Comparing social entrepreneurship across nations: An exploratory study of institutional effects

Abstract

Institutional and cultural contexts shape social entrepreneurship differently. This paper explores the roles of culture, socioeconomic development, and governance institutions on the prevalence of social entrepreneurship. The empirical results are based on Global Entrepreneurship Monitor data, including 49 countries across the globe. The results indicate that the negative effect of the level of development holds for entrepreneurial activity in general, but there is no such effect on social entrepreneurship. Of Hofstede's (1980) cultural dimensions, power distance is negatively related to all types of entrepreneurship, and Inglehart's (1997) secular-rational values are positively related to established entrepreneurship. Self-expressive values relate positively with established social entrepreneurship. The results imply that the existence of social problems and/or market failures does not result in higher levels of social entrepreneurship unless the formal institutions are sufficiently developed.

The role of institutional and stakeholder networks in shaping social enterprise ecosystems in Europe

“…There is also a significant strand of research that argues that informal institutions such as culture, heritage, and normative values are significant factors in shaping economic behaviour (Baumol, 1990;North, 1990;Williamson, 2000;Puumalainen et al, 2015); furthermore, these informal institutions are shaped by social networks that mediate trust, reputation, collaboration, power dynamics, commitment and shared norms (Zafeiropoulou and Koufopoulos, 2013;Qureshi et al, 2016;Doherty et al, 2009). While social networks within social enterprise ecosystems appear critical as both mediators of stakeholder behaviour and interpretation of logics and discourses (Luhmann, 1989;Van Assche et al, 2014;Hazenberg et al, 2016), the distribution (and potential concentration) of power between stakeholders, as well as stakeholder diversity within the ecosystem, is also an important factor in shaping its development.…”

“…This diversity will also allow for increased heterogeneity in the social enterprise 'gene pool' (During et al, 2016) and increase communication in order to facilitate positive change, learning and the continual reassessment of logics (Luhmann, 1988). It is such pluralistic networks that allow social enterprise ecosystems to understand their environment and see the 'truth' (Dey and Steyaert, 2012), resist dominant discourses (Jones et al, 2015), and think and behave independently and innovatively (Dey and Steyaert, 2014) by creating areas of low power distance (Puumalainen et al, 2015) and increasing trust and collaboration (Zafeiropoulou and Koufopoulos, 2013;Qureshi et al, 2016).…”

Social Enterprise: A Study of Its Prevalence, Role and Characteristics in Swedish‐Speaking Regions of Finland

“…The existence of SE varies widely from place to place (Puumalainen et al ). Increasing literature has emerged to examine SE development in varying national or regional contexts.…”

“…To the author’s knowledge, the SEs in the Swedish‐speaking regions have not been studied in earlier research. The study contributes to examining SE development in varying regional and community contexts; for example, regional differences in SE support (Kerlin ; Munoz ; Pinch & Sunley ); the effects of culture (Puumalainen et al ); and importance of local networks (Roy et al ). The regional innovation and business strategies’ development (Heckl et al ; Rinkinen et al ) could also benefit from the results of this study.…”

Work Ethics in Bugis; Connecting Culture and Entrepreneurial Behavior

“…Moreover, culture also plays important roles in explaining human behavior and this also includes entrepreneurial behavior. A number of scholars across various fields postulated that culture positively contributed to the emergence of entrepreneurship and entrepreneurial behavior [4]- [6].…”