1 Social Enterprise, Health, and Wellbeing
A Timely Topic for Uncertain Times?
Michael J. Roy, Jane Farmer, and James M. Mandiberg
DOI: 10.4324/9781003125976-1
Introduction
When we first had the idea for this book, just like everyone else we did not expect the world to be gripped by a global pandemic. In any number of different ways, COVID-19 has brutally exposed just how the economy and the health and wellbeing of the population are intimately intertwined. Although they were clearly apparent before the present crisis, deeply entrenched forms of inequality, especially in relation to health and wellbeing outcomes, have been brought to the fore of public consciousness like never before. As a result, there has been an incessant clamour for new ways of working and organising the economy. In the vein of imagining a better future, rather than simply re-erecting the same models that were considered not to work very well for the great majority of people, âsocial enterpriseâ has been presented as having a critical role to play in the post-COVID-19 recovery (Gallick, 2021; Hermant, 2021; OECD, 2020).
Drawing on a number of prominent research projects, in this book, we present what could be termed the âstate of the artâ of research on social enterprise, health, and wellbeing with a view to stimulating interest in generating the next wave of research in this field. In this opening chapter, we will introduce social enterprise and its emergence; summarise evidence about social enterprise, health, and wellbeing; highlight why this is a significant topic with important avenues for further exploration; and introduce some of the key themes that we see recurring throughout the book.
The Rise of Social Enterprise
Organisations combining commercial and social missions have been with us for centuries, but in recent decades, governments internationally have started to explicitly promote âsocial enterprise,â often as a welfare policy instrument for transitioning individuals and communities out of disadvantage (Barraket, 2014; Farmer et al., 2016; Muñoz et al., 2015; Teasdale, 2010). Acknowledging that social enterprise is an inherently contested concept, varying with history, geography, culture, and context (Defourny et al., 2020; Kerlin, 2013; Teasdale, 2012), here we define social enterprise as âorganisations with an explicit aim to help the community, initiated by a group of citizens and in which the material interest of capital investors is subject to limits,â and which place âa high value on their autonomy and on economic risk-taking related to ongoing socio-economic activityâ (Defourny and Nyssens, 2006, p. 5).
Social enterprises exist worldwide, operate in most industrial sectors of the economy, and manifest in multiple shapes and sizes. Contemporary social enterprises are the descendants of the first cooperative forms of business which were founded in the late 18th century, emerging as a reaction to the grim working conditions, social upheaval, and power inequities of the Industrial Revolution. More recently, terms such as community business, community enterprise, social venture, or even âaffirmative businessâ (particularly in North America) have been used to capture the idea of trading for a social purpose. Global figure and Nobel Peace Laureate, Muhammad Yunus conceptualises his particular brand of âsocial businessâ as targeted to address a social problem, financially sustainable and with profits generated to be reinvested in the business and aimed at social impact, with no financial dividend for business owners (Yunus et al., 2010). A variety of terminology is used to capture the social enterprise sector in different countriesâfor example, Francophone and Hispanophone countries use the terms âeconomie socialeâ (social economy) and âeconomie solidaireâ (solidarity economy) (Utting, 2015) to describe trading for social purpose.
Broadly speaking, there are two main traditions of social enterprise apparent in contemporary academic discourse (Defourny and Nyssens, 2010) which evolved more or less independently of each other. On the one hand, there is an Anglo-American Business School perspective that emerged from social enterprise education courses at, for instance, Harvard Business School in the early 1990s (Austin and Rangan, 2019), from social entrepreneurship education at the Fuqua School of Business at Duke University (Dees, 1998), and the Skoll Centre at Oxford University. This tradition, spread across the world through social innovation networks such as Ashoka (Drayton, 2011; Teasdale et al., 2020), often conveys social enterprise as driven by the work of charismatic, âheroicâ social entrepreneurs who found and run social businesses (Ruebottom, 2013). The second tradition is rooted in the work of the EMES (EMergence dâEntreprise Sociale en Europe) international research network which began in Europe during the 1990s (Borzaga and Defourny, 2001; Defourny and Nyssens, 2006). Rather than focusing on outstanding individuals, this tradition links back to cooperative origins, emphasising the importance of the collective, democratic governance, and meaningful involvement by intended beneficiaries in the operation of social enterprises.
Most of the chapters in this book discuss social enterprise activity in Scotland, Canada, and Australia. These countries represent varying specific country contexts but share a relatively consistent notion of social enterprise as an organisational form. Scotland is regularly presented as having âthe most supportive environment in the worldâ for social enterprise (Roy et al., 2015) with an ambitious ten-year strategy for social enterprise development co-produced with sector representatives (Scottish Government, 2016). Although there now exists clear policy identifying the envisaged contribution of social enterprise in Scotlandâs economic and social fabric, the term âsocial enterpriseâ arrived surprisingly late to Scotlandâs policy discourse, almost a full decade after then UK Prime Minister Tony Blair recognised its potential to operationalise his âThird Wayâ New Labour Government agenda bridging socialism and capitalism (Haugh and Kitson, 2007). Social enterprise in contemporary Scotland is the latest incarnation of a âcommunity businessâ tradition (Murray, 2019) designed to address community economic development.
