Faculty Member, Department of Business Studies, Salalah College of Technology, Salalah, Sultanate of OMAN
Online published on 21 November, 2017.
Social entrepreneurship is an attempt to draw upon business techniques to find solutions to social problems. Unlike traditional corporate businesses, social entrepreneurship ventures focus on maximizing gains in social satisfaction, rather than maximizing profit gains. The Social enterprises provide various economic benefits to the society such as helping to improve the skills of local workforce, reduction of inequalities in access to health and social care services, construction of good quality housing for those in sub-standard conditions, reduction of social exclusion for the displaced/unemployed etc. Thus, this study is mainly aimed to examine the role of Social entrepreneurship in social and economic development of nations by taking some live examples from various countries. It also studies the role of organizations that support social entrepreneurs and identifies challenges faced by the social entrepreneurs. The study revealed that the contributions made by social enterprises worldwide in terms of innovation, provision of employment opportunities and other areas of social and economic development of the nations are very significant. Despite the positive impact that social enterprises have on their communities, they still face significant barriers to their development. Though the constraints for social enterprises in individual countries vary, yet the opportunities are vast for the governments to take active steps to encourage and promote the work of social entrepreneurs.
Social Entrepreneurship, Social Entrepreneur, Economic Development, Local communities, Challenges