for productive Social Entrepreneurship in a Global Perspective. Figure 2 indicates that there may be around ten success factors for successful Social Entrepreneurship globally.

Success Factors of Social Entrepreneurship

The study of social entrepreneurship shows that there is not much theoretical advancement in this area. There are immense opportunities to extend existing theoretical lenses and develop new models and frameworks for analysis that facilitate future research. The social entrepreneurship is silent support to the Society and businesses in many countries in the world.