Meanwhile, in Australia, interest in social enterprise has waxed and waned, and currently the interest varies between the different states. Barraket and colleagues stated that social enterprise only started to emerge during the 2000s in response to a mix of federal and state government policies to stimulate non-governmental organisations to provide social services and to diversify their income streams (Barraket et al., 2010). The state of Victoria is currently regarded as the most active for promoting and incentivising social enterprise development with recent policies promoting social procurement among a range of pro-social enterprise measures (Barraket et al., 2017).
Like Australia, enthusiasm to support social enterprise differs markedly between provinces of Canada, with their different cultures shaping how social enterprise is conceptualised and enacted. There is a strong emphasis on the social economy tradition in Francophone Quebec (Mendell and Neamtan, 2010; Quarter et al., 2009), while Anglophone provinces such as Alberta and Ontario tend to look to the United States and Anglo-American traditions. Social enterprise has recently been formally recognised as a significant policy instrument in Atlantic Canada (Lionais, 2015), with new provincial policies in places including in Nova Scotia, which have a long history of innovative community economic development approaches.
The development of social enterprise practice in the last 30 years has seen a parallel rise in academic research interest. Reflecting the fieldâs influence from policy movements, much of the emphasis of early research about social enterprise featured defining and counting social enterprises and rudimentary attempts to measure their impact. As policy interest has evolved to apply social enterprise to address specific societal needs, such as to create jobs or address environmental goals, so too research interest has moved to examine the role of social enterprise in these areas. While past studies have considered the impacts of social enterprise on individuals, communities, and regions, most recently there has been interest from policymakers and researchers about roles for social enterprise at the level of the political economy. The role of social enterprise in wider economic discussions is one of the themes picked up in different chapters across this book, and we will reflect more upon this in the concluding chapter.
The Growth of Work Integration Social Enterprise
One type of social enterprise that has come to the forefront as a policy tool for leveraging individual and community benefit is the work integration social enterprise (WISE). Several of the studies covered in this book feature WISEs. WISEs tend to be established to prepare people deemed as having insufficient capability to enter the open labour market, providing pathways to mainstream employment (Campi et al., 2006; Spear and Bidet, 2005; Vidal, 2005), or providing alternatives to mainstream employment. WISEs are sometimes termed âsocial firmsââa concept that captures broadly similar types of organisations (Warner and Mandiberg, 2006).
Those proposed to benefit from WISEs through gaining work experience, skills, and employment could include people who: have lower educational attainment or lack networks; experience disabilities or long-term illness; or are exiting institutions such as prison or mental health facilities. With experiencing gaps in their capabilities, such people often also experience work exclusion due to stigma. In their enabling role, WISEs could be regarded as âspecialâ workplaces established to address the failure of mainstream organisations to accommodate the inclusion of participants who need particular supports for periods of time or ongoing, including mentoring and flexibility in roles or working conditions (Evans and Wilton, 2019).
Such special workplaces are needed because the conditions of capitalism generally mean that only those who can comply or âcompeteâ effectively will fit within the mainstream system. Capitalist production demands speed and efficiency as necessary qualities of workers, with work defined into specified roles that are not easily modifiable to accommodate diverse capabilities. With the development of capitalism and industrialisation, those who were considered incapable were often consigned to institutions and undertook work within these. Inmates of prisons or asylums were generally required to work, including on farms and in workshops and factories within the institutions, growing and making the things needed by them. Such ârequired labourâ by people experiencing poverty and disability, in institutions and communities, has a mixed history. The requirement to labour is recognised as exploitative, but there is also recognition that involvement in work can support recovery and wellbeing. Required labour in institutions evolved into remedial sheltered workshops, a now-obsolete model where portions of a production process are subcontracted to the workshop to be performed by people with disabilities. In sheltered workshops, the workers are isolated from non-disabled workers and the general population, the type of work is limited, people are paid by how efficient they are rather than the hours they work, and the work is typically repetitive and boring. In some circumstances, sheltered workshops have been replaced by placing workers with a disability into competitive jobs, supported in those jobs by counsellors (Murphy and Rogan, 1995). Some sheltered workshops have evolved into WISEs, with the isolation of the workshop replaced by embedding people with disabilities with non-disabled people in forms of community businesses (Krupa et al., 1999, 2003).
The development of the WISE as a coherent model draws from multiple prior traditions. Perhaps the earliest long-standing example of what today is called a WISE is the Salvation Armyâs repair and sale of donated materials, initially in London and beginning in 1865. This and other similar early examples of the charity shop (United Kingdom)/thrift shop (United States)/opportunity shop (op-shop) (Australia) model provide a prototype internationally for social purpose businesses that provide work opportunities for people with varying capabilities. Work is not subject to the pressures of efficiency, and the workforce is often a mix of people who experience workforce disadvantages alongside those who do not.
Early examples of charity shops such as those of the Salvation Army were initially created with religious motivations. Social service organisations, secular and faith-based, took longer to recognise that there could be a role for social purpose business in the wellbeing and recovery of disadvantaged people. Required labour in institutions and asylums for people with mental illnesses and disabilities became industrial therapy programs, with the view that work was therapeutic (Black, 1970). Once deinstitutionalisation began internationally in the post-Second World War period, community-based industrial therapy-like sheltered workshops became a dominant model. These were often associated with vocational readiness evaluation programs that purported to be able to determine what kinds of work could be performed by people experiencing various forms of disadvantage.
The relative failure of these models (Mandiberg, 2012) led to two approaches to work for those disadvantaged in the mainstream system. The first approach, generally called âsupported employment,â found people jobs with competitive employers, with the workers trained and supported on the job by ...
