The State of Theory and Research on Social Enterprises

Abstract

Although ‘social enterprise’ is a relatively new subject for study, there is quite a lot of literature that could be reviewed here.* Substantial papers have now been written on such aspects as comparative forms of social enterprise around the world (Borzaga and Defourny, 2001; Kerlin, 2010a, 2009, 2006), the various organizational and legal structures that ventures called social enterprise can assume (e.g. Brody, 2009), the relationship between venture philanthropy and social enterprise (Van Slyke and Newman, 2006), the multiple values and sources of income on which social enterprises are based (Herranz et al., 2010), performance measurement for social enterprise (Bagnoli and Megali, 2009), strategies for balancing of social and commercial goals in social enterprises (Cooney, 2010; Mozier and Tracey, 2010), and of course many case studies of the experiences of particular social enterprises (e.g. Cooney, 2006; Cordes and Steuerle, 2009; Mannan, 2009; Squazzoni, 2009; Aiken, 2010; Teasdale, 2010; Harranz et al., 2010). Scholars have also developed the rudiments of theory for social enterprise, trying to explain its emergence in a market economy and democratic society from various disciplinary viewpoints (Young 2008, 2009), the dangers associated with commercialization of nonprofit or philanthropic organizations (Weisbrod, 1998, 2004; Eikenberry, 2009), the different forms social enterprise assumes in alternative national contexts (Kerlin, 2009), the development of new (commercial) ventures within conventional nonprofit organizations (Oster, 2010), the circumstances under which social enterprises survive (Yitshaki et al., 2008), how they contribute to the goals of the welfare state (Borzaga and Defourney, 2001) and related topics, especially the emergence and performance of hybrid organizations (Tuckman, 2009; Billis, 2010).