A Crossroads for Social Entrepreneurship: Profits versus Ethics

Abstract

This paper reveals one of the most critical challenges faced by Spanish social entrepreneurship: either prioritizing ethical, social and environmental objectives or profit-seeking. Social entrepreneurship (those initiatives that pursue social and environmental objectives as well as economic ones) has become a very celebrated sector welcomed by political leaders, international corporations, large financial actors and the public opinion alike. The motto that another economy is possible is gaining momentum while an enormous number and variety of both public and private promotional programs are fostering and energizing such promising sector in practically any spot of the world. However, unlike more conventional enterprises, social entrepreneurship face some crucial challenges due to its own hybrid nature and the goal of making philanthropy (i.e., ensuring the social and environmental values) compatible with profit. A mixed-methods oriented research conducted in Catalonia (Spain) reveals some of these contradictions and challenges. As concluding remarks, we provide some clues to reconsider the scope of social entrepreneurship under a different political economy framework.

Principled Leadership and Business Ethics: Innovative Models of Mission-Drift Avoidance in Social Entrepreneurship Hybrid Venture Development and Management

“…17 This research clearly indicates that SEHVs create ethical cultures with principled leadership (PL), and successfully maintain them with business ethics (BE), contributing to "...a more ethical and socially inclusive capitalism." Principled leadership (PL) and business ethics (BE) are new yet complementary concepts to Fuentes and Valenzuela-Garcia (2019).…”

“…SE and SEHVs face many challenges in running their ventures, among many, these include running a hybrid organization, Baporikar (2016), as well as prioritizing ethical, social and environmental objectives, Fuentes and Valenzuela-Garcia (2019). This research introduces new models of managing such tensions and challenges, namely principled leadership (PL) and business ethics (BE).…”

Entrepreneurial intention, expectations of success and self-efficacy in undergraduate students of health sciences

“…For maximum benefit to students, strategies to address networking, inter-disciplinarity, and entrepreneurship must be embedded in the culture that research students experience throughout their research degree programme [ 43 ]. Moreover, since the economic crisis of 2008, the field of social entrepreneurship has experienced a considerable boom [ 44 ]. The study of Chien-Chi et al [ 45 ], who analyzed the relationship between college students' emotional competences, entrepreneurial self-efficacy, and entrepreneurial intention, showed that socio-emotional competence has a positive effect on entrepreneurial intention; moreover, all dimensions of entrepreneurial self-efficacy were significantly and positively correlated with entrepreneurial intention.…”

Empreendedorismo Social e Educação Física: a construção do aplicativo DataProEF para professores de Educação Física

“…Este setor responde a um fenômeno emergente e estrutural, uma manifestação de um realinhamento do capitalismo que está alterando as relações de trabalho, a compreensão do bem público/comum e da maneira pela qual o valor econômico é criado e extraído. (VALENZUELA-GARCIA;FUENTES, 2019, p. 849, tradução nossa) As origens e definições do termo, muitas vezes confundido com empreendedorismo empresarial, tiveram suas bases difundidas fora do Brasil, mas também existem importantes autores e definições que discorrem sobre a temática. Fonte: adaptação de Oliveira (2004, p. 12) Além das definições expostas por OLIVEIRA ( 2004), outros autores compartilham da mesma linha de pensamento a respeito das expressões e objetivos do perfil empreendedor: "O empreender socialmente está relacionado com a criação de um negócio ou projeto que visa colaborar com a resolução de problemas sociais, geração de impacto positivo e obtenção de lucro" (OLIVEIRA; SILVA, 2018, p. 440).…”