Social Entrepreneurship: A Critical Review of the Concept

Journal of World Business 41 (2006) 56–65 www.socscinet.com/bam/jwb Social entrepreneurship: A critical review of the concept
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Ana Marıa Peredo a,*, Murdith McLean b,1 a Faculty of Business, University of Victoria, 3800 Finnerty Drive,
Victoria, BC, Canada V8P 5C2 b Centre for Studies in Religion and Society, University of Victoria, 3800 Finnerty Drive,
Victoria, BC, Canada V8P 5C2

Abstract
This paper undertakes an analytical, critical and synthetic examination of ‘‘social entrepreneurship’’ in its common use, considering both the ‘‘social’’ and the ‘‘entrepreneurship’’ elements in the concept. On both points, there is a range of use with significant differences marked by such things as the prominence of social goals and what are thought of as the salient features of entrepreneurship. The paper concludes with the proposal of a suitably flexible explication of the concept: social entrepreneurship is exercised where some person or persons (1) aim either exclusively or in some prominent way to create social value of some kind, and pursue that goal through some combination of (2) recognizing and exploiting opportunities to create this value, (3) employing innovation, (4) tolerating risk and (5) declining to accept limitations in available resources.
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1. Introduction
The concept of social entrepreneurship has become well established in business. Popular as well as scholarly books and articles are written about the characteristics of organizations thought to engage in social entrepreneurship. It holds a place in the curriculum of leading business schools, and it is the subject of numerous professional and academic meetings. There are associations devoted to studying and implementing social entrepreneurship, and there are numerous web sites on which one may become acquainted with the concept and receive information and/or advice on putting into it practice. There are even special editions of

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