Introduction

In this paper we will explore innovation and social entrepreneurship in the social housing sector in Ireland by examining the nature of hybrid organisations in this sector over time. Initially, we had planned to report on the recent emergence of social entrepreneurship in the social housing sector and compare the empirical data with framework(s) for understanding hybrids proposed by Billis (2010) and others. However, upon (re)examining the literature and the empirical data we found not only competing perspectives, but an inescapable conclusion that hybridity and social entrepreneurship have always been features of organising in civil society, at least in social housing in Ireland. Furthermore, it seemed to us more appropriate to conceive of hybridity and social entrepreneurship as dynamic processes rather than static classifications. Our question then became: What has been the nature of hybridity in social housing in Ireland over time, and what does this tell us about the current debate about how best to analyse and theorise hybridity and social entrepreneurship in the third sector?

In the next section we examine the literature to find three different conceptualisations of the concept of hybridity and its relation to the study on nonprofit organisations. The third section tells the ‘story’ of hybridity in social housing in Ireland drawing upon previous empirical research and the different conceptualisations as appropriate. The empirical data were drawn from various sources, including a major study of social housing organisations completed in 2003 (Mullins et al. 2003), data collected in the course of a PhD on housing in the Republic of Ireland (Rhodes 2008), government publications and a recent comprehensive study of nonprofit organisations in Ireland (INKEx 2012). In addition, the work on social housing in the UK, including Northern Ireland, by David Mullins and his collaborators (Mullins et al. 2003) contributed significantly to the analysis herein. In the “Conclusion”, we highlight the main implications for the further development of theory about hybrids and social enterprises—their nature, role and dynamics—in the ongoing evolution of third sector organisations.

The Concept of Hybridity

The concept of hybridity has been in use within organisation theory since at least the 1970s, but has only relatively recently been applied in third sector studies. Even so, there are a number of different definitions and applications currently in use. In this paper, we identify three conceptualisations of hybridity that are currently in use in the third sector field. We use these conceptualisations to examine hybridity in social housing in Ireland.

Definitions of Hybridity

In the 1980s, organisation theorists applied the term ‘hybrid’ to organising practices in the public sector domain that were not purely ‘public’. For example, Emmert and Crow identified hybrid organisations “which are part public, part private” (Emmert and Crow 1987, p. 55). Perry and Rainey (1988) defined hybrid organisations as “organizations that overlap”, with the overlap being, for example, private ownership and public funding, or vice versa (Perry and Rainey 1988, p. 184). They described hybrid organisations as “intermediate forms” and drew on Wamsley and Zald (1973) to identify the elements of organisations that should be considered when looking to distinguish hybrids. They referenced “important organizational properties such as goals, decision processes, and structure” (Perry and Rainey 1988, p. 185). This early focus on the ‘organizational properties’ is useful for pinning down hybridity’s core elements, as there is a current tendency to use the hybrid “label” without explaining what is meant by the term (Honingh and Karsten 2007, p. 137).

In the public sector literature, the typical definitional approach to hybrids has been to describe them as “organizations that combine a public orientation with a market orientation” (Joldersma and Winter 2002, p. 83). Conceivably, orientation elements may differ from hybrid to hybrid so that two organisations may be hybrids of quite different public and market elements. One of the first third sector references to hybridity appears in 2001. In this paper, Kickert wrote on the public management of hybrid organisations, defining hybrids as “organizations that exist in the intersection of two distinct spheres—the public and the private” (Kickert 2001, p. 135). Kickert presented an organising conundrum in the provision of public goods—e.g. healthcare, provision of education, social care and social housing. He noted that in Europe, they are often delivered by “judicially “private” organizations, the intermediary layer of social, voluntary, nonprofit organizations…which fit neither in the strictly public realm of state action nor in the strictly private realm of commercial relationships” (2001, p. 136).

After Kickert’s paper (and shortly thereafter, Koppell) (Koppell 2003), other early contributors (Evers and Laville 2004; Brandsen et al. 2005; Evers 2005; Brandsen and Hout 2006) noted that organisations delivering public services, whether state, commercial or third sector, were becoming more like each other. Defining hybrid organisations as “heterogeneous arrangements, characterized by mixtures of pure and incongruous origins, (ideal)types, “cultures,” “coordination mechanisms,” “rationalities,” or “action logics””(Brandsen et al. 2005, p. 750), they argued that hybrids are arrangements where there is such a mix of mechanisms and logics, there is “no longer a clear match with any single type” (Brandsen and Hout 2006, p. 549). Further, they proposed that such hybridity was a core defining characteristic of the third sector such that the third sector is itself a “hybrid domain”… “that is, organisations in this sector emerge as hybrid types between the pure actors we know as bureaucracies, enterprises, and families or clans” (Brandsen et al. 2005, p. 751).

