The major interest of our research team in community-based social enterprise (CBSE) stems from two main sources. First, it is found that CBSE in Taiwan and Hong Kong have highly expected the practice of public value. In terms of the solution of unemployment in the community, enhancement of the value of community industry, and promotion of health concepts, community-based NPOs frequently use the form of social enterprises after recognizing the problems of community. Second, from the resource dimension, it is considered that communities have lesser hinterlands and many community organizations must rely on linkages with external resources in order to effectively launch related community services. With this trend, we realize that some community non-profit organizations participate in the operation of social enterprises with the main purpose to increase citizen’s participation in organization’s activities (Kerlin, 2009). Somervillea and McElwee (2011) also claim CBSE can be characterized as an enterprise whose social foundation lies in a community of some kind. CBSE can also be classified as social enterprises insofar as they are controlled by their members and have social as well as economic aims.
The term “social capital” initially appeared in community studies, highlighting the central importance of networks of strong, crosscutting personal relationships developed over time that provide the basis for trust, cooperation, and collective action in such communities (Nahapiet and Ghoshal, 1998). As a set of resources rooted in the linkage of relationships, social capital has many different attributes. Putnam, Leonardi, and Nanetti (1993) also emphasized that civic communities are not products of economic abundance. In fact, when looking at it from a cause-effect relationship, civil communities not only bring about political participation, but also promote business partnerships. Thus, they are the reason behind economic development, and not the outcome. The formation of civil communities contributed towards partnership and trust between individuals, thereby resulting in a strong social capital.
Based on the above discussion, in the process of creating new enterprise, CBSEs must have the capacity of attracting the participation of community people; the community residents’ participation will be the important factor to the development of social enterprises. The central proposition of social capital theory is that trusts, networks of relationships constitute valuable resources for the conduct of social affairs that include the creation of CBSE. By identifying this phenomenon of CBSE, the concept of social capital constituted both an aid in accounting for the participation of community people and an aid toward the process and context of CBSE development.
This study conducts in-depth interviews with five community-based social enterprises (CBSEs) in Taiwan and Hong Kong. The respondents of CBSE in Taiwan and Hong Kong sharing their experience for running the social enterprises will be one of the key materials for the analysis. The analysis of this study will include:
1. The current mode and process of CBSE’s operation and civic participation.
2. How do CBSEs identify the needs of community population and how to grasp the opportunities to develop social enterprises?
3. Operational process- how to mobilize the resources in and out of community.
4. The structure of relationships- how to create the trust and norms in the process of developing social enterprise.
Keywords: Community-based social enterprise, Civic participation, Social capital,
Community
References:
Kerlin, J. A. (2009). Social Enterprise: A Global Comparison, Massachusetts: Tufts University Press.
Nahapiet, J. and Ghoshal, S. (1998). “Social capital, intellectual capital, and the organizational advantage”, The Academy of Management Review, 23(2), 242-266.
Putnam, R. D., Leonardi, R. & Nanetti, R. Y. (1993) Making democracy work: civic traditions in modern Italy, Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
Somervillea, P. and McElwee, G. (2011). “Situating community enterprise: A theoretical exploration”, Entrepreneurship & Regional Development, 23(5-6), 317-330.
