Defining Social Entrepreneurship

Last Friday, I received an invitation from the British Council to represent Gifts and Graces at a Round table Discussion on Social Entrepreneurship with Cliff Southcombe, a social entrepreneur and head of Social Enterprise Europe Ltd. Other organizations present were PBSP, Kids Foundation, Soup of the Day, Jollibee, Starbucks, SAGE Philippines, Messy Bessy Cleaners, Green Renewable Power Producers, Rags to Riches, and SEDPI. The RTD was facilitated by Arnel Casanova. One of the objectives of the RTD was for the British Council to have an idea of social entrepreneurship in the Philippines in order to determine how they can come in and help build social entrepreneurship in the Philippines and in the region. Cliff Southcombe shared that the UK experience has been more on cooperatives as social enterprises. In the Philippines, aside from cooperatives, other innovative social enterprises have sprung up as evidenced by the composition of the RTD participants. For a country with a lot of NGOs established to fill the gaps of government service, social entrepreneurship is a natural step. Much of the discussion however centered around the definition of social entrepreneurship. Being a "new" field the definition has not been well established. One view of social entrepreneurship is focused on the social entrepreneur who finds a problem and sets out to solve it with an innovative solution. My own definition of social entrepreneurship is more limited and was greatly influenced by J. Gregory Dees' Enterprising Non-Profits. For me a social enterprise is an enterprise with a social mission - the mission is the raison d' etre. Most social enterprises are non-profit organizations with specific advocacies such as education, health, access to water, access to electricity, and in Gifts and Graces' case providing livelihood support. One of the main differences between social enterprises and regular enterprises is that social enterprises invest in different interventions that regular enterprises don't regularly invest in. For example community organizing, capability building seminars, values formation talks. For social enterprises this is an integral part of their mission. One of the main challenges of this model is finding the funding for these interventions which go beyond operations. This is the challenge of financial sustainability, another hot topic at the RTD. Cliff defined sustainability as sustainability of the the of the social enterprises' impact. For me sustainability of impact and financial sustainability are not mutually exclusive though financial sustainability may be a medium term goal. To this I add looking at organizational sustainability which means that the enterprise has in place policies, structures, and systems that will ensure its survival and sustainability beyond the social entrepreneur that founded it.  In my view, in order to help grow and foster social entrepreneurship in the Philippines there must be an enabling environment which requires the involvement of government, civil society, and corporations. An enabling environment means just the right amount of regulation from the government, support in terms of tax breaks or exemptions, availability of funding for capability building interventions, fostering dialogue and cooperation, measuring impact, recording results for duplication and scalability. To this end, the British Council's and Starbucks support are very much welcome.  Thanks again to Felix Golez and Nanette Mercado for setting up the Round table Discussion.  Thanks for Cliff Southcombe for sharing his insights and experiences. I hope our paths will cross again as we all work together to promote social entrepreneurship in the Philippines. Cheers!