Other writers on third sector organisations pointed to the importance of hybridisation for the third sector, but did not equate it with a “hybrid domain”. For example, Rathgeb Smith argued that nonprofit organisations should see hybrid structures as a strategic choice rather than an intermediate form of organising—as “helpful for nonprofit organizations as they strive to respond to a rapidly changing environment and create sustainable and effective organizations” (Rathgeb Smith 2010, p. 227). Rathgeb Smith assumes the logic of the sector is distinct from the structural choice of hybridisation.

An important third sector approach was offered by Billis, who bases his approach on a ‘prime sector’ assumption. Hybrids are organisations that comprise characteristics from more than one sector. However, a hybrid is not any mix of heterogeneous elements. Rather, its governance and operational principles will be determined by its origins in a particular sector. Thus, Billis argues that hybrid organisations have “‘roots’ and primary adherence to the distinctive principles – the ‘rules of the game’ – of just one sector” (Billis 2010, p. 3). In this definition of hybrid organisation, the logic of the sector is a critical element shaping the hybrid organisation.

While most of the third sector examples cited so far position third sector hybrids in relation to the public sector, the social enterprise literature uses the term ‘hybrid’ to classify organisations that combine business practices and methods with social goals. So, for example, hybrid organisations are defined as “nonprofit social service organizations that combine business enterprises with a social purpose mission” (Cooney 2006, p. 145). Other writers dispense with the sector concept, for example defining hybrids as “the entities through which social entrepreneurs carry on their affairs” (Kelley 2009, p. 340).

Defourny and Nyssens (2012) provide a useful classification of the social enterprise literature which proposes that there are three different perspectives on the nature of social enterprise: two arising from the USA and a third from Europe. In the US versions, social enterprise may be viewed as either the result of innovative organisational responses to social problems by social entrepreneurs (the ‘innovator’ perspective) or the undertaking of commercial activities by a nonprofit organisation for the purpose of funding their social objectives (the ‘earned income’ perspective. The European view (as espoused by EMES networkFootnote 1) incorporates all forms of stakeholder cooperation for the purpose of creating social value. The European view is linked to a concept of a ‘social economy’, in which goods and services are produced with the explicit and principle aim of benefiting a target community—including members of the organisation producing the goods/services. In this conceptualisation, a broad range of cooperative undertakings can be considered social enterprises. Furthermore, research by the members of the EMES network across Europe indicates that the dominant form of social enterprise since the 1990s has been in the form of ‘work-integration social enterprises’ (WISEs). “The main objective of these enterprises is to help low qualified unemployed people, who are at risk of permanent exclusion from the labour market, and to integrate these people into work and society through a productive activity” (Defourny and Nyssens 2012, p. 7).

The definitional literature is thus broad and reflects many different starting points. Looking across that literature, we identify three broad approaches, which we set out before turning to focus on the housing sector and the hybrid forms found there.

Three Third Sector Conceptualisations of Hybridity

Hybrids as Rooted in a ‘Prime Sector’

In this approach, understanding third-sector hybrids is grounded in a three-sector model. Hybrid organisations are those that, rooted by their origins in a particular sector, evolve over time into organisations that also take on characteristics of other sectors due to activities that move them into those sector domains. Core organising elements, comprising the logics or ‘rules of the game’ (Billis 2010, p. 3) of a particular sector, shape each organisation at their establishment. From this perspective, hybrids are not random collection of heterogeneous elements, but rather identifiable core types of one sector that are elaborated by the elements of other sectors. Billis presents a typology of core elements for each sector comprising ownership, governance, organising principles, human resources and “distinctive other resources” (2010, p. 55). Mullins and Pawson (2010) have applied Billis’ typology model to housing associations in Britain, and have demonstrated how different cases reflect quite distinct patterns of hybridisation, a. (p. 210), as reflected in Billis’ distinct ‘hybrid zones’. The US ‘earned income’ perspective belongs in this category, as does the recent foray into ‘Social Value’ creation by Porter and Kramer (2011).

The form emerges due to the (mainly) exogenous factors pushing organisations to hybridity. Changes in the state, the role of the state and its relationship with the third sector, as well as declining trust in the for-profit sector and the persisting economic crisis are all cited as important factors. For example, “The basic argument is that hybridization represents the impact of the changing role of the state and the adaptive response of nonprofit organizations to an increasingly uncertain funding and political environment” (Rathgeb Smith 2010, p. 220). This explanation would seem to build upon the assumption that we need to understand hybridisation within a sectoral logic and in terms of one sector’s relation to another; changes in one sector domain precipitates changes in another.

