Social businesses seek financial, social and even environmental results. Academic knowledge on how such organizations operate, however, has emerged more recently. This article sought to investigate qualitatively the main tensions and dilemmas occurring throughout the history of Rede Asta, a pioneer social business in direct catalog sales of artisanal products in Brazil. Results indicate the Rede Asta managers have experienced tensions and dilemmas in three of the four categories identified by Smith, Gonin, and Besharov (2013): social and financial performance, organizational aspects and learning. One of the dilemmas involves organizational aspects and learning, since Asta achieves feasibility with two organizations: a nonprofit association and a for-profit corporation. On perceptions of belonging, stakeholders declared they felt they were a part of the organization's social and environmental goals; some even as activists.
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The purpose of this article is to identify, organize and analyze the international scientific production on social enterprises (SE). It presents the results of a bibliometric study combined with a systematic literature analysis. We analyzed 204 academic articles on the subject, from four different sources: (i) articles published in journals with high impact factors; (ii) most cited articles as per Google Scholar; (iii) articles addressing topics related to SE; and (iv) articles from the Social Enterprise Journal, specialized in the subject. Results point to remarkable recent growth in the field of SE, both theoretically and empirically. In addition, this study presents the main pieces of work, countries, institutions, research questions, methodology and results found in the SE literature. Studies have concentrated around six main categories: (1) understanding SE, through different approaches, concepts and models; (2) governance and relationships with stakeholders; (3) attempts to increase practical references and samples within the field; (4) organizational learning, structure and critical factors for success and failure of SE; (5) metrics, indicators and social impact generated by SE; and (6) legislation of different countries and how it relates to SE.
A ComBio Energia – certificada como Empresa B – vende serviços de geração de vapor para indústrias. Para tanto, usa como combustível resíduos de biomassa, gerando economia e diminuindo impacto ambiental. Sua operação no Pará contempla expandir o uso de caroço de açaí como fonte de biomassa, com duas possibilidades de fornecedores: indústrias de médio porte ou batedores de açaí – pequenos comerciantes que fazem descarte incorreto desse resíduo. Para decidir, a ComBio precisa equilibrar desafios logísticos, sociais, ambientais e econômicos.
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