The Dilemma of Social Entrepreneurship and Social Enterprise: An Exercise

Abstract

Social equilibriums can be both positively and negatively affected through the actions of social enterprises and social entrepreneurs and have both intended and unintended consequences. Many learners have considered only the light, or positive, viewpoint of social enterprise and social entrepreneurship. There are also potential dark aspects. In our increasingly ‘woke’ world, it is critical that we spur discussion of both light and dark issues. To deepen critical thinking about the implications of giving to ‘do good’, learners should consider potential dark motivations to increase the social enterprise’s competitive advantage through ‘green-washing’ tactics which could create dynamics of dependency, unneeded/unwanted assistance, or the disruption of local economies. The participants in the exercise experience the consequences of their decisions along with debrief opportunities for dark-light language. The authors provide a suggested pre-exercise reading assignment to prepare learners, the exercise and debrief guidance.

Creating Societal Impact Through Learner Empowerment

“…We designed a Q Methodology Q study to explore our research question: "how does an increased awareness of social issues through social movement learning and a macro-social work lens change perception of the importance of a set of social issues among learners?" Q Methodology, a mixed method originally developed by Stephenson (1935), allows consideration of subjective viewpoints of the most important and least important elements, which are analyzed quantitatively via factor analysis (McKeown & Thomas, 1988: Newman & Ramlo, 2010. Q Methodology allows the researcher to analyze subjective perceptions of the most and least important items (McKeown & Thomas, 1988), in this case, social issues.…”

“…However, some believe that all entrepreneurs are social entrepreneurs as entrepreneurs “improve the quality of goods and services available to consumers, and ultimately raise the standard of living” (Schramm, 2010, p. 21). Various scholars (e.g., Dey & Steyaert, 2012; Komlos, 2015; Opatrny-Yazell et al, 2021; Wydick et al, 2016) suggest that entrepreneurs create unintended societal consequences through their actions. Although many definitions of a social entrepreneur exist, most definitions presented are narrow and fail to recognize recent stakeholder-focused business motivation and related actions.…”

Transforming Learners: A Programmatic Approach to Helping Students Find “The Right Work”

“…With this in mind, we invite readers to pay close attention to how each course creates opportunities for students to engage in reflection as they consider their own values and career goals. Table 1 provides a brief overview of how these courses use the While this table provides a snapshot of the way these courses engage transformative learning theory, faculty members at our university have published on each of the courses included in this article (For additional information, see Bright et al, 2016;Caza & Nelson, 2019;McCord et al, 2015;Michealsen & McCord, 2011;Michaelson et al, 2002;Opatrny-Yazell et al, 2021;Wright et al, 2014).…”

“…While this table provides a snapshot of the way these courses engage transformative learning theory, faculty members at our university have published on each of the courses included in this article (For additional information, see Bright et al, 2016; Caza & Nelson, 2019; McCord et al, 2015; Michealsen & McCord, 2011; Michaelson et al, 2002; Opatrny-Yazell et al, 2021; Wright et al, 2014).…”

Videographic profanations: A companion to the videography “Pride: Alternative Entrepreneurship Enjoyed”

“…Critical approaches to similar cases of "doing good" exist within entrepreneurship studies and has spurred a debate about undecidability and nuance (see e.g. Dey, 2007), calling for more attentiveness to the combination of positive and negative effects (Dempsey and Sanders, 2010;Vasi, 2009), for example in the current trend of being "woke" (Opatrny-Yazell et al, 2021). The debate about "woke" is also represented within OMS (Rhodes, 2022) where some applaud corporate engagement in social and political issues and welcome the fact that "being 'woke' has become 'cool'" (Middleton and Turnbull, 2021: 574).…”