From this perspective on hybridisation, we gain some insight into why hybrid forms may prove challenging for third-sector managers, as “the combination of characteristics and objectives present in a hybrid organisation generates conflict of interests” (Thomasson 2009, p. 364). The membership association that espouses principles of its root sector and is also a client serving service deliverer employing the logics of another sector is a common example of a third-sector hybrid. This approach may be less useful for studying recently established organisations and those that, at their establishment, explicitly incorporate more than one sectoral logic (e.g. a not for profit business). This approach takes for granted a sectoral logic, and assumes that sector identity is a core element of organising.

The Hybridised Third Sector

In this approach, it is argued that that hybridisation has replaced the sector metaphor and what we call the ‘third sector’ is distinctive in being a space of hybridised activity. Rather than examining how organisations become hybridised over time, this approach assumes that all organisations operating in the third sector are by definition hybrids. The understanding of a hybridised domain—the third sector—is as a mix of ways of doing things. Rather than assuming third-sector distinctiveness, we are told the distinctiveness lies in the mix of different sector characteristics. This perspective is revealed in the European concept of the ‘social economy’ and the inclusion of co-operatives and stakeholder-governed production activities. In their summary of this perspective, Defourny and Nyssens (2012) locate social enterprise at the intersection of state, market and community-based organisations, using a diagram drawn from Pestoff (2005).

This approach puts contradiction, conflict of interest and management of multiple stakeholder claims at the centre of the third sector. Rather than being a by-product of a decision to hybridise, conflict is part of the ‘core mix’, as “hybrid organizations are characterised as a mix of pure, but incongruent, contradictive and conflicting behavioural rationalities” (van der Wal and van Hout 2009, p. 225). That said, the unifying logic for this hybridised domain is care: these hybridised organisations variously advocate for the care of others, act politically in the care of others, care within community contexts and act as formal care providers (Brandsen et al. 2005).

As in the prime sector approach to hybrids, the key explanatory factor for the hybridisation is the state. Brandsen and Karré have described their growth as “spurred by political trends and fashions like the privatisation, decentralisation and deregulation of public services” (Brandsen and Karré 2008, p. 2). The analysis undertaken using this approach has tended to focus on policy fields (Brandsen and Karré 2011) (e.g. housing, social welfare, education) rather than on the ‘hybridized third sector’. The unifying logic of care is very much embedded within the policy context.

Hybrids as ‘Fit-for-Purpose’ Entities

The last approach does two things that distinguish it from the other approaches. First, it does not define hybridisation in terms of sectors. Whilst Gregory Dees and Beth Battle Andersen wrote on ‘sector-bending’ (Dees and Anderson 2003), they did not linger on sector but rather on modes of organising and developing modes most suited to producing social and financial returns to organisations. This approach is pragmatically focused on identifying how best to secure desired outcomes. Many of the contributors are concerned with building ‘fit-for-purpose’ social ventures—these writers are grappling with the challenges of how to design and build social enterprises that can do both the social and the enterprise well (Brewster et al. 2009; Cooney 2006). This is something of a building block or puzzle piece approach—the focus is on how to fit it together depending on what it is you want to do. It dispenses with the clear rules of the game underpinning both the prime sector and hybridised third-sector approaches.

Among authors who adopt a ‘fit-for-purpose’ approach, the explanations for hybridisation tend to either ignore or at least put less emphasis on a sectoral logic—and, with a very few exceptions (e.g. Herranz et al. 2011) to leave the public sector out of the equation altogether.Footnote 2 Rather, the focus is on the organisation and the form through which it can best achieve its objectives. This is consistent with the US ‘innovator’ perspective identified by Defourny and Nyssens (2012). Thus, hybridisation in nonprofit organisations may be understood as a structural choice directly related to goal achievement. This approach is evident in Bratt’s (2012) analysis of hybridity in US nonprofit housing organisations in which she equates hybridity with changing strategies and a mix of objectives that she terms the ‘quadruple bottom line’. We see this too in Dees and Anderson’s critique of sectoral logics: “Increasingly we are turning to business methods and structures in our efforts to find more cost-effective and sustainable ways to address social problems and deliver socially important goods” (Dees and Anderson 2003, p. 16).

As with the other two approaches, there are challenges identified. Multiple stakeholders have contrasting conceptions of value. How best to evaluate outcomes is a constant concern. And the underlying challenge of creating both social and financial value is recognised, by some authors at least, as a fundamental hybrid problem (Kelley 2009). Trade-offs between different value objectives and organisational cultures and the conflicts arising from these also feature in this literature (Teasdale 2010).

