SOCIAL INNOVATION AND ENTREPRENEURSHIP

SOCIAL INNOVATION AND ENTREPRENEURSHIP 

Social entrepreneurship involves creating new products or services to address social or environmental needs. The products and/or services are made available through existing market structures. These are enterprises with a social betterment goal that are structured to make a profit. This business model creates shared value, meaning that the organization simultaneously generates financial benefits and environmental and/or social benefits.

 

Social innovation is about creating new social structures that allow issues of justice, education, environmental protection, sustainability and/or community development to be reframed so that new solutions can come forward. Social innovators question the premises on which existing social structures are built and then reimagine systems and institutional relationships to bring about change. The distinction between social entrepreneurship and social innovation is fluid, and there is often overlap between the two changemaking approaches.

 

Social innovation and social entrepreneurship may work through a variety of organizational architectures to enable change. We can think about organizations as being on a spectrum: At one end of the spectrum are not-for-profit entities that fill vital social and environmental needs through traditional charitable approaches, relying on donations as their primary source of funding. At the other end of the spectrum are for-profit businesses that fill customer needs through market-based mechanisms: selling the product or service for what the market will bear. Many for-profit companies incorporate sustainability and socially responsible practices into their operations and culture, but they are still primarily focused on the financial bottom line. In between these two ends of the spectrum are a range of organizational architectures that innovatively address social and environmental needs by developing new products and services and/or through creative structures for the delivery of these products and services. This space between traditional not-for-profit and traditional for-profit organizations encompasses social innovators and social entrepreneurs.