Having examined conceptualisations of hybridity and social enterprise in relation to the third sector in the literature, we are left with three basic perspectives and a list of organisational features to consider in assessing organisational hybridity. The ‘prime sector’ perspective suggests that goals, institutional structure (ownership, governance and decision processes) and resources (principally HR and financial) characterise organisational form and each of the three ‘primary’ sectors have a stable combination of these features that characterise organisations in that sector. Hybrid organisations are those that have shifted away from one of these ‘ideal’ types by altering one or more of these characteristics due to pressures or turbulence in the environment. The ‘hybridised third-sector’ perspective also includes goals and institutional structure (called “rationalities”, “action logics”, and “coordination mechanisms”) as key features that characterise organisations, along with organisational origin and culture. However, there is no concept of stable or ‘ideal’ organisational forms from which organisations diverge, but rather that the third sector is the space in which hybridity (i.e. various combinations of features) occurs. What does characterise all organisations in the third sector in this conceptualisation is a common focus on ‘care’. Similarly, the ‘fit-for-purpose’ perspective highlights a common focus among all organisations in the social enterprise sector—but one that combines social benefit with profitability (or at least financial sustainability). In this conceptualisation of hybridity, the organisation will experiment with different combinations of features to come up with something that will achieve its objectives. Organisational features are similar to those described in the ‘prime sector’ view. i.e. goals (shareholder value), institutional structure (ownership, governance and legal form) and resources (service fees and access to capital). In the next section, we will attempt to map these conceptualisations to the evolution of third-sector social housing organisations in Ireland to assess which one is most consistent with the facts as described.

Hybridity in (Third-Sector) Social Housing in Ireland

As described in the introduction, we will draw largely on secondary sources to tell the ‘story’ of hybridity in third-sector social housing in Ireland. The main source of data is Mullins et al. (2003), “Non-Profit Housing Organisations in Ireland, North & South”. More recent data are drawn from research conducted as part of a PhD (Rhodes 2008) and publicly available data from the relevant government and sector associations, as well as from a government-funded report on nonprofit organisations across the Republic of Ireland (INKEx 2012). In addition, we draw on recent experience on nonprofit housing association boards and discussions with senior management and board members of sector associations. Following Mullins et al. (2003), this section is divided into four ‘phases’ of evolution of the sector and reinterprets the data for the period up to 2001 presented by Mullins et al. using the perspectives on hybridity described above. For the last phase, we extend the analysis to 2011 using more recent data sources and personal experience as described above.

Phase 1: “Early Philanthropy”

Mullins et al. (2003) define the first phase in the evolution of the nonprofit housing sector in Ireland as beginning in the late eighteenth century, largely in the form of ‘alms’ or ‘poor’ houses that were connected in one way or another with religious organisations or the Crown. These organisations provided basic shelter and food for those who had fallen on hard times and were more often than not temporary solutions to accommodation needs. In addition, other services were provided such as employment, medical care and, in some cases, enforced incarceration. In terms of an organisational form they tended to be run along what at the time would have been religious organisational lines—i.e. a voluntary management body (but ‘reporting to’ the church/Crown patron), funded by voluntary contributions. An excellent example of this type of organising is the Belfast Charitable Society that was established in 1767 by the Sovereign of the City and “the principal inhabitants of said town and gentlemen of fortune in the neighbourhood who are desirous to promote so valuable an undertaking (Strain 1952, p. 4, quoting the Belfast Newsletter in July 1753).” The ‘valuable undertaking’ was the building of a poor house and hospital in Belfast that would not only provide shelter and medical care, but also ensure that vagabonds and beggars in the city were put to work and kept off the streets. The initial investment required was funded by a combination of lottery ticket sales and the contribution of land and building materials by gentry and merchants. In 1771, the foundation stone for the building was laid, and in 1773 legislation was passed by the Irish Parliament that gave statutory powers to the charity (whose president was to be the Sovereign of the town of Belfast, Lord Donegall) to “make such and the like Byelaws and Regulations… with respect to the poor and all idle and sturdy beggars… as the Corporations created by virtue of the said Act within counties at large, and counties of towns and cities are enabled to (legislation as quoted in Strain 1952, p. 7).” Note that there was no state provision of housing as such, although Ireland did have some of the earliest legislation in the world regarding rural tenant rights in response to agrarian unrest in the late eighteenth century.

“There was a more significant development of endowed trusts and limited profit companies in urban areas the 19th century. These developments were largely independent of the state (Mullins et al. 2003, p. 34)”. Innovations such as the Dublin Artisan Dwelling Co. Ltd., a limited profit company providing shareholders with dividends of 4–5 %, erected over 3,000 dwellings in Dublin between 1840 and 1912. Mullins et al. (2003) continues:

Other housing societies that provided working class housing included The Alexandra Guild Tenement Company Ltd., the Association for the Housing of the Very Poor, the Social Service Tenements Company Ltd. Such housing was also built in Belfast, Cork and other towns. Other noteworthy philanthropic initiatives in the housing field in Ireland in nineteenth century include the pioneering work of Quaker industrialists, such as the Malcolmson family at Portlaw, Waterford and the Richardson family at Bessbrook, County Armagh who built on earlier Quaker housing experiments at Lisburn, County Antrim in the eighteenth century (p. 35).

In a similar vein to the Belfast Charitable Society a century earlier, The Guinness Trust—established by the Earl of Iveagh in 1890 to assuage homelessness among urban workers in London and Dublin—was given a separate statutory legal basis under the Iveagh Trust Act (1899) and the Dublin Improvement (Bull Alley Area) Act (1903). This legislation combined the Dublin-based part of the Trust with a local authority improvement scheme and invested the trustees of the new ‘Iveagh Trust’ with the power to carry out the aims of the original trust and the scheme. This legislation was amended in 1961 to give the trustees clearer (and more flexible) authority to invest excess capital to increase financial stability. It is important to note that the hybrid public/private arrangements of The Iveagh Trust and Belfast Charitable Society were not typical, but they would have been seen as leading examples of ‘voluntary’ acts of charity and social service provision.

In this phase it is difficult to see much support for the ‘prime sector’ approach. There is evidence of activity emerging from individuals or groups situated in various sectors, including the private, community, religious and public sectors—with some carrying over of governance norms—but little else, as the hybrid organisations evolve to facilitate the pursuit of idiosyncratic goals and fit into socioeconomic and cultural norms of the time. In the early stages there is very little state regulation providing guidance as to what is acceptable, which results in a heterogenous group of organisations with quite different characteristics in spite of the common underlying goal of provision of housing for poor people.

Phase II: ‘Crowding Out by the State’

According to Mullins et al. (2003), this phase begins around the partition of Ireland into a two jurisdictions in 1922. There had been some increase in state provision of housing prior to this period having to do with slum clearance schemes and programmes aimed at ameliorating homelessness among veterans of WWI, and these continued after partition. In particular, the Housing and Town Planning Act, 1919 (the ‘Addison Act’) provided for central government funding of local authority housing and Mullins et al. (2003) suggest that this was the beginning of the end of the nascent voluntary housing sector in Ireland. For the next 50–60 years (depending upon the jurisdiction), they suggest that state-funded schemes for social housing delivered by local authorities ‘crowded out’ any new voluntary housing activity, although there were notable exceptions to this. For example, the “Ulster Garden Villages was set up … in 1946 using loan stock issues and borrowing from friendly societies and banks to build homes for rent. About 1,500 dwellings were built, but the society soon ran into severe financial difficulties as a combination of rising prices of building materials and lower than expected income owing to rent controls forced the society into receivership in 1952 (Mullins et al. 2003, pp. 38–39)”. The ‘co-operative’ housing movement in Ireland began in the 1950s and was active in building dwellings for the next two decades. Housing co-operatives were aimed at providing the opportunity for home ownership (or equity sharing in later permutations) to their members and were generally set up with limited liability status under the Industrial and Provident Societies Acts in both jurisdictions and registered as ‘friendly societies’ along the lines of credit unions, which were also established using this legal form. It is worth noting that the governance of such organisations was strongly ‘membership’ oriented, i.e. those individuals who manage and benefit from the activities of the organisation must be ‘members’. In Northern Ireland, a special purpose housing co-operative association (Northern Ireland Co-operative Housing Association) was set up in 1978 to manage the government-funded shared ownership scheme which allows people to take a ‘starter share’ of anywhere between 50 and 90 % of the cost of a dwelling with the rest funded (and owned) by the association. This association is governed by a voluntary board elected by the shareholders of the association, and lease-holders must apply to become shareholders.

Another example of hybridity in the third sector in this period is the creation of the Northern Ireland Housing Trust in 1945. This was a housing organisation fully funded by the UK exchequer for the purpose of providing housing in those areas where the local authorities’ provision was insufficient. While it was a public body established by an Act of Parliament, its mission, structure and operating principles were similar to other well-known nonprofits such as the Scottish Special Housing Association and Octavia Hill’s system of housing management. It built over 48,000 homes in its 26 years of existence and was by far the largest provider of social housing outside of the local authorities in that period. In 1971, its housing stock and remit was combined with that of the local authorities to create the Northern Ireland Housing Executive (NIHE). At the time this was seen as a way of addressing the widespread dissatisfaction with local authority housing provision that had contributed to the outbreak of civil disobedience and violence in Northern Ireland in the late 1960s.

Notwithstanding the examples above, social housing in Ireland in the 50 years following partition was public sector led and delivered. Local authority (along with the NI Housing Trust in Northern Ireland) stock dwarfed that of the housing associations in both jurisdictions and the sector was not seen by either government or citizens as a major player in the housing system. In this we can see the institutionalisation of state-provided housing for those who could not provide adequate housing from their own resources—thus creating the ‘public sector’ component of social housing. This is clearly not part of the ‘social economy’ or hybridised third-sector conceptualisation of social good provision—although the emergence of housing co-operatives is evidence of this sort of dynamic—however marginal it may have been. The NI Housing Trust could be considered an early version of the ‘prime sector’ dynamic of hybridisation—but it would be difficult to say which sector was the primary one for this organisation: public or nonprofit? In short, this period appears to be one in which hybridity was marginalised in favour of the creation of a two-sector (public and private) housing system. This is best explained by the ‘fit-for-purpose’ approach, with the understanding that as policy changed, many previously successful hybrids were no longer viable or necessary.

Phase III: ‘A Complementary Role’

In the last quarter of the twentieth century the state began to fund the development of nonprofit organisations, largely to undertake complementary roles outside of mainstream general needs housing. This phase began in 1976 in Northern Ireland and in 1984 in the Republic. (Mullins et al. 2003, p. 34)

Legislation institutionalising the form and state funding of nonprofit housing associations began to appear in the 1960s, with the Housing Act (1966) in the Republic of Ireland and the Housing NI Order (1976). It should be noted that the legislation in the Republic did little more than create a category of ‘approved housing bodies’ to which local authorities could, if they wished, provide sites for social housing development. The Northern Ireland legislation put the sector on much firmer footing, providing clarity around the form, funding and regulation that would apply. It was not until the creation of the ‘Capital Assistance Scheme’ for housing associations in the Republic of Ireland in 1984 that housing associations there had access to large-scale capital funding from government. The passing of this legislation resulted in a flurry of organisational formation in the sector with 45 new associations created in NI in the first 10 years following the legislation and over 230 associations registered in a similar period in the ROI However, the activities allowed under the legislation and the amount of funding available (particularly in ROI) meant that housing associations were limited to ‘niche’ activities, primarily in the provision of housing for older people (‘sheltered accommodation’) and for homeless people. In both jurisdictions, the legislation set out the minimum requirements to receive funding and sector associations formed around the time of the legislation assisted fledging organisations to establish appropriate mission statements, legal structures and governance structures to qualify for funding and/or comply with what was seen as ‘best practice’ at the time. This created a kind of institutional mimeticism (Dimaggio and Powell 1983) that supported the growth of similarly established and managed organisations, while discouraging alternative forms. It is in this third period that the distinction between the public and nonprofit sectors in social housing becomes crystal clear in Ireland.

This is not to say that there was no innovation or hybridity in the sector during the latter part of the twentieth century and into the early part of the twenty-first century. Arising out of the ‘Social Justice’ movement, housing associations targeted sub-sections of society previously excluded (or ignored) such as single parents, released prisoners, travellers and victims of domestic violence. This activity resulted in a broadening of the types of supports that social housing tenants required and, particularly in Northern Ireland, the creation of networked arrangements between housing providers, public sector and social service specialists. Also in Northern Ireland, government policy shifted under the aegis of ‘New Public Management’ to shift responsibility for all new social housing development from the NIHE to housing associations and to create opportunities and supports for these organisations to access private finance. This period also saw the gradual decline in public support for local authority housing in both jurisdictions due to perceptions of poor management, increasing anti-social activity on housing estates and the isolating effects of the ghetto-isation of social housing in urban areas.

This is a difficult period to conceptualise in any of the three strands of hybridity as the activity in social housing outside of the public and private sectors was highly influenced by the policies in force at the time and the relatively generous level of funding available from the state for ‘approved housing bodies’ in both jurisdictions. Essentially, the activity of housing associations was steered by the state into niche roles that were seen as best addressed by these organisations, namely housing for people with additional support needs. The ‘fit-for-purpose’ conceptualisation is the best fit of the three, but without the ‘innovator’ aspect that characterises the US version of this approach.

Phase IV: ‘Mainstream Role’

Mullins et al. (2003) saw the beginning of the twenty-first century as a new phase in nonprofit housing in Ireland. Whether this is due to the timing of their report or is based on a real substantial change in the role of the sector remains to be seen as many of the anticipated changes—primarily focusing on growth of the sector—have been overtaken by the fiscal and economic crises in Ireland and the UK. The main reasons for their assessment appears to have been the shift in government policy supporting a more mainstream housing function for housing associations, and a shift to more ‘business-like’ operating principles espoused by boards and senior management of these organisations. The drivers of these changes were different in each jurisdiction, with organisations in Northern Ireland having to respond to increased regulation and performance reporting requirements along with having to compete with other housing associations for development grants—not to mention private sector lending requirements. In spite of these challenges, however, the transfer of the new development programme from the NIHE to housing associations in 1996 heralded a new period of growth in the sector.

In the Republic of Ireland, the government had steadily ratcheted up funding to the sector and there was an emergence of a small number of general needs housing associations with significantly greater ambitions than had previously been the case. This shift to a more mainstream role was seen as a response to the increasing lack of housing affordability in the ROI with housing costs in Dublin reaching unprecedented heights. In addition, there were great expectations around the impact of the Planning & Development Act (2000) which required that local authorities set aside up to 20 % of any newly approved private housing development for social and affordable housing. Finally, there were indications that existing housing associations were considering strategic moves into other services, such as community development, jobs training, day centres and urban regeneration. While this was mostly evident in the ROI, there were some organisations in NI who were considering these as part of a ‘niche’ strategy.

In the overall scheme of things, however, many of these plans have not played out. In 2001, 38 housing associations in NI managed approximately 22,000 housing units (18,000 self-contained and 4,000 bedspaces) or 3 % of the total housing stock. In 2011, there were 31 housing associations managing 33,000 units (28,300 self-contained and 4,500 bedspaces), with the increase coming from both NIHE transfers and new build. Housing association stock accounted for 4 % of total housing stock. While this appears to fulfil the prediction of growth and consolidation in the NI housing association sector, the trajectory is not particularly impressive as the increase in nonprofit social housing is offset by a significant decrease in NIHE provided housing. In short, the 11,000 additional dwellings managed by nonprofits is more than offset by the 45,000 unit decrease in NIHE housing stock from 2001 to 2011. In terms of hybridity in the sector, the adoption of private sector management processes, particularly in the area of performance and financial management, has continued arising both from the policy and regulatory changes along with the shift to more private sector funding. In terms of the three perspectives outlined in the previous section, housing associations in Northern Ireland appear to be shifting towards a ‘private sector’ model on a continuum of private versus public organisational forms, although they retain their voluntary board structures and commitment to the creation of social value.

In the Republic of Ireland, a broadly similar trajectory has developed since the Mullins et al. (2003) report, albeit with rather less organisational change. The anticipated increase in additional social housing stock was more modest than the widely published policy and sector objectives to more than quadruple annual output. Nevertheless, there was a fairly steady output of about 1,500 new dwellings per year up to 2010 to bring the sector to roughly 24,000 dwellings under management—doubling the total stock that existed as of 2001. In addition, the latest reported count of approved housing bodies by the Centre for Housing Research was 723 in 2008—which is a 120 % increase over the estimated number in 2001. This increase needs to be contextualised, though, as the period also saw a massive increase in private sector output—nonetheless the sector’s share of total housing stock grew to 2 % and nearly 20 % of social housing. In spite of this growth—or perhaps because of it—there was little evidence of a trend towards hybridisation along the lines of the private–public continuum, nor were there any notable innovations in organisational form. In fact, the availability of funding, the demand for general needs housing and the lack of any incentive to experiment resulted in as much standardisation as any regulatory regime could have.

This rather unexciting story masks some real tensions in the ROI nonprofit housing sector as many organisations are grappling with looming financial sustainability issues in the face of collapsing government funding and insufficient income and/or sinking funds to maintain properties. One of the larger associations has actively been lobbying government to allow housing associations to access private funding and/or generate additional income through market-based rentals. In the area of homeless services, a major policy, research and coordination effort was undertaken in Dublin between 2000 and 2010 to create an integrated funding, delivery and performance management network. This effort has failed to achieve its stated objective of eliminating homelessness in Dublin in spite of the nearly fivefold increase in funding for services, but continues to fundamentally influence the relationships among the statutory and voluntary sectors in the area. Recently, nonprofit service providers in this area have had to ‘bid’ for contracts by providing tenders to umbrella funding agency acting on behalf of the statutories.

As a board member on three different housing nonprofits in the last several years, one author has personally grappled with the challenges of trying to introduce management practices in the areas of finance, operations, marketing and HR, with varying degrees of success. While one of the organisations has embraced a range of management practices and is continuing to introduce innovations in service provision and finance, the other two have had difficulty reconciling their voluntary and/or religious/community ethos with a more challenging economic environment. In addition, a recurring issue has been the difficulty in introducing any kind of profit-oriented activity into the provision of social housing—even if it is for the purpose of supporting the mission of social housing through cross-subsidisation. As highlighted in Sabeti (2011), one difficulty lies in the legal structures available to housing associations to engage in such ‘mixed’ activities. Another issue is the dearth of strong and innovative professional services in accounting, legal and management consulting for nonprofits that have long been able to get by without these in a ‘light-touch’ regulatory framework with little competition. The heavy dependency on government funding which carried no risk and virtually no expectation of performance management has also kept housing associations in the Republic from developing more business-like risk/reward skill sets. Finally, the orientation of the Irish Council for Social Housing has largely been to support the growth of the sector through local community-based organising activities and to discourage any competition among housing associations.

In a nutshell, the last 10–15 years in social housing in Ireland has seen significant growth in the sector facilitated by policy instruments and funding from government, but little in the way of further hybridisation or innovation in organisational structure. There has been some movement towards more ‘business-like’ operating practices—particularly in Northern Ireland where the funding and regulatory regimes have necessitated this—but evidence of active experimentation in goals, structures and resource acquisition is thin on the ground. The social return/social finance phenomenon in the US/UK philanthropic sectors has only begun to filter through to Ireland and while there is some nascent interest in the implications of this type of funding for social housing, little has happened to suggest that it will affect the behaviour of nonprofits in the near term. In this phase, there is some support for the prime sector approach as nonprofit housing associations seek to expand their activities and/or funding sources to more market-based models, but the adoption of other changesFootnote 3 to accommodate this shift towards private sector modes of operating are not apparent. What is apparent is that the social housing sector has become caught in a funding crisis and is seeking new sources of funding as a matter of urgency.

Conclusion

In our presentation of our case data, we have drawn on multiple hybridity/social enterprise conceptualisations as we traced the recent development of social housing and pointed to the particular challenges this sector faces at the current time. Of the three strands of third-sector hybridisation concepts, the strand which is best supported by the data on housing associations in Ireland and which is most useful for engaging with the current challenges of this sector is the third, ‘fit-for-purpose’ strand which suggests that hybridity is an evolving concept arising from organisation choices taken in the context of changing objectives and a changing environment. While the current applications in the social enterprise literature dispense with the ‘public’ category, the original conceptions of hybrids (Emmert and Crow 1987; Perry and Rainey 1988) as falling on a public–private continuum and the emphasis on understanding the combination of goals, decision processes and structures could probably be integrated with the social enterprise approach to develop a richer continuum model than is currently available. Crossan and Til’s (2009) treatment is a step in this direction.

The institutionalisation of the social housing sector during the twentieth century into clearly delineated sectors supports a sort of evolutionary path theory in which different combinations of goals/structures/resources are explored and the environment (in the case of Ireland, hugely influenced by government policy—but also created by the interaction of the housing associations and their relevant sectoral bodies) supports some and rejects others. Having said that, the environment, at least in the Republic of Ireland, was largely benign and organisations with significant community/membership-type organisational forms continue to survive happily alongside—albeit on the margins of—the more institutionally ‘fit’ forms of limited companies/trusts with charity status.

The different context and recent policies in Northern Ireland appears to be leading housing associations in this jurisdiction to adopt more ‘private sector’ operating practices and structures. What we are seeing is a change in the government funding and regulatory environment and movement along a continuum towards private sector financial/resource strategies in response to this. While they retain some organisational features traditionally associated with nonprofit sector organisations (voluntary boards, orientation towards ‘care’), these do not appear to overly influence strategic decision-making and Mullins and Pawson (2010) in their study of similar developments in the UK observe that some behave more like agents of the state and/or profit-driven entities.

The history of the nonprofit housing sector(s) in Ireland does not seem to offer support for the ‘prime sector’ perspective and is challenging to classify within the hybridised third-sector model. We thus argue that for the purpose of analysing the Irish social housing sector, the ‘fit-for-purpose’ strand is of most value at this time. The editorial in the recent special issue in Housing Studies on ‘Social Enterprise, Hybridity and Housing Organisations’ (Mullins et al. 2012) provides some support for this view: “the concepts are found to be most useful when they inform dynamic analysis of hybridisation and identify underlying change mechanisms, rather than simply providing static descriptions of hybridity (p. 405)”. Combining their observation on the cases included in the special issue with our analysis of the Irish social housing sector suggests that hybridity is a process, not an outcome. Hybrid organisations are better characterised by the process of incorporation of new or different practices, structures and logics to facilitate their objectives, than they are by a typology of specific characteristics resulting from planned or, indeed, emergent strategic decisions. If this is a more appropriate use of the term, then more work is needed to determine what is meant by the process of hybridity and researchers need to tease out and test hypotheses that use this conceptualisation to provide insights into evolution of organisations and sectors and the influence of policy and other features of the environment. The historical analysis we have presented does suggest that the institutional and economic environment within which social entrepreneurs operate is of critical significance to the organisational forms that emerge. Therefore it may well be the case that social innovation and the emergence of hybrid organisations will take an unanticipated turn in the coming years as the context within which they operate changes